Kathryn A. Coleman, a partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher's New York office, joined the firm in 1986 as one of the founding lawyers in the San Francisco office.  She is a member of the Business Restructuring and Reorganization Practice Group with extensive experience in all areas of the restructuring practice, including out of court workouts, troubled loans, creditors' rights, and all phases of bankruptcy cases. Ms. Coleman's practice has included representations of chapter 11 debtors, creditors' committees, secured creditors, and acquirors in bankruptcy cases, preparation and prosecution of creditors' plans of reorganization, and complex loan restructurings outside of bankruptcy, representing both borrowers and lenders.

Some of Ms. Coleman’s most recent representations include:

• Scotia Pacific Company, LLC, a redwood timber company.  Ms. Coleman was lead debtor’s counsel in Scotia Pacific’s highly contentious chapter 11 case, which was filed in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas (Corpus Christi Division).   The Scotia Pacific case is remarkable for the number of issues that were fully litigated, including venue, use of cash collateral, Scotia Pacific’s alleged status as a single-asset real estate debtor, exclusivity, valuation, cramdown standards, administrative claims, and a stay pending appeal.  Ms. Coleman and her team defeated the noteholders’ attempt to have Scotia Pacific declared a “single asset real estate debtor,” and obtained an affirmance of the trial-level decision at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, in one of the first cases to be directly certified to the Circuit Court of Appeals from the bankruptcy court.  The opinion, which is the only Circuit Court of Appeals decision on the issue so far, is reported at 508 F.3d 214 (5th Cir. 2007). The multi-week contested confirmation trial in the Scotia Pacific case initially involved five competing plans of reorganization, cramdown standards, and valuation of Scotia Pacific’s assets.  The confirmation of the plan for Scotia Pacific and its related debtors has also been appealed and certified to the Fifth Circuit.
• Hoop Holdings, LLC and its subsidiaries, former operators of several hundred Disney Stores in the United States and Canada.  Ms Coleman led Gibson Dunn’s restructuring team in Hoop Holdings’ prenegotiated chapter 11 case, filed in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware.
• Wilson Daniels, Ltd., one of the country’s largest wine distributors, which was the exclusive marketing agent and distributor of the Arrowood, Freemark Abbey and Byron wine brands for the brands’ owner, Legacy Estates, a chapter 11 debtor.  Ms. Coleman and the Gibson Dunn team implemented a strategy that led to full payment of Wilson Daniels’ claims and ensuring that Wilson Daniels has a continuing relationship with the brands’ acquirer, Kendall Jackson Wine Estates Ltd.

A frequent lecturer on bankruptcy law and problem loans, Ms. Coleman regularly speaks for the Practising Law Institute, the American Bankruptcy Institute, California Continuing Education of the Bar, the American Bar Association, the Pacific Bankruptcy Law Institute, the Western Mountains Bankruptcy Law Institute, and the Norton Bankruptcy Litigation Institute.  Ms. Coleman's most recent publication is Recent Developments in Business Bankruptcy 2005, 28 California Bankruptcy Journal 3 (2006), and she also authored Selling an Operating Business in Bankruptcy, 33 UCC Law Journal 387 (2001).  She has served on the Uniform Commercial Code Committee of the California State Bar.  Ms. Coleman was recently named one of the 100 Most Influential Women in Business by the San Francisco Business Times, and she is ranked by Chambers USA as a leading restructuring lawyer.  Ms. Coleman was also named as a leading lawyer in bankruptcy in the 2009 edition of The Best Lawyers in America.  She served as partner in charge of the San Francisco office of Gibson Dunn from 2000-2005, and is a member of the firm’s Diversity Committee.

Ms. Coleman is a member of the Turnaround Management Association and the American Bankruptcy Institute.

Ms. Coleman graduated magna cum laude from Pomona College and obtained her Juris Doctor in 1983 from Boalt Hall School of Law, where she served as Senior Articles Editor of the California Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif.  Prior to joining Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, she clerked for the Honorable C. Martin Pence, U.S. District Judge for the District of Hawaii.