Pillsbury announced that a group of prominent insolvency and restructuring partners is joining its firm-wide Insolvency & Restructuring practice, and will be resident in the New York office. Deryck Palmer, Andrew Troop and Christopher Mirick joined the firm from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, where Palmer was the co-chairman of the financial restructuring department and a former member of the firm’s Management Committee.

Palmer was a recent delegate to the UNCITRAL Working Group V (Insolvency Law) on behalf of the International Law Institute. He was also selected as one of the lead counsels to the U.S. Treasury Department in the General Motors restructuring and represented the Detroit Public Schools, the sixth-largest school district in the country, in one of the most successful municipal restructurings, out of court. He and his team concentrate their practice on the representation of all parties involved in proceedings under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code, as well as in workout, corporate restructuring and bankruptcy matters. They have handled some of the largest and most significant matters in the country during the past three decades, including LyondellBasell Industries in its reorganization case; Millennium Custodial Trust; Apollo Health Street; and Citibank in the Lehman Brothers Holdings Chapter 11 case. Other recent clients include Omnicare, JPMorgan Chase and numerous private equity firms and hedge funds with investments in distressed credits.

The team represents both creditors and debtors, including representation of lenders extending credit to troubled borrowers and entities investing in or acquiring troubled companies or assets from distressed owners, in various industry sectors including automotive, retail, real estate, energy, health care, hospitality and manufacturing. They enhance Pillsbury’s capabilities in these key industry sectors and bring significant additional experience representing municipal and health care entities in debt restructurings and working with traditional and non-traditional lenders in creating new lending products for municipalities.

Recognized as one of the “Leading Law Firm Rainmakers” by the Minority Corporate Counsel Association, Palmer is active in the American Bankruptcy Institute and the TMA. For more than ten years, he served as a foreign advisor on U.S. bankruptcy law to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and was instrumental in the drafting of the new PRC Enterprise Bankruptcy Law. An Adjunct Professor of Law at New York Law School, Palmer received his B.A. from Syracuse University and his J.D. from the University of Michigan.

Troop and Mirick have also received accolades for their work. Most recently, Legal 500 recognized Troop for being “extremely capable, effective and creative,” and IFLR1000 reported that clients praise Mirick for demonstrating “tremendous leadership skills” and having “very innovative solutions.” Troop and Mirick focus their practices on business reorganizations and debtors’ and creditors’ rights. Troop’s practice includes representing nonprofit organizations within his primary focus of debtors’ and creditors’ rights. He received his J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law and his B.A. from Amherst College. Mirick has represented private equity clients in connection with acquiring, selling and reorganizing both domestic and international portfolio companies. He has also counseled mezzanine lenders and private equity investors in defending fraudulent-transfer and breach-of-duty claims asserted in connection with companies to which they have extended credit or invested equity. A graduate of Amherst College, he holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School.