McGlinchey Stafford files bankruptcy ahead of NOLA closure | Business News

Six weeks after announcing it was shutting down after more than 50 years in business, McGlinchey Stafford has filed for bankruptcy, hastening the demise of a firm that was once among the state’s most prominent and high profile.

The filing on Thursday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana is a Chapter 7 filing, meaning the firm is liquidating its remaining assets to satisfy creditors, not a Chapter 11 filing, which allows a debtor to stay in business while coming up with a plan to pay off debt.

Court documents filed in the case, which has been assigned to U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Meredith Grabill, do not yet paint a clear picture of the firm’s finances. A standard bankruptcy petition form says only that McGlinchey has between 200-999 creditors and that the firm’s assets and its liabilities range between $10 million and $50 million.

Experts say a more detailed financial statement will likely be filed in the coming days. The firm’s New Orleans office will shut down on March 31. Other offices closed at the end of January.

Several attorneys familiar with the situation who were not authorized to comment publicly on the case said the firm did not initially plan to file for bankruptcy when it announced it was closing. As it began winding down operations, however, it became evident that there wasn’t enough money to satisfy the firm’s more than 15 long-term lease obligations in office buildings around the country.

McGlinchey’s attorneys stopped practicing law at the end of January, the firm previously announced.

Dane Ciolino, a law professor at Loyola University in New Orleans, said initiating liquidation proceedings through a bankruptcy filing is not surprising, given that McGlinchey is no longer practicing law and has no longer has any income.

“Law firms generally don’t have a lot of assets they can sell off to satisfy debt,” Ciolino said. “They have office furniture, which isn’t worth much, and accounts receivable. So, if they have lease obligations, filing bankruptcy makes sense.”

William Steffes and Barbara Parsons, whose Baton Rouge bankruptcy firm is representing McGlinchey, declined to comment.

McGlinchey’s managing member, Michael Ferachi, also based in Baton Rouge, declined to comment.

Trouble brewing

In early January, McGlinchey Stafford announced that its “equity members,” a group of senior attorneys who owned the firm, had voted to dissolve, sending shock waves across south Louisiana’s legal community and taking some of the firm’s attorneys by surprise.

A variety of factors contributed to the decision, including the recent departure of several high-profile rainmakers with the firm, delinquent collections, internal disagreements and steep overhead costs in far-flung offices, according to sources familiar with the situation and the firm’s own statement.

At the time, the firm had around 160 attorneys and hundreds of support staff in 18 offices around the country from Seattle to Boston, though its New Orleans and Baton Rouge offices were the largest by far.

In a statement at the time, Ferachi, a commercial litigation specialist who became the firm’s managing member in 2021, said that no single factor had led to the vote to dissolve. Rather, the troubles had been building.

“This is not because of any specific attorney’s departure, or any individual financial decision or leadership action that led us to this point,” he said. “This is the result of a combination of market factors, such as lagging collections, compounded with various internal factors over several years.”

The statement also said the firm’s leaders made the decision after “assessing several strategic alternatives.”

Bankruptcy court documents filed Thursday show that Teneo, a global consulting firm, has been advising McGlinchey on the wind down.

Teneo’s principal on the case, Gary Polkowitz, did not respond to a call seeking comment.

Where they landed

In the weeks since the announcement, individual lawyers and groups of attorneys within McGlinchey have left for other firms, according to recent announcements.

A prominent group from the Baton Rouge office moved their corporate and real estate practice, including nine attorneys and four staffers, to Adams and Reese.

A 36-person team, including 19 attorneys from several of McGlinchey’s offices outside of Louisiana, announced they were joining Womble, Bond, Dickison, a transatlantic firm with 1,300 attorneys and home offices in London and Baltimore, according to an announcement from the firm.

AM Law, an industry trade publication, reported Jan. 16 that talks between the group, headed by a partner in McGlinchey’s Cleveland office, and Womble began on Dec. 8 and concluded Dec. 26, less than 10 days before the vote to dissolve.

Around the same time, McGlinchey lost four attorneys from its corporate litigation group in New Orleans to Jones Walker. Another four attorneys from the firm’s Washington D.C and Florida offices that specialize in consumer financial services defense announced their departure for Chicago-based Hinshaw.

In early February, eight attorneys and five support staff from McGlinchey’s maritime practice, including José Cot, the managing member of McGlinchey’s New Orleans office, joined Simon, Perragine, Smith and Redfearn.

McGlinchey previously notified the Louisiana Workforce Commission that any remaining emloyees in its New Orleans office would be laid off as of March 15.

Trustee to take over

Now that McGlinchey has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, the job of liquidating the remaining assets and dealing with property owners and outstanding leases, as well as other vendors, will fall to a court-appointed trustee in the case, Wilbur “Bill” Babin, a New Orleans attorney who has overseen dozens of bankruptcy proceedings.

Babin did not respond to a call seeking comment.

Among the property managers he’ll be negotiating with is Stirling, which manages the Pan American Life Center on Poydras Street in New Orleans, where McGlinchey’s New Orleans office has been located since 2008.

Babin also will have to negotiate with Wampold Companies, which owns the II Rivermark Centre building in Baton Rouge, where the firm completed more than $1 million of tenant improvements for 15,000 square feet in May 2025.

The property owners did not respond to calls seeking comment.

Experts say it’s too soon to say how long the liquidation might take. Unlike Chapter 11 cases, like the recent Archdiocese of New Orleans bankruptcy, which lasted nearly six years, liquidation cases typically conclude in a matter of months, not years.