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Is He General Counsel or Isn't He?
Corporate Counsel exclusive: Merial Limited and one of its in-house attorneys disagree about what his title is
Corporate Counsel
July 05, 2007
Image: Photodisc Blue
Did the top lawyer at Merial Limited mislead Pennsylvania court officialsabout his resume? Horace "Hod" Nalle appears to have been general counsel ofthe animal pharmaceutical company for a decade, according to severalsources. But in a recent application to renew his Pennsylvania lawlicense -- which he let lapse in 2002 -- Nalle made no mention of being generalcounsel. The omission didn't seem to bother disciplinary officials, who inJune recommended his reinstatement.
Nalle declined to comment for this article, and Merial's corporatecommunications director did not respond to requests for comment.
A joint venture of Merck & Co. Inc. and Sanofi-Aventis, Merial is based inDuluth, Ga. The privately held company, which had sales of $2.2 billionlast year, produces drugs and vaccines for livestock, pets, and wildlife.Merial mentions only one officer -- its executive chairman -- on the U.S. versionof its corporate Web site. But biographies for all members of the company's"leadership team," including Nalle, are posted on three country-specific Websites that Merial maintains for Singapore, the Philippines and New Zealand. Accordingto Nalle's bio on these sites, he joined Merck in 1991, helped create Merialsix years later, and has been its general counsel "ever since."
For several years, Nalle was also listed as Merial's GC in a profile of thecompany created by Hoover's Inc., the corporate information service. Hisname disappeared from the profile this past February, however.
That same month, Nalle filed an application with the discplinary board ofthe Pennsylvania Supreme Court to have his law license reinstated. Accordingto the application, he was licensed in Pennsylvania until 2000, when hetransferred to Merial's London office. Nalle stated that he voluntarilysuspended his Pennsylvania license because he wasn't able to fulfill thestate's CLE requirements. When he returned to the United States two yearslater to work at Merial's offices in Georgia, he didn't reactivate hisPennsylvania license. Nalle also didn't apply for admission in Georgia,which allows attorneys to practice in the state if they're licensedelsewhere.
But while Nalle was up-front about his licensing status in his reinstatementapplication, he seems to have been less forthcoming about his job titles.Nalle wrote that since he moved back to America in 2002, he has beenpresident and company secretary of Hubbard LLC, a poultry genetics companyand Merial subsidiary. Nowhere in his application did Nalle mention the GCtitle credited to him on the Merial Web sites, although he did state that heintended to serve as the company's general counsel once reinstated.
Nalle's description of his job title is also at odds with one of the lettersof recommendation that he submitted with his application. Kyle Lathrop, aformer corporate counsel at Merial, wrote, "As general counsel of a globallife sciences company, [Nalle] handles a wide variety of challenging legalissues that necessitate continued learning in the field." Lathrop added, "Ina variety of transactional, litigation, regulatory, and other legal matters,[Nalle] has shown a high degree of skill in problem-solving and providinglegal advice." Lathrop is now an assistant GC at Stiefel Research InstituteInc., a North Carolina-based developer of skin care products.
Another letter of recommendation included with Nalle's reinstatementapplication also praises his legal counsel. Megan Kelly wrote, "[Nalle] isexceedingly competent, offering to his clients practical advice that isbased upon insightful legal analysis combined with a consideration of thebusiness implications." Kelly, who worked with Nalle at Merial for fouryears, is now at Ashe, Rafuse & Hill in Atlanta. Neither she nor Lathropresponded to a request for comment.
When Corporate Counsel first contacted Alan Davis, the Pennsylvania courtofficial who handled Nalle's application, he was surprised to hear thatMerial listed Nalle as its GC. "It certainly requires an explanation," Davissaid.
That explanation came when Nalle testified by phone at a disciplinaryhearing on June 18. Denis Gray, who acted as the sole hearing committeemember -- in effect, the judge on Nalle's application -- says that Nalle"testified that he worked at Merial and worked in the GC's office, not thathe was GC." According to Gray, a partner at Palmer & Gray in Malvern,Pennsylvania, Nalle said that he had consulted an Atlanta law firm, whichgave him an informal verbal opinion that he was not practicing law without alicense.
Gray says that he concluded the hearing by recommending that thePennsylvania Supreme Court reinstate Nalle, a decision that bar officialDavis did not object to. Davis declined to comment after the hearing. Finalaction on Nalle's reinstatement is expected later this year.
