Barron, Newburger, Sinsley & Wier, PLLC, (BNSW), an Austin-based firm with five offices in three states, will be celebrating two important anniversaries this month. The first is the 25th anniversary of the alliance of Barbara Barron and Manny Newburger for the practice of law and the 22nd year of Barron & Newburger, P.C. The firm will also be celebrating its upcoming second anniversary with a client conference and festivities at the Salt Lick Pavilion.
In 1983, Barbara Barron and Manny Newburger were two young lawyers sharing office space with another firm. Ms. Barron was an Assistant Attorney General for the State of Texas who had gone into private practice and Mr. Newburger was a newly minted law school graduate. Twenty-five years later, they lead a multi-state firm with an international reputation in the credit and collections industry. BNSW currently consists of eleven attorneys located in Austin, the Dallas Metroplex and Houston, Texas, Tampa, Florida and Scarsdale, New York.
With the increasing pressure being put on the credit and collections industry to heal and defend itself, the industry members look to BNSW to assist them in doing so. Attorneys in the firm have represented or given educational programs to the leading trade groups in the field, including the Commercial Law League of America, DBA International, the ACA International, the National Association of Retail Collection Attorneys, the National Association of Credit Management, and the U.S. Foreclosure Network.
Barron, Newburger, Sinsley & Wier utilizes the decades of experience of both its partners and other attorney to assist clients in complying with consumer collection laws, to represent clients in litigation, and to advise clients on complex transactions. A material portion of the firm’s practice consists of corporate training to promote compliance with consumer protection laws such as the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. The firm has multiple clients in India and Manny Newburger has traveled to both India and the Philippines to conduct training on U.S. consumer law and compliance. Another unique service which the firm offers is litigation “triage” in which consumer claims are quickly evaluated for their settlement prospects to minimize costs to clients. BNSW has also consulted on acquisitions of collection industry members involving tens of millions of dollars. All of the senior members of the firm have experience in class action litigation.
The firm also has a substantial bankruptcy section. Its attorneys have handled cases of national significance, representing at various times debtors, creditors, trustees and creditors committees. The firm’s bankruptcy attorneys defend and consult on cases involving violations of the discharge injunction and the automatic stay on a national basis and have litigated several important cases involving challenges to exempt property and are some of the very few in the country with experience in class actions prosecuted in Bankruptcy Court.
As the firm celebrates these anniversaries it looks forward to future expansion of its work across the country and across the world.