PHILADELPHIA, PA—Duane Morris LLP has appointed San Francisco partner Meagen E. Leary to the firm’s eight-member Executive Committee. Leary will also continue in her role as co-chair of the Business Reorganization and Financial Restructuring Practice Group. Joining Leary as co-chair of the group is Philadelphia partner Wendy M. Simkulak who succeeds Philadelphia partner James J. Holman. Holman will continue practicing as a partner in the group.
Leary maintains a national creditors’ rights, commercial real estate finance and bankruptcy practice. Her clients include institutional lenders, CMBS servicers, REITs, debt funds and other diverse businesses. Leary and her team handle all aspects of commercial loan workouts, bankruptcies, real estate finance and lender liability litigation, and commercial loan and real estate transactions. In addition, she provides national, coordinating counsel and general counsel services to several clients.
She is a cum laude graduate of Tulane University Law School, where she was a member of the Tulane Maritime Law Journal, and a graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles.
In addition to her new role as the practice group’s co-chair, Simkulak serves as chair of the group’s Insurance Rights division. She also serves as a team lead for the firm’s Insurance/Reinsurance industry group and is a member of the firm’s governing Partners Board. Simkulak represents insurance companies, financial institutions, trade creditors, lessors, liquidating trustees and debtors in debt restructurings and in all aspects of a bankruptcy case.
Simkulak is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public and International Affairs. Simkulak is also a summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Muhlenberg College.
