Adams & Heald's Kent Adams
Lewis Brisbois sets up shop in Texas
October 28, 2009
Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith plans to open offices in Houston and Beaumont, Texas, through the acquisition of Adams & Heald, an insurance defense law firm with 11 attorneys.
The two additional offices, scheduled to open on Nov. 1, are the latest locales for the Los Angeles-based Lewis Brisbois, which has been expanding in recent years. In January, the firm opened an Atlanta office with eight attorneys from four different firms. Soon afterward, it opened a small office in Charleston, W.Va. In 2007, Lewis Brisbois opened offices in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Lafayette, La.
Robert Lewis, founding partner of Lewis Brisbois, said that the firm's leaders have been interested in the Texas market for a long time.
"We just know there's a lot of business in Texas," he said. "It was a nice fit."
Founded in 1985, Adams & Heald focuses on insurance and corporate defense, including personal injury, products liability, toxic torts, admiralty and medical malpractice.
Kent M. Adams, the firm's chairman, said that he had planned to join a larger firm for the past two years as practice areas outside insurance defense, such as employment law, intellectual property and commercial litigation, have grown.
"We felt like with that part of our business growing, it would be a great benefit to our national clients, many of which are publicly traded, to have the backing of a firm with a national footprint," said Adams, who will become managing partner of the Texas offices at Lewis Brisbois.
The firms share clients, including American International Group Inc. and The Allstate Corp. Lewis said that he plans to expand the Texas offices to include a full slate of practice areas, including employment, intellectual property and environmental litigation, as well as general business transactions.
In addition to Adams, the new partners at Lewis Brisbois are Sarah Davis, who was managing shareholder at the Houston firm, and Russell Heald, Gerald Riedmueller, Ross Jones and David Oubre, who were shareholders. John Lynd, who was an associate, joins as a partner. Joining as associates are Leena Bhasin, Kristie Johnson, Monica Wilkins and Justin Burrow, who were associates at Adams & Heald.
The acquisition leaves Lewis Brisbois with more than 700 lawyers in 19 offices in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Nevada, New York, Texas and West Virginia.
Lewis Brisbois, which has six offices in California, began expanding nationally seven years ago by opening an office in New York. Lewis said that he is talking to firms about potential additional expansion in Louisiana and Atlanta.
Amanda Bronstad can be reached at abronstad@alm.com.
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