MoveMakers & NewsMakers for Nov. 2, 2021

St. Louis | Kansas City | Mid-Missouri | Other Areas of Missouri
 

St. Louis

Baker Sterchi Cowden & Rice is pleased to welcome two new associates in St. Louis.

Hannah Chanin joins the firm as an associate practicing in the areas of insurance coverage and bad faith, medical malpractice, personal injury defense, premises liability, product liability, and professional and management liability. She earned her law degree from Washington University in St. Louis School of Law as a full-merit scholar in 2021. While in law school, Chanin served on the board of the Wiley Rutledge Moot Court Competition and as a primary editor of the Washington University Jurisprudence Review. She also worked with various non-profits, including Compassion and Choices and the Migrant and Immigrant Community Action Project. Chanin was a summer law clerk at Baker Sterchi in 2020.

Kameron Fleming joins the firm as an associate practicing in the areas of employment and labor, insurance coverage and bad faith, personal injury defense, premises liability, product liability, and toxic/mass tort and environmental. He earned his law degree from Washington University in St. Louis School of Law in 2021. While in law school, he served as the managing editor of the Washington University Global Studies Law Review and was a mentor of many law students. Fleming was a summer law clerk at Baker Sterchi in 2020.

Robert E. Wallace Jr. and Andrew Kasnetz have joined the mediator and senior arbitrator panels of United States Arbitration & Mediation.

Monique D. Abby of St. Louis was elected to serve on the board of directors (as the Region 1 director - St. Louis City) with the Missouri Child Support Education Association at their 44th Annual Conference held in Camdenton last week.

Kansas City

Emily Cipra has joined Sandberg Phoenix as a member of the business litigation practice group. She received her J.D. from The University of Tulsa College of Law (2012) and her B.S. in criminal justice from the University of Central Missouri, graduating cum laude. Cipra is licensed to practice in Kansas and Missouri, and before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, the U.S. Court for the District of Kansas and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.

Gov. Mike Parson has appointed Katie Jo Wheeler of Kansas City to the Administrative Hearing Commission. She recently served as deputy director for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, a position she held since 2018. Prior to becoming deputy director, she served as general counsel for the department.

Commissioner Wheeler began her legal career practicing environmental law with Spencer Fane LLP in Kansas City. She received a B.A. in political science from Baylor University and earned her J.D. from the University of Missouri - Columbia School of Law.

Madeline Nagel joins Baker Sterchi Cowden & Rice as an associate practicing in the areas of personal injury defense, premises liability, and product liability. She earned her J.D. from the University of Missouri - Kansas City School of Law in 2021. While in law school, she was a member of the UMKC Law Review, served as a judicial intern for Judge Stephen R. Bough, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri, and worked on a discovery project for Baker Sterchi.

Mid-Missouri Area

The Missouri Bar Board of Governors reappointed John Ruth to the board of trustees of The Missouri Bar during its annual meeting in September.

Established in 1960, the board of trustees acts for and in the name of The Missouri Bar, Chief Disciplinary Counsel, and Missouri Board of Law Examiners regarding ownership, management, and control of each entity’s headquarters buildings.

Ruth is a founding member and shareholder of Newman, Comley & Ruth in Jefferson City, and he has practiced law for more than 34 years. His term expires Oct. 16, 2024.

Other Areas of Missouri

The Missouri Board of Governors appointed Chris Lebeck to the Missouri Court Automation Committee at its annual meeting in September.

The 23-member Missouri Court Automation Committee was established in 1994 by state statute to develop, implement, operate, and maintain a statewide court automation system. The committee also administers the Statewide Court Automation Fund.

Lebeck serves as the city attorney for Branson. He assisted with implementing, maintaining, and overseeing ProsecutorbyKarpel (PbK), a statewide prosecutor case management system used by most state prosecutor offices in Missouri. He also helped implement the system nationwide by providing data conversion, custom software development, and training to numerous courts, jails, police, and jail records systems.

Branson is the only municipal court in Taney County to use Show-Me Courts, with Lebeck’s office being entirely file-less. His office is also one of only two statewide that file citations through a case initiation software interface instead of manually.
 

The Missouri Bar Board of Governors reappointed Kim R. Moore for a second term to the Complaint Resolution Committee in September.

The five-member committee oversees The Missouri Bar’s Complaint Resolution Program, which assists with resolving complaints about lawyers that the Chief Disciplinary Counsel has determined may best be resolved outside of the formal disciplinary system.

Moore serves as the vice president, general counsel, and chief compliance officer for The Bank of Missouri in Jackson. His second term expires Dec. 31, 2025.