New York—Dentons, the global law firm, has expanded its New York office and key global offerings with five laterals in three weeks. The laterals joining include Gerry Bender, Gary Gartner, Jeffrey Scheine, Michael Smith and Walter Van Dorn. They expand the Firm's Restructuring, Insolvency and Bankruptcy practice, Tax practice and Corporate practice, including capital markets and securities.

"By adding lawyers with global practices in New York, Dentons is continuing to position our team to serve our clients in key markets in the US and across the world," said Dentons US CEO Mike McNamara. "Our growth in New York is reflected in other critical markets across the US as we add lawyers and professionals who share our commitment to providing high-level legal advice and advisory services that are most beneficial to our clients."

"Strategic additions is a priority for our New York office as we continue to respond to client needs," said Bob McCarthy, managing partner of Dentons' New York office. "These five are distinguished practitioners in their sectors and are respected by Dentons' lawyers across the globe. We are dedicated to having the best teams for our clients in these key areas and will continue to build on this momentum in New York."

The five New York lawyers join on the heels of other moves to Dentons across the Firm's US footprint, including former Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens and nationally-recognized litigator Mark Trigg who both joined in Atlanta; well-known insurance and financial litigators Fred Reinke and Richard Dodge, who recently joined in Washington, DC; and Dave Fenley who joined the Real Estate practice in Kansas City.

The five New York colleagues include:

Gerry Bender
A veteran in the financial restructuring industry, Bender joins as partner and brings more than 30 years of experience in developing innovative and cost-effective solutions for clients looking to achieve maximum recovery and value from distressed situations. He focuses on all aspects of bankruptcy and financial restructuring, including the representation of secured and unsecured creditors, unofficial and official creditors' committees, and debtors in out-of-court restructuring and Chapter 11 reorganizations. Bender regularly represents investors in, or acquirers of, debt of troubled companies, including private equity funds and hedge funds. He advises clients in a broad range of industries, including telecommunications, transportation, healthcare, housing, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, among others.

Gary Gartner
Gartner joins as senior counsel and has extensive experience counseling clients on domestic and international tax consequences of transactions, restructurings and securities offerings, and strategic joint ventures, mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, liquidity transactions and related finance matters. He has represented multinational corporations and high net worth families in overall international structuring, global tax planning and strategic advisory. Previously, he was chair of the Tax department in various significant international law firms and before that, was head of Arthur Andersen LLP's U.S. International Tax Practice for the Northeast United States (which included Canada). He also has written and lectured widely on various topics relating to international tax and financial matters.

Jeffrey Scheine
Scheine joins as senior counsel and provides sophisticated local and international tax and related business consulting advice to domestic and international clients, including private equity funds, private and governmental pension funds, closely held real estate owners and operating partners, and professional service firms with international platforms, on a broad spectrum of transactions and investments. He has written and lectured extensively on a wide variety of topics relating to cross border investment and financing. Prior to the launch of Alchemy, Scheine was tax partner in private legal practice and previously, a tax principal with Arthur Andersen.

Michael Smith
Smith joins as partner and brings 25 years of experience advising clients on cross-border M&A, international capital markets, global fund formation, and corporate strategy and governance.  He regularly advises issuers and underwriters in connection with public and private debt and equity offerings, including high yield debt, sovereign debt, structured products, Rule 144A, Regulation S and Canada-US MJDS offerings. The global nature of Smith's practice has led him to serve clients in the US, Canada, Latin America and the Middle East.

Walter Van Dorn
Van Dorn, who rejoins Dentons as partner where he previously practiced for seven years, advises issuers, underwriters, broker-dealers and other financial institutions on securities and capital markets transactions including IPOs, public and private offerings of equity and debt securities (including sovereign debt), securities offerings under Rule 144A and Regulation S, mergers and acquisitions and the creation of ADR and GDR programs. Earlier in his career, Van Dorn served as Special Counsel in the Office of International Corporate Finance, Division of Corporate Finance at the SEC in Washington. His areas of responsibility there included offerings of equity securities and ADRs, offerings of debt securities by both corporate and government issuers, offerings under the multijurisdictional disclosure system with Canada (the MJDS) and mergers and acquisitions, tender and exchange offers involving non-US companies. He leverages this experience to guide clients across the world through complex compliance matters and transactions involving all aspects of the US securities laws, including the Securities Act, Exchange Act, Investment Company Act, Investment Advisers Act, Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Dodd-Frank Act, JOBS Act and Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

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