NEWS
1972
Judge Robert E. Burch of the 23rd Circuit Court of Tennessee retired in August after 34 years on the bench. A former attorney and commercial pilot with Capitol Airways in Nashville, Bob began his judgeship in 1980. In 2000, he established the 23rd Judicial District Drug Court, and in 2002, he was named Tennessee Trial Judge of the Year.
1976
William F. Carpenter III (BA’76), CEO of LifePoint Hospitals, has joined the advisory board of Avondale Partners.
1982
Robert Hays Jr. has been re-elected chairman of King & Spalding for a fourth term, to begin on January 1.
1993
Michael Sawyer Smith has been elected the managing partner of Baker & McKenzie’s Chicago office.
1995
Jeffrey Michael Sullivan, a partner at Hunton & Williams, has been appointed to serve as executive vice president, general counsel and secretary of STAG Industrial by the company’s board of directors, effective January 1.
1996
Joseph Sciarrotta Jr. has been appointed by Arizona Governor Jan Brewer to the Maricopa County Superior Court. Joe is expected to take the bench early next year. He has served as general counsel to the governor since 2011.
1998
Walter Judd Peak (EXMBA’15) has been named corporate compliance officer at Frost-Arnett.
2004
James Robert Craig has opened Craig Henry, a firm focused on consumer law in Louisville, Kentucky.
2006
Samar Subhi Ali (BS’03) has joined Bone McAllester Norton’s Nashville office as a member of the firm’s administrative law, business and corporate law and international law practices. Samar comes to Bone McAllester after spending two and a half years as assistant commissioner for international affairs at the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development. She has also been advising the Obama administration on issues related to the foreign terrorist group ISIS.
2009
Erin Michelle Carter has been appointed assistant U.S. attorney in the Northern District of West Virginia, based in Wheeling. Prior to her appointment, Erin was a trial associate in the Philadelphia office of Duane Morris.
2010
Andrew Robert Gould has joined the appellate division of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas in Houston. He previously served in that federal district as a law clerk to Judge Lee H. Rosenthal. He had been a litigation associate at Gibson Dunn & Crutcher in Washington, D.C.
2012
Rick Apple has been named COO of SETEL US, a Brentwood, Tennessee-based company that provides communications services to businesses. He previously served as director of Council Capital’s TNInvestco fund.
MARRIAGES
2008
David Paul Byeff married Jill Larson on August 9 in Minneapolis. In attendance were several VLS alumni, including Todd Brecher, Safieh Nemazee Campbell, Geoff and Vanessa Gross, Hugh Hill and Julia Gorodetsky, Jeffrey Hollis, Jamie Hoxie, Fong Hsu, Justin Leck, Sigrid Neilson, Kevin Potere, Brett Sander, Kelly Walsh, Justin Welch, Benjamin and Angie Wickert, and Kevin Young.
DEATHS
1956
Mac Edward Robinson (BA’51) died September 11. He was 85. Mac had a notable four-year career on the Vanderbilt football team. After earning his law degree, Mac practiced law in Nashville for nearly 50 years. He was a member of the Nashville Bar Association, the Federation of Insurance Counsel and the Tennessee Defense Lawyers Association. Mac is survived by two children.
Our thoughts are with Andy Kaufman ’74, whose wife Michele died September 12 after a three-year battle with ALS.
