News

The 2017 “Texas Super Lawyers” List Features Bradley B. Clark

The Bradley B. Clark Law Group, P.C. is proud to announce that Bradley B. Clark has been named to the 2017 “Texas Super Lawyers” list published by Super Lawyers – a Thompson Reuters publication rating service. According to Super Lawyers, inclusion is based on a highly selective process comprised of detailed and comprehensive peer nominations, evaluations and research – yielding only those who have both a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. Ultimately, no more than 5 percent of eligible lawyers in the state are named to the “Texas Super Lawyers” list.

The 2016 “Texas Super Lawyers” List Features Bradley B. Clark

The Bradley B. Clark Law Group, P.C. is proud to announce that Bradley B. Clark has been named to the 2016 “Texas Super Lawyers” list published by Super Lawyers – a Thompson Reuters publication rating service. According to Super Lawyers, inclusion is based on a highly selective process comprised of detailed and comprehensive peer nominations, evaluations and research – yielding only those who have both a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. Ultimately, no more than 5 percent of eligible lawyers in the state are named to the “Texas Super Lawyers” list.

Bradley B. Clark Featured in the 2015 Super Lawyers Business Edition

We are pleased to announce that for the second year in a row Bradley B. Clark is featured in the 2015 Super Lawyers Business Edition.

Super Lawyers Business Edition is an annual resource that serves as the go-to guide for general counsel and executives in charge of making critical law-firm hiring decisions. This publication features the top law firms of all sizes throughout the United States who specialize in business, construction, real estate, employment, intellectual property, and business litigation.

Super Lawyers, part of Thomson Reuters, is a research-driven, peer influenced rating service of outstanding lawyers who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement.

About Bradley B. Clark: Mr. Clark, who focuses on commercial real estate and business litigation, is a 2014 and 2015 Super Lawyer, a 2012, 2013, and 2014 Texas Super Lawyer–Texas Rising Star, a fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation (comprised of the top 1/3 of 1% of all Texas attorneys), and a member of the College of the State Bar of Texas. Additionally, Mr. Clark is rated AV-Preeminent by Martindale-Hubbell, the highest rating that can be achieved.

The 2015 “Texas Super Lawyers” List Features Bradley B. Clark

The Bradley B. Clark Law Group, P.C. is proud to announce that Bradley B. Clark has been named to the 2014 “Texas Super Lawyers” list published by Super Lawyers – a Thompson Reuters publication rating service. According to Super Lawyers, inclusion is based on a highly selective process comprised of detailed and comprehensive peer nominations, evaluations and research – yielding only those who have both a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. Ultimately, no more than 5 percent of eligible lawyers in the state are named to the “Texas Super Lawyers” list.

Bradley B. Clark has Achieved the AV Preeminent® Rating from Martindale-Hubbell®.

Austin - Bradley B. Clark has earned the AV Preeminent® rating from Martindale-Hubbell® which is the highest possible rating for both ethical standards and legal ability.

For more than 130 years, lawyers have relied on the Martindale-Hubbell AV Preeminent® rating while searching for their own expert attorneys. Now anyone can make use of this trusted rating by looking up a lawyer's rating on Lawyers.com or martindale.com. The Martindale-Hubbell® AV Preeminent® rating is the highest possible rating for an attorney for both ethical standards and legal ability. This rating represents the pinnacle of professional excellence. It is achieved only after an attorney has been reviewed and recommended by their peers - members of the bar and the judiciary. Congratulations go to Bradley B. Clark who has achieved the AV Preeminent® Rating from Martindale-Hubbell®.

Bradley B. Clark commented on the recognition: "The Martindale-Hubbell AV Preeminent Rating is a credential highly valued and sought after in the legal industry. I am thankful to my fellow attorneys who nominated me for this distinction, and proud to have earned this, the highest possible Martindale-Hubbell rating."

The 2014 “Texas Super Lawyers” List Features Bradley B. Clark

The Bradley B. Clark Law Group, P.C. is proud to announce that in addition to being named to the 2014 Texas Rising Stars List, Bradley B. Clark has been named to the 2014 “Texas Super Lawyers” list published by Super Lawyers – a Thompson Reuters publication rating service.

According to Super Lawyers, inclusion is based on a highly selective process comprised of detailed and comprehensive peer nominations, evaluations and research – yielding only those who have both a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. Ultimately, no more than 5 percent of eligible lawyers in the state are named to the “Texas Super Lawyers” list.

The College of the State Bar of Texas Welcomes Bradley B. Clark

AUSTIN – The College of the State Bar of Texas congratulates Bradley B. Clark on his membership in the College.

Bradley B. Clark is an accomplished litigator and is recognized as both a Texas Super Lawyer and a Texas Rising Star in business litigation by Texas Monthly and Super Lawyer Magazines – an extremely rare combination. Mr. Clark represents public and private companies, their owners, investors, and contractors in complex business litigation.

The College of the State Bar of Texas, the only organization in the United States formed for this purpose, is an honorary society of lawyers, chartered by the Supreme Court of Texas in 1981, to recognize and encourage lawyers who maintain and enhance their professional skills and the quality of their service to the public by completing at least double the required hours of continuing legal education each year. The College also sponsors or otherwise assists in educational activities of significant merit and widespread relevance and applicability to the legal profession.

Austin Startup Lawful.ly Offers Open Source Legal Insight

By SUSAN LAHEY Reporter with Silicon Hills News

Historically speaking, law is a tangled mess of arcane language wrapped around a maze of pitfalls and risk, and lawyers were the only ones who could safely wield it. But a new Austin startup wants to change that. Lawful.ly, founded by Chris Murphy and Bradley Clark, a couple of entrepreneurs who are both attorneys and IT guys, is a law crowdsource website. Users can get free legal documents as they can on other sites, but instead of just blank forms, the documents will be explained by commentary about what they mean and how to use them from lawyers and other experts.

“Having done my own startup a couple years ago, it’s amazing how much money I spent on the legal fees,” said Tony Frey, a product management and strategy executive who is advising the Lawful.ly team. “It’s easy to go find various resources, you can find these documents but if you’re not versed in legal issues you think ‘This sounded right to me.’ Then you go back to your legal advisors and they come unglued because they’re like: ‘You found this document? It’s a great document if you’re in California but you’re in Texas and you really screwed yourself with this.”

Murphy, started out in IT and then got his law degree, and now serves as an attorney at Dell. He doesn’t want to abolish lawyers but instead have them serve the function of counselors on complicated legal matters, not filling out forms.

“People who use contracts should be able to interpret them without having to go to a lawyer,” he said. “It should be understandable to you what is and isn’t allowed…. If you’re looking for auto mechanic advice you can go to a forum and find all sorts of great information. But it’s really hard to find that going on around legal advice. The other question is, ‘How much can I trust this advice?’ One thing we do differently is add that level of verification and trust. Explanations on documents will have been voted up, similar to Quora.”

Clark said he believed the legal profession was at a tipping point. The old guard protected the legal profession through language the deliberately obscured the meaning, so that only lawyers could interpret it. It was a kind of job security. Young people, he said, prefer more open source information. “There’s a distain among the younger generation of closed systems…. Wikipedia is a huge success; I think that’s exactly what this generation wants.”

The founders plan for the information on the site—including such documents as NDAs and series certifications of incorporation—to be free for the public. Business owners could use it. Lawyers, too. Murphy said that, as a corporate attorney, he’s familiar with corporate transactions but “I’m not a lot better than Joe-up-the-street at writing wills. Attorney’s tend to specialize.”

“When you go to law school they give you free access to Westlaw and Lexus, it’s like crack cocaine,” said Clark. But if you’re in private practice, those services cost a fortune. Last time they priced it, Lexus was about $2,000 a month.

The founders plan to monetize Lawful.ly through institutions like government agencies and law schools. Law schools, they said, give students access to expensive services like Lexus Nexus, but students could use even more.

Kyle Mitchell, a UT law student and open source coder who met Murphy through the site GitHub, is one of the beta users. As a law student, he said, he has access to all kinds of legal information through the library. “They give you a lot of information but it’s still rare and hard to find documents that explain themselves,” he said. With Lawful.ly, he said, it’s: “Here’s a form. Here are some comments that explain kinda sorta what these parts mean, what these words mean and not just the blanks for you to fill in. There are other services online that provide ‘Come and Take It’ legal services, Rocket Laywer, Legalzoom. They’re just providing forms with blanks to fill in and the ability to send them around and get them signed electronically.”

Lawful.ly is Murphy’s second company and he pitched at DEMO and applied with Tech Stars.

“When it comes to pitching I just tell him, make sure you don’t sound like a lawyer,” Frey said. “VCs are the farthest thing from a lawyer. They’re all seat-of-your-pants, all about what you feel. You’re going to want to make sure you have all your arguments lined up and they’re looking for your passion.”

“He’s making the transition very well. He’s articulate, comes across knowing what he’s talking about in this space and that’s paramount over everything. Legal scares everybody. Listening to Chris talk, he’s very even-toned…. Some of his success in the early beta is that he is good at connecting with people. People can grab onto that and make this community grow big, fast.”

Bradley B. Clark Selected for "Texas Monthly's 2013 Texas Rising Stars List."

Bradley B. Clark of Austin, TX has been honored with a recognition by Texas Monthly in its selection to the "2013 Texas Rising Stars List." Mr. Clark also was recognized in 2012 as a Rising Star.

Austin, TX (PR Newswire) June 14, 2013 -- Announcing a special recognition appearing in the April, 2013 issue of Texas Monthly published by Emmis Publishing Corporation. Bradley B. Clark was selected for the following honor: "Texas Monthly's 2013 Texas Rising Stars List."

Bradley B. Clark commented on the recognition: "I am honored to be included among the top 2.5% of attorneys in Texas under the age of 40. The fact that my peers, and Texas Monthly, included me on this prestigious list for the second year in a row is humbling."

The Bradley B. Clark Law Group, P.C. is an Austin, Texas based law firm applying project management principles to the delivery of legal services in commercial real estate, business formations, business litigation, intellectual property, internet law and technology law in order to deliver on-time results at a predictable cost.

For more information on Bradley B. Clark, located in Austin, Texas please call 512-298-1735, or visit http://www.bradleybclark.com.

Contact Info:

Bradley B. Clark
Phone: 512-482-0061
Email Address: bradley@bradleybclark.com
Bradley B. Clark Selected for "Texas Monthly's 2013 Texas Rising Stars List."

First Corporate Solutions Welcomes Guest Speaker Bradley B. Clark for Webinar on Basics of Lien Priority

Sacramento, CA (January 29, 2013) - First Corporate Solutions (FCS), a global UCC and corporate risk management and due diligence firm, announced that on Thursday, January 31, 2013 they will be hosting a webinar event, "Basics of Lien Priority."

First Corporate Solutions' guest speaker for the event is attorney Bradley B. Clark. As a partner at Gray & Becker in Austin, TX, Mr. Clark represents public and private companies in complex business transactions and litigation. His practice focuses on complex business transactions and litigation arising out of corporate financing, equity acquisitions, mergers and acquisitions and more. He has also been recognized as a Texas Rising Star® in business litigation by Texas Monthly and Super Lawyer Magazines.

This sixty-minute presentation is a must-see for anyone who works with secured transactions. Topics to be covered include: the importance of attachment; the importance of perfection by filing, possession or control; and the basics of UCC priority rules including claims by secured and unsecured creditors, purchase money security interests, subordination agreements, set-off rights and bankruptcy trustees.

FCS began providing monthly educational webinars in 2010, including their popular Insider's Guide webinars, a four-part series that walks participants through performing lien searches, preparing and filing UCC documents, the due diligence cycle, and cost saving strategies. This year, FCS is offering 2-3 free live webinar events every month, many delivered by well-respected special guest speakers.

"We are pleased to be working with such a talented pool of guest speakers," said David Silverburg, President and CEO of First Corporate Solutions. "The industry has really come to expect high-quality, relevant, relatable webinar offerings from FCS, I am confident that attendees will be impressed with this year's offerings."

Those interested in attending a free First Corporate Solutions webinar are encouraged to visit the FCS website at http://www.ficoso.com/events.aspx.

FBI Probes Gig Harbor Company

Gig Harbor, Washington. The News Tribune

by: Jeanine Stewart

The FBI is investigating Harbor Funding Group Inc., a Gig Harbor-based corporation, for conspiracy to commit securities wire fraud.

HFGI allegedly offered to provide loans to land developers in exchange for a 10 percent fee, which they kept without providing the loan money, alleges the indictment brought forth by the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. HFGI initially appeared before the U.S. courthouse in Tacoma in January.

The defendants, HFGI President William C. Lange and Black Sand Mine President Joseph Pascua allegedly stole more than $9 million from about 300 individuals, a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office states. Many were victims of Hurricane Katrina who were attempting to rebuild their homes, the indictment claims.

“This case serves as another warning to the public to be wary of investment campaigns that represent profit opportunities that appear too good to be true,” FBI Special Agent-in-Charge Laura Laughlin said in a release. Based in Seattle, Laughlin is conducting the investigation.

Lange said he could not respond to the allegations because the investigation is ongoing.

“My attorneys have said that we can’t comment on it,” Lange said, “but we look forward to being able to tell our side of the story.”

One alleged victim was Oasis at Five Palms LLC, a San Antonio-based company that has brought a civil lawsuit against HFGI and several related individuals, including Pascua. The case will be tried in August in the district court of Guadalupe County, Texas.

Bradley Clark, OFP’s attorney, recently came to Gig Harbor to gather testimony from witnesses. He calls the case a classic Ponzi scheme, claiming that HFGI took people’s money without intending to repay it.

“It’s overwhelming the evidence against them for what they were doing,” Clark said.

OFP had intended to borrow $2 million from HFGI and had wired $200,000 to HFGI’s attorney to fulfill the 10 percent pre-payment requirement, Clark said. His reading of bank statements leads him to believe that, four days later, that money was transferred to another account. OFP also lost its $5,000 processing fee, Clark said.

“It’s just amazing that people get away with this stuff,” said Clark, who is seeking punitive damages that could reach more than $1 million and actual damages valued at $372,000.

But Patrick Hundley, the attorney who represents HFGI as of April 7, said his clients did not knowingly swindle people out of their money.

“They were trying to do the best they could to make the investments work,” said Hundley, although he conceded that he’s been their lawyer for just half of the case, and he may not continue.

On Friday, Hundley filed a motion to withdraw due to what he called a conflict of interest. It will be up to the judge what Hundley will be allowed to do, he said. Clark said if Hundley is allowed to withdraw, he would be the second lawyer for the defendants to remove themselves from the case.

Clark said HFGI used the money to fund lavish vacations, pay the mortgage on a mansion and pay children for work they did for the company. He also claims HFGI was using money from clients to fund a gold-mining venture in Alaska led by BSMI.

But Hundley said he has not found any evidence that Lange and Pascua intentionally cheated clients out of their money.

“Were they bad in business? Did they make bad business decisions? Probably so,” Hundley said. “But did they commit fraud, or were they intentionally trying to defraud any of their investors? I guess that’s what the trial is about.”

The indictment also alleges that Lange and Pascua used in-person presentations and “webinars” to persuade victims to invest thousands of dollars in BSMI. On its website, BSMI claims to own 440 acres of land in Sitkinak Island, Alaska. The website states BSMI planned to use recent advancements in mining technology to recover precious metals, such as gold.

“Now is the Right Time,” reads the header on the BSMI homepage. The website states the company’s goal is to be a part of “the 21st Century Alaskan Gold Rush.”

“Black Sand Mine, Inc. is committed to facilitating operations that will begin to harvest these precious metals,” BSMI states on its website.

The indictment alleges that BSMI made fraudulent claims in order to entice clients to invest in the company.

Hundley said HFGI has made many attempts to pay clients back.

“They were taking people’s money, just like anybody who’s looking for investments and investors for ventures,” Hundley said. “They seek investments for what they’re trying to do ... ”

But on websites like Bigger Pockets Forums, HFGI clients express outrage over their lost assets.

The civil case, originally set to begin this month, has been put off until Aug. 15 for two reasons: to give the defendants time to find a new lawyer, and to wait for the outcome of the federal case, Clark said.