Name Organization Speaking At
Christina Rogers
Christy Rogers is a Member at Nexsen Pruet in Columbia, South Carolina where she focuses her practice on employment litigation matters and employment and labor counsel and advice.
Prior to joining Nexsen Pruet, Christy served as Senior Corporate Counsel for Michelin North America, Inc. where she provided counsel and advice on employment, benefits, and data privacy-related matters for all Michelin operations in the United States.
Christy received her undergraduate degree from
Clemson University, cum laude , and
received her J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Law, cum laude . During law school, Christy
was a member of the Mock Trial Bar and was selected as a member of the national
competition team. As a result of her advocacy skills, she was awarded the Sherod H. Eadon Scholarship and also served as Chief Justice of the Mock Trial Bar. At graduation, Christy was the recipient of the prestigious Compleat Lawyer Award.
Upon graduation from law school, Christy served as a law clerk to the Honorable Joseph F. Anderson, Jr., Senior U.S. District Judge for the District of South Carolina.
Before attending law school, Christy was a litigation
paralegal for eight years. In that capacity she worked on a variety of cases in both state and federal court, assisting with many depositions, hearings, mediations, and trials.
Christy is the former co-chair of the SC Bar
YLD iCivis Committee and serves on the In-House Counsel Committee for the SC
Bar. She is a member of the John Belton O’Neall Inn of Court, an invitation-only
organization that fosters excellence in professionalism, ethics, civility, and
legal skills. In 2019 Christy was the recipient of Clemson University
Psychology Department’s inaugural Distinguished Alumni Early Career Award. She was has been recognized as a Legal Elite of
South Carolina in Employment Law was listed as a Super Lawyers Rising Star for
Employment and Labor in 2021 and 2022.
Maynard Nexsen, PC
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Joseph Clark
2020
Joseph D. Clark
Haynesworth Sinkler Boyd, P.A.
Columbia SC
Joe Clark is a Shareholder in the Columbia office of Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd, P.A. and serves as the Columbia representative on the firm's three-member Management Committee. His practice areas include Corporate & Business, Corporate Organization & Governance, Mergers & Acquisitions, Corporate Finance & Securities and Commercial Transactions.
Mr. Clark received his B.A. in 1983 from the University of South Carolina, his M.B.A. in 1989 from the University of South Carolina and his J.D. (cum laude) in 1995 from the University of South Carolina School of Law.
Prior to joining Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd, Mr. Clark worked for First Union National Bank (1989-1992) and First National Bank of South Carolina and South Carolina National Bank (1983-1989).
Mr. Clark is a member of the South Carolina Bar (Corporations, Banking and Securities Law Section, Past Chairperson); American Bar Association (Business Law Section); Speaker, Business and Corporate Law, South Carolina Bar Bridge the Gap Program; Richland County Public Library, Friends of the Library Board Member; and is an Adjunct Professor, University of South Carolina School of Law.
He is the Co-author of the South Carolina Limited Liability Companies and Limited Liability
Partnerships (4th ed. 2012) and South Carolina Corporate Practice Manual (2nd ed. 2005).
Mr. Clark has been recognized in The Best Lawyers in America ® - Corporate Law; Securities / Capital Markets Law.
Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd, PA
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Lawrence Girard
Foster Girard leads Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd’s Corporate Practice Group and concentrates his practice on corporate finance and commercial transactions.
He advises on a number of financing documents and commercial
contracts involving goods (including under Article Two of the Uniform
Commercial Code), services and commercial real estate. Foster works to find
practical legal solutions to achieve his clients’ business objectives and
provides guidance on general corporate matters, including choice of entity,
entity formation and governance documents.
Foster also represents buyers, sellers and developers in real estate matters and serves as lender’s counsel. From start to finish, he has the experience developers need to efficiently design and close a project, including acquiring land, obtaining local permitting, and assisting with financing and construction loans. Foster has been involved with numerous retail, multi-family housing and mixed-use projects.
Experience
•
Represented a buyer in the purchase of a $75,000,000 apartment
complex
Foster is a licensed title insurance agent and writes title
insurance for a number of national title insurance companies.
Education
University
of South Carolina, J.D., 2009
The
Citadel, B.S., 2006
Admissions
Honors and Awards
The
Best Lawyers in America© Corporate Law (2021-2025)South
Carolina Super Lawyers ® "Rising Stars" Business/Corporate
(2019) and Business Litigation (2018)Columbia
Business Monthly's "Legal Elite of the Midlands"
Commercial Real Estate Law (2018-2020)Columbia
Business Monthly's "Best & Brightest 35 and Under"
2017Order
of the Coif
Order
of the Wig and Robe
Recipient
of The Citadel's Mark W. Clark Honor Committee Award
Professional and Civic Activities
Junior
Achievement of Greater South Carolina, Board of Directors (2018-2025),
Midlands District Board Vice Chair (2020-2025)
? South Carolina Bar,
Corporate, Banking & Securities Law Section Chair (2022-Present),
Young Lawyers Division Community Law Week Co-Chair (2010-2013) and Fifth
Circuit Representative (2013-2016)Leadership
Columbia, Class of 2014
Presentations and Publications
"Contract
Review and Drafting," SC Bar Transactional/Corporate Law Essentials
Program (2018-2020)
“Coronavirus
Supply Disruption Checklist ,” HSB Blog, March 17, 2020
"Who Runs this Place Anyway? Considering Corporate Governance Documents," HSB 2015 Corporate Law for Accountants Seminar Series
Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd, PA
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Melissa Cassell
Melissa
focuses her practice on corporate, employment law and commercial real estate.
She is licensed in North Carolina and South Carolina, allowing her to better
serve clients whose business and legal matters cross state lines.
She
represents clients in acquiring real estate, assets, entities and key
employees, from start up to growth to winding up. With clients in a variety of
industries, she has drafted and negotiated a myriad of agreements, including
purchase and leasing agreements, employment and severance agreements, service
agreements, buy and sell agreements, and corporate governance agreements.
In the
healthcare realm, Melissa has represented practitioners including dentists,
physicians and physical therapists. She has assisted both for profit and
nonprofit providers reaching and executing acquisition, employment and
partnership agreements, all while navigating the various local and national
requirements on healthcare providers.
In 2009, Melissa earned her B.S. degree, cum laude , in Business Administration from the University of South Carolina where she was a member of Alpha Delta Pi sorority. In 2013, she earned her Juris Doctor degree from the University of South Carolina, where she was an editing member of the Real Property, Trust and Estate Law Journal, a member of the Pro Bono board and research assistant for Alan S. Medlin.
Melissa
has served as an adjunct professor at the University of South Carolina School
of Law, teaching a Small Business Organization Law Capstone class in which
third-year students navigate legal matters that face a hypothetical company
during the formation and capitalization stages. As part of her practice, she
regularly assists small business owners with many of those same issues,
including formation, capitalization, and reorganization of their companies.
Melissa lives in Fort Mill with her husband, Andrew and son, Ben.
Morton & Gettys, LLC
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Robert Bethea
Robert P. Bethea, Jr.
Adams & Reese, LLP
Columbia SC
Rob Bethea joined Adams and Reese in 2013 as a Partner following the firm's expansion into South Carolina by merger with Ellis, Lawhorne & Sims, P.A. Rob served as the Partner in Charge of the Adams and Reese Columbia office from 2013 to 2017 and now chairs the Middle Market Mergers and Acquisitions Team for the firm.
Rob advises clients on business transactions in the southeastern United States and beyond. He provides counsel on startups, mergers, stock and asset acquisitions, recapitalizations, taxation, business contracts and agreements, succession planning, franchising, securities and finance. Rob advises clients in a range of industries including health care, professional services, manufacturing and distribution, marine products, and industrial services. With advanced training in tax law, he has extensive experience advising clients on the often-complex tax consequences of business decisions and options, and he brings extra value to clients when negotiating transactions. Rob also plans and structures transactions in close coordination with clients' accountants, bankers, and other advisors.
He has represented clients in contractual and business disputes - including management and shareholder disagreements, shareholder oppression and fiduciary duty claims, and successor liability and indemnity claims - as well as in government and regulatory investigations and compliance matters. Rob also provides counsel on the protection of trade secrets and intellectual property, including non-compete, confidentiality, and non-solicitation agreements.
Rob earned his LL.M. in Taxation from New York University School of Law in 1997; received his J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Law in 1996; and received his B.A. from Wofford College in 1993.
Adams and Reese LLP
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Thomas Brumgardt
Tom Brumgardt practices in the areas of corporate
law, mergers and acquisitions, and insurance regulation.
Experience
·
Experience with mergers and
acquisitions, corporate formation and governance issues, commercial contract
issues and other corporate transactions
·
Experience with insurance
regulatory issues (including captive insurance and other alternative risk transfer mechanisms)
Recognitions
Professional
Activities
·
Corporate, Banking, and
Securities Section, South Carolina Bar (former chairman)
·
Former delegate, S.C. Bar’s
House of Delegates
·
American Bar Association
·
South Carolina Bar Association
·
D.C. Bar
·
Richland County Bar
Association
Leadership
·
President and Chairman, South
Carolina Captive Insurance Association (2012)
·
Former Secretary/Treasurer and
Chairman of Governmental Affairs Committee, South Carolina Captive Insurance
Association
·
Former Director and
Secretary/Treasurer of CIPAC, a political action committee of the South Carolina Captive Insurance
Association
·
Former Chairman and Section
Delegate to House of Delegates, Corporate, Banking and Securities Law Section
of the South Carolina Bar
·
Graduate of Leadership
Columbia (2004) Education
Education
·
University of South Carolina
School of Law, JD (2001)
·
University of South Carolina,
Honors College, BS, Finance (1998)
Admissions
·
South Carolina
·
District of Columbia
Practice Areas
·
Captive Insurance
·
Corporate Governance
·
General Counsel Services
·
Mergers & Acquisitions
Articles
& Speeches
·
Annual Conference 2016,
Insurance Managers Association of Cayman - Speaker (December 2016)
·
S.C. Captive Insurance
Association Conference - Speaker (November 16, 2016)
·
Montana Captive Insurance
Association Tenth Annual Conference - Speaker (July 19-21, 2016)
Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough, LLP
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William Higgins
Bill has been practicing law in Columbia since 1985. His
primary practice areas are commercial real estate, tax-deferred exchanges of
real estate, entity formation and other business transactions, and legal ethics
and lawyer misconduct. Bill also serves as general counsel to GLV. Bill teaches
the Real Estate Transactions I course at the University of South Carolina
School of Law.
Bill is an active member of the South Carolina Bar, having
served as chair of the Real Estate Practice Section Council, the Professional
Responsibility Committee, and the Ethics 2000 subcommittee. He currently serves
on the South Carolina Bar’s Ethics Advisory Opinion Committee and the
Professional Responsibility Committee, as well as serving as a faculty member
for the Legal Ethics and Practice Program: Ethics School co-sponsored by the
South Carolina Bar’s Professional Responsibility Committee and the South
Carolina Supreme Court’s Office of Disciplinary Counsel.
Bill received an LL.M. in Taxation from New York University
School of Law in 1998; a J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of
Law in 1984, where he was a member of the Law Review and the Order of Wig and
Robe; and a B.S., summa cum laude, from Presbyterian College in 1982.
Bar Admissions
South Carolina Bar
Professional/Civic Affiliations and Honors
Peer Review Rated – AV (Preeminent) in Martindale Hubbell
Publications
Are You Sure You’re Ready to Disburse?, SC Lawyer
Magazine , 2009
Education
Presbyterian College, B.S., summa cum laude
University of South Carolina Law School, J.D.
Member,
Law Review
Member,
Order of Wig and Robe
New York University School of Law, LL.M.
Graybill, Lansche & Vinzani, LLC
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William Umbach
William M. Umbach advises businesses on a full range of legal matters, including commercial transactions, mergers and acquisitions, entity formation, governance, restructuring, business planning, corporate divisions, recapitalizations, and divestitures. With advanced training in taxation, he is able to help his clients organize, manage and reorganize their businesses to adapt to the changing business climate and to structure transactions in a tax-advantageous manner. Will also advises on lending transactions, including setting up new entities and representing borrowers when financing and refinancing credit facilities.
Will has advised clients in a variety of industries, including textiles, marine and other types of manufacturing, automobile and boat dealerships, and health care entities of various types, including large physician medical practices and hospital trust services companies. His clients range in size from individuals navigating local markets to Fortune 100 companies with more than $1 billion in annual revenue, and he currently serves as outside general counsel for a leading manufacturer with locations in four U.S. states, China and India, as well as other companies in the manufacturing, fitness amenities, and appraisal services industries.
EXPERIENCE
Structured and negotiated multimillion-dollar sales and acquisitions of stock and assets of ongoing businesses, including representing certain members of a business' management team in a $20+ million dollar acquisition of the equity of the managed business. Structured and negotiated mergers, split-ups, split-offs, and spin-offs that utilized various non-recognition provisions of the Internal Revenue Code, including representing a group of sellers in connection with a multi-step reorganization and sale of a portion of the equity of their existing business at a valuation in excess of $55 million. Represented borrowers in the negotiation and closing of various secured credit facilities, including a $125 million credit facility financed by private equity and supported by tax incentives and $50 million credit facility to finance a dividend recapitalization of the borrower. Represented executive to determine the excise tax consequences of severance payments made upon a change in control of employer and negotiated settlement of claims for severance payments based in part on the same.
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS
Will is an active member of the Taxation sections for both the American Bar Association and South Carolina Bar and currently serves as a Council Member of the South Carolina Bar, Tax Law Section.
COMMUNITY SERVICE
Will is active in the community, performing pro bono work for a charitable entity that provides affordable housing for low-income families and another that runs a group residence for children.
Adams and Reese LLP
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