Butler Snow is pleased to announce that attorney Phillip S. Sykes has been named Treasurer-Elect of the International Association of Defense Counsel.
The International Association of Defense Counsel (IADC) has been serving a distinguished membership of corporate and insurance defense attorneys and insurance executives since 1920. Its activities benefit the approximately 2,500 invitation-only, peer reviewed members and their clients, as well as the civil justice system and the legal profession. Moreover, the IADC takes a leadership role in many areas of legal reform and professional development.
Phillip is an experienced trial lawyer. He also serves as an AAA arbitrator on its commercial panel of neutrals. He remains a licensed CPA and is a KPMG alum. After more than 30 years practicing law, Phillip has broad experience in a variety of areas including commercial litigation, environmental and toxic tort litigation, and personal injury. For example, he obtained a 7-figure jury verdict on behalf of his client for breach of contract related to the inspection, cooking, and delivery of industrial quantities of poultry. In an arbitration, he secured an award for a telecom client for breach of contract where he also validated an event of default under a pledge agreement resulting in the accelerated payment of a companion promissory note, while also defeating each of the opposing party’s counterclaims. The final award included his client’s attorneys’ fees and costs of arbitration. In another matter, Phillip represented a public company in federal district court in Chicago, defeating a TRO attempting to stop that client’s $7.5 billion transaction selling assets in 20 states. Finally, Phillip led the defense of community-wide, groundwater contamination cases related to two different sites. Each site generated dozens of plaintiffs and multiple lawsuits, including litigation brought by the Attorney General on behalf of the State.
For many years, Phillip has been recognized by Chambers USA (Band 1) for his litigation experience and BL Rankings, The Best Lawyers in America® in 15 categories, including Bet the Company Litigation. He was also twice named a BTI Client Service All-Star. He is also served on the faculty of the 2023 IADC Trial Academy at Stanford Law School.
Phillip’s practice has taken him coast to coast with court appearances from New York to California. He obtained his Juris Doctor magna cum laude from the University of Mississippi and is admitted The Mississippi Bar, the U.S. District Courts for the Northern and Southern Districts of Mississippi and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
