NEWS
Dallas partner, Kirk Pittard, presented a CLE at the Capital Area Trial Lawyers Association’s monthly membership lunch on January 14, 2024. The topic was “Legal Issues Related to Non-Economic Damages: Gregory v. Chohan”. Thank you for representing DP&S in Austin this week, Kirk.
DP&S is proud to announce that Santa Fe attorney Rosalind Bienvenu has been designated to serve as chairperson of the Uniform Jury Instructions Civil Committee by the New Mexico Supreme Court. Roz has extensive experience assisting DP&S’s trial lawyer clients with jury instructions and has served on the Committee since January 2023. Congratulations, Roz!
Durham, Pittard & Spalding is proud to have been recognized in the fifteenth edition of Best Law Firms in appellate practice and personal injury litigation for our offices in Dallas, Houston and Santa Fe, respectively. Best Law Firms rankings celebrate firms that have consistently demonstrated excellence in legal expertise and industry knowledge. You can view our firm’s complete rankings here.
Congratulations to Dallas attorney, Shelby White, who presented at the Fort Worth Paralegals Association’s holiday luncheon on November 21, 2024. The topic was “The Appellate Process: What Your Attorney Wants You to Know for Litigation and Appeals”. Thanks for representing DP&S, Shelby.
DP&S would like to congratulate Aditi Deal, whose 2020 law review article, “When Less Is More: A New Formula for Avoiding Equally Divided Decisions in the Supreme Court,” was cited by South Texas College of Law’s Constitutional Law professor, Josh Blackman, in his article “Making Sense of the 7-1-1-8 Split in Environment Texas Citizen Lobby v. ExxonMobile” in the online publication Reason Magazine. You can read Professor Blackman’s article here and you can access Aditi’s law review article here.
On November 21, 2024, DP&S Partner, Lara Hollingsworth spoke to the lawyers attending the State Bar of Texas CLE, “Prosecuting and Defending Truck and Auto Collision Cases.” Lara discussed the benefits to and advantages of making appellate counsel part of the trial preparation team. Thanks for representing DP&S, Lara.
On November 21, 2024, DP&S attorney Thad D. Spalding was interviewed by Fox News regarding a recent $98.6M verdict in the Botham Jean v. Amber Guyger civil rights case. Mr. Spalding’s interview focused on why the City of Dallas was not a defendant in the case and the difficulty in holding municipalities liable when constitutional violations are committed by their officers. You can listen to the interview here: Fox 4 News Dallas Interview.
A $21.6M Civil Rights verdict that DP&S attorneys Thad Spalding and Shelby White assisted in winning for client Odell Edwards in 2023 was recently recognized as the Number 1 Verdict in Texas in the category of Excessive Force, Police Brutality, Police Misconduct, and Law Enforcement Misconduct. This case also placed number 21 in the Top 50 Jury Verdicts and 37 in Top 50 Wrongful Death Verdicts in Texas overall for that year. Congratulations to all the hardworking attorneys involved in this case! You can see the Top Verdicts list here and can read more about the details of the case here.
Congratulations to Santa Fe attorneys Caren Friedman and Philip Kovnat who successfully convinced the New Mexico Court of Appeals to affirm the judgment in its entirety in this consolidation of two domestic relations appeals in which DP&S represented the Father as Appellee. The Appellant had argued that the district court abused its discretion in refusing to modify child support and concluding that Father could claim Child on his tax returns. DP&S argued that the appeals were untimely, depriving the Court of Appeals of jurisdiction. In the alternative, DP&S argued that the district court did not err. The Court of Appeals agreed with DP&S that one of the appeals was untimely. The Court also agreed that the district court correctly decided the issues in the remaining appeal. You can read the memorandum opinion in Burke v. McCargar, A-1-CA-40947 (N.M. App. October 10, 2024), here.
Congratulations to Dallas partner, Thad Spalding, along with DP&S summer intern and second-year law student at the University of Oklahoma, Claire Moulton, on getting their co-written article published in this month’s Headnotes, a publication put out by the Dallas Bar Association. The article, titled “DIY Clerk’s Records – How Could this Possibly Work?” explores the new rule allowing appellants to file their own clerk’s records. Headnotes publishes articles on timely legal issues, membership news, and upcoming Continuing Legal Education programs. You can read the October edition of Headnotes, including Claire and Thad’s article featured on page 8, here.