Emerging Legal Leaders recognized for service to community, profession

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Emerging Legal Leaders recognized for service to community, profession

By Fred Horlbeck
Published: January 28, 2011
Time posted: 7:41 am
Tags: Emerging Legal Leaders

By FRED HORLBECK, Senior Staff Writer

fred.horlbeck@sc.lawyersweekly.com

Lawyers from around the state gathered in Columbia Thursday to celebrate the achievements of top young attorneys as South Carolina Lawyers Weekly held its 2011 Emerging Legal Leaders awards reception.

The event was the first in which the newspaper honored lawyers whose professional excellence, community involvement and contributions to the practice of law set them apart as up-and-coming leaders. Ten award winners were chosen from among 18 finalists.

More than 100 well-wishers applauded as Publisher Tonya Mathis named finalists and winners and Managing Editor Gregory Froom handed out awards at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center.

“I congratulate you,” Mathis told honorees. “Each of you is unique in your own right. But you share some very special attributes that helped you earn the honor for which you are recognized. It is very obvious to me and our judges that you are the ones who consistently go above and beyond what is asked of you.

“You have the tenacity to create opportunities while you balance work and life and relationships in general.” Mathis added. “We applaud you. We admire you. And, most of all, I sincerely say we respect you for what you bring to the table.”

Honorees said they were thrilled to receive the awards.

“It feels great,” said award winner Breon Walker of Ellis Lawhorne & Sims. “This is the first year they’ve done it … and I heard that the response was overwhelming. So, out of that, to be one of 18 young lawyers in the state to be selected for this is great.”

“I’m really honored to be part of this group and certainly in very good company,” said award winner William R. Johnson, who practices with Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd. “I appreciate what South Carolina Lawyers Weekly has done to honor the young members of the legal profession.”

Mathis told attendees that Emerging Legal Leaders sponsors had just as big a role in honoring the young lawyers as the newspaper did. Sponsoring the event were Robson Forensic, the Hood Law Firm and Rogers Townsend & Thomas.

The winners were:

• Shannon Bobertz. Bobertz, a litigator who has tried dozens of cases, focuses her practice at Turner Padget Graham & Laney on torts and insurance, municipal law and insurance coverage law.

After graduating cum laude from the University of South Carolina School of Law in 2002, she clerked for state Supreme Court Justice Costa M. Pleicones before joining Turner Padget in 2004. She has defended complex cases involving personal injury, bad-faith litigation, property damage and general torts.

She is a member of the S.C. Bar’s House of Delegates and serves on the state Board of Bar Examiners. As a member of the board of the nonprofit Friends of the Richland County Public Library, she helped raise $80,000 for her local library.

• Suzanne Boulware Cole. As a shareholder focusing on workers’ compensation at Collins & Lacey, Cole helped start and grow the firm’s Greenville office, where she mentors younger associates.

A 2004 graduate of the USC’s law school, she has tried many cases before the Workers’ Compensation Commission and has argued before the state Court of Appeals and state Supreme Court. She has had a number of speaking engagements at conferences on workers’ comp law.

Her community work includes service as a commissioner on the Spartanburg Housing Authority, and she also has worked with the Girl Scouts and has served as family connections coordinator for the Junior League of Spartanburg.

• Reggie Corley. Corley leads one of the biggest departments at Rogers Townsend & Thomas, where he started work as college freshman.

A 2001 USC law grad, he served just one year as a practicing attorney before taking the reins as operations attorney manager for the firm’s default services department. Since then, the department’s caseload, income and number of employees have more than quadrupled.

Corley also serves on the firm’s professional development committee and its strategic opportunities assessment committee. A former member of S.C. Bar’s House of Delegates, he is a Meals on Wheels volunteer and a Sunday school teacher.

• Robert Goings. With Collins & Lacy since he got his law license in 2006, USC law grad Goings is noted as a strong courtroom advocate. He handles civil litigation involving business torts, employment law, health-care litigation, defective products, professional malpractice, bad-faith insurance claims, catastrophic personal injury and wrongful-death claims.

He also represents clients in matters involving civil rights and constitutional issues. A member of several law-related organizations, including the Defense Research Institute and the S.C. Defense Trial Attorneys’ Association, he also devotes time to the Columbia Rotary Club, the Wofford College Alumni Association and his church.

• William R. Johnson. Named Young Lawyer of the Year in 2010 by the Bar’s Young Lawyers Division, Johnson practices with Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd, where he has gained a reputation as the “whole package” for legal excellence.

A former Eagle Scout, the 2005 USC law grad serves on the YLD’s Special Olympics Committee and the Bar’s Tax Council and also is a member of such organizations as the Central Carolina Economic Development Alliance and Honor Flight South Carolina. He is a 2008 graduate of Leadership Columbia and is in the 2011 class of Leadership South Carolina.

• Maurie Lawrence. Joining Wyche Burgess Freeman & Parham in 2003 and achieving shareholder status in just six years, Lawrence focuses her practice on commercial real estate development and transactions, heads up marketing planning efforts for the firm’s real estate practice and has spearheaded some of the first advanced mixed-use projects in downtown Greenville.

Co-founder of a local chapter of Commercial Real Estate Women, she is now the chapter’s president. Her community work has included serving as president of the YWCA of Greenville and volunteer service with the Children’s Hospital. With a daughter who battled leukemia for more than two years before being cured, Lawrence centers much of her volunteer time on childhood cancer treatment.

• Jonathan Lee. After just five years at Ellis Lawhorne & Sims, Lee is making a name for himself as a talented attorney. With a J.D. from USC and an LL.M. in estate planning, he has carved out a place for himself in community and professional organizations alike. He is a member of the probate, estate planning and trust section of the S.C. Bar and the real property and trust and estate law sections of the American Bar Association. Since 2006, he has chaired the Columbia Taxation Study Group.

His community work includes serving as treasurer of Friends of the Richland County Public Library and volunteering with HomeWorks of America, a nonprofit that repairs the homes of low-income elderly and disabled citizens. He is a 2010 graduate of Leadership Columbia.

• Nosizi Ralephata. Ralephata grew up in Zimbabwe and knew by age 7 that she wanted to be a lawyer. In 2005, she received her law license and joined Turner Padget Graham & Laney, where she is a member of the firm’s business litigation group and focuses on insurance coverage, employment law, business law, franchise and shareholder disputes, business immigration and trademark and copyright actions.

Ralephata’s professional service includes chairing or co-chairing four ABA committees, and she also serves on the S.C. World Affairs Council, the S.C. World Trade Centers Association and the International Education Foundation of South Carolina. She participates in Muscular Dystrophy Association fundraisers.

• Breon Walker. Walker has practiced as member of the Ellis Lawhorne & Sims litigation team since 2007, handling criminal and civil cases. After graduating from Emory University Law School in 2004, she clerked for Circuit Court Judge Reginald I. Lloyd and then practiced with the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, handling all of the state’s tobacco litigation.

Her community service has included organizing a bone marrow drive for the National Marrow Donor Program, and she is a member of Leadership Columbia’s class of 2011. As experienced speaker, she has prepared and presented seminars on statutory compliance, case law developments and witness preparation. In 2010, she received the Gary Walker Memorial Scholarship to attend the trial academy of the International Association of Defense Counsel.

• Stephen Wunder. A 2007 cum laude graduate of the USC School of Law, Wunder practices in the Greenville office of Haynsworth Sinkler Boyd. With a strong interest in economic development, he works with senior members of the firm’s public finance team and focuses on bond issue structuring, renewable energy project finance and economic-incentive transactions.

He recently helped restructure more than $500 million debt in connection with the health-care industry. For Wunder, community leadership means serving on the Greenville Chamber of Commerce’s Leadership Development Advisory Council and on the Advisory Board of the Salvation Army Boys and Girls Club of Greenville County. In 2008, Greenville Magazine named him one of the area’s Best and Brightest Under 35.