Hispanic Heritage Month
Written by: HON. DEBORAH L. THORNE
September is Hispanic Heritage Month, and time to acknowledge our Hispanic and Latinx colleagues. First we must acknowledge that, like many other “ethnic” groups that make up the population of the United States, this is not a homogeneous population, but rather a diverse group comprised of those whose parents, grandparents and great-grandparents spoke Spanish but with different dialects – some from Mexico, from Spain, from Cuba, Argentina and the Dominican Republic. Every journey was different but had one common feature—each family came looking for opportunity and worked hard to make sure their children and grandchildren succeeded.
Representation of Hispanic and Latinx individuals on the Bankruptcy Bench is, not surprisingly, all too small. Puerto Rico had Spanish speaking referees as far back as the 1920s, but no other circuits did until much later. The Article III bench was not much better. Judge Reynaldo Garza was the first Latinx Article III judge, appointed to the Texas District Court in 1961, and he remained the only Latinx Article III judge until President Carter appointed several others in 1979. As of 2022, only 4.8% of all U.S. lawyers were Latinx, even though almost 19% of the U.S population are Latinx. And, although our research is incomplete, it appears that out of approximately 350 authorized bankruptcy judges, only eleven are of Hispanic and Latinx heritage, approximately only 3%.
What has become clear to us is that the NCBJ goal of increasing diversity among the bench and bar is imperative. Much work remains to support and encourage young people hoping to enter the legal world, where there remain significant barriers to entry, including lack of representation, low enrollment in law school, and the daunting cost of a law degree. Support of Blackshear Presidential Scholars, Just the Beginning, and increasing contact and mentoring of high school, college and law students will help broaden the pipeline to the insolvency profession and ultimately to the bench. Many thanks to each of our colleagues for sharing their family stories this month. Like all of us, they benefited from family and scholarly support, and each of them continue to lend a hand to raise up those who are our future colleagues.
Enrique Lamoutte Inclan (San Juan, D. Puerto Rico, 1st Circuit)
Enrique was raised in Caguas, the “heart and center” of Puerto Rico. Before pursuing his legal career, he held key positions in the automotive industry, including Credit Manager for Caribe Motors Corp., from 1969 to 1970, and General Manager of Caribe Motors Leasing, Inc., from 1970 to 1974. (These corporations were subsidiaries of Caribe Motors Corp., the largest General Motors dealer in the world at that time.)
Enrique earned his bachelor’s degree in economics from Boston College in 1969, followed by his Juris Doctor from the University of Puerto Rico School of Law in 1976. He began his legal education as a night student at the University of Puerto Rico Law School in 1969, while also serving in the Puerto Rico Air National Guard. His commitment to both his work and military duties led him to temporarily pause his legal studies in 1971. After realizing that the business world did not meet his personal expectations, he returned full-time in 1974 to complete his law degree.
After graduating, Enrique started his legal career as a law clerk for the Hon. Hernán G. Pesquera at the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico, where he conducted research and drafted opinions on bankruptcy appeals, including appeals from the esteemed Judge Asa Herzog, then a visiting bankruptcy judge. After his clerkship, he was appointed as the first Clerk of Court for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Puerto Rico, a position he held following the enactment of the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978.
While balancing his role as Clerk of Court with his service in the National Guard, Enrique developed a friendship with General Daniel F. Lopez Romo, who at the time was also the U.S. Attorney for Puerto Rico. On his friend’s advice he transitioned to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, where he served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney from 1983, and later as Chief of the Civil Division from 1985 to 1986.
On November 7, 1986, Enrique was sworn in as a U. S. Bankruptcy Judge for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Puerto Rico and is currently serving his third term. During his distinguished career, he has served multiple terms as Chief Bankruptcy Judge, first from 1986 to 1998 and again from 2009 to 2018. He also serves on the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the First Circuit, where he was Chief Judge from 2004 to 2008.
Enrique’s career is marked by his dedication to public service. He retired from the National Guard in 2008 with the rank of Colonel and its Director of Support. His colleagues, including the Hon. Mildred Caban Flores, Hon. Edward Godoy, and Hon. María de los Angeles Gonzalez-Hernandez, who was his law clerk, have all practiced before him. Enrique considers his role as a bankruptcy judge the fulfillment of his life’s purpose and obligation—serving his community with integrity and excellence. His work is deeply inspired by the core values of the U.S. Air Force: integrity first, service before self, and excellence in all we do.
Edward Godoy (San Juan, D. Puerto Rico, 1st Circuit)
Edward’s father was an architect in Argentina and emigrated to New York in 1952, leaving Edward’s family behind in Argentina until he could establish himself in New York. In 1954, his mother and the five children came to join him and moved into a house in Midland Park, New Jersey. Edward and his twin brother were born in 1955. Most of the people in Midland Park were of Dutch descent, and Edward and his siblings were the “minority students” at Midland Park High School. After graduation, Edward attended and graduated cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in Philadelphia with a B.S. degree in finance and economics. He then received his J.D. degree from Columbia University Law School in New York. After law school, he traveled to Argentina, where he took postgraduate courses on the civil and commercial codes at the Faculty of Law of the University of Buenos Aires in Argentina. He also worked as an intern in San Paulo, Brazil, now practicing law in Portuguese.
Edward traveled to Puerto Rico on a vacation to visit his twin brother and decided to stay and work for a law firm doing federal trial work. His brother worked for the FBI on domestic counter terrorism matters involving the Matchateros, a violent Puerto Rican organization that claimed credit for murders, bombings, and robberies throughout the island of Puerto Rico and the U.S.
Eventually, he took a job as a Trial Attorney at the United States Trustee Program, , and in 2011, he was appointed by the First Circuit to the Bankruptcy Court, where he continues to serve. Edward served as the Chief Judge of the First Circuit’s Bankruptcy Appellate Panel from 2019-2023.
Carlota Böhm (Pittsburgh, W.D. Pennsylvania, 3rd Circuit)
Carlota was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1952 to first generation Argentinian parents. Her father was an engineer and physics professor and her mother a Spanish professor. Her father was extremely interested in nuclear energy and when Carlota was eight, the family moved to the United States with the hope that they would eventually return to Argentina. That never happened–her father was recruited by Westinghouse in 1960, and her mother went on to get her Ph.D. in Spanish literature and resumed teaching at the university level.
Her parents exposed Carlota and her siblings to music and culture and never pushed them into any specific career. Carlota’s uncle, a Supreme Court Justice in Argentina, recognized her keen mind and encouraged her to consider law and, although during college she prepared to apply to medical school, she took his advice and took up law. As she considered applying to law school, her mother became ill with pancreatic cancer. She decided that she should stay local to help with her sister, who was only eight. She attended Duquesne University Kline School of Law, afterward becoming a law clerk to Pittsburg Bankruptcy Judge Bernard Schäffler.
Her term began the day the 1978 Bankruptcy Code became effective. With new cases filed under the Code and existing cases pending under the Act, the opportunity to learn was wide open. Just a few months into her clerkship, Judge Schaffler decided to leave the bench and form his own firm. He asked Carlota to join him as a partner. Then, just as she was about to leave, newly appointed bankruptcy judge Joseph Cosetti asked her to stay and clerk for him. Knowing that he needed the help, she elected to stay for a year and then leave to join Judge Schaffler at his new firm.
Once she rejoined Judge Schaffler, they formed a bankruptcy boutique – handling many bankruptcy issues, including committee work, corporate debtor and trustee work. The work was exciting and challenging and Carlota loved it. After a wonderful twelve years working together, the firm broke up, as Schaffler left for big law and Carlota–now with a family and less desire to work seven days a week–left for a mid-sized firm, satisfied with leaving ownership behind. She has served as a judge U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Western District of Pennsylvania since 2011.
On the bench, Carlota has heard numerous large bankruptcy cases over the years and is adamant that we need to continually support the pipeline of new bankruptcy attorneys. She continues to employ a term clerk each year with the expectation that she will help launch them into a career in bankruptcy. Throughout her practice and time on the bench, she has remained a proud child of first-generation Argentinians. She is fluent in Spanish and made sure that her children were as well. She has strong family ties with family that remained in Argentina.
Mildred Cabán (San Juan, D. Puerto Rico, 1st Circuit)
Millie is of Puerto Rican descent and spent much of her youth in New York City, in the South Bronx. Her parents, both from Puerto Rico, met in New York. They both valued education, as they had not had the opportunity to further their own—her mother attended school through third grade and her father through eighth grade. Her father worked as a porter in a building on 33rd Street; her mother worked in a factory making handbags.
Millie attended several different schools during junior high school in both Puerto Rico and New York. Because Millie went to various schools in New York and Puerto Rico, the New York schools were suspicious of her ability. When her father went to enroll her in 8th grade in the Bronx, the school wanted to place her in a low-level class. To determine her ability, the school gave her a long list of English words and made her read them to determine her “grade-level.” If she stumbled on any word, this would determine her placement. She did stumble and was placed in a lower-level class. But she came to the math class on a day the students were taking a test. And even though she had not been in the class for even one day, she took the test and received the highest score of any of the students! After that, the teachers recognized that they had an exceptional student, and she was placed in the highest level
Millie had an older cousin who told her that when she was ready for college, she should go to Columbia University. Naturally, when she attended a college fair, she walked right up to the Columbia table and asked for an application. She was told that this was impossible, as Columbia only accepted male students, and she must go across the room to the Barnard table. She submitted her application to Barnard and was accepted. After graduating from Barnard, she went downtown to NYU for law school.
After graduation, she returned to Puerto Rico and clerked for a district court judge. As the junior clerk, she was assigned the bankruptcy cases that had been remanded to the District Court. Millie not only decided that she really found them exciting but also that she wanted to practice in Puerto Rico. She decided that she wanted to be a bankruptcy lawyer, took the Puerto Rico bar, and joined a midsized firm. The first case she had was before Judge Lamoutte.
The rest is history. Appointed in 2010, Millie has become a leader among bankruptcy judges, serving on education committees for the FJC and on the First Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel.
Eduardo V. Rodriguez (Houston, Southern District of Texas, 5th Circuit)
Eduardo V. Rodriguez grew up in Brownsville, Texas. His dad was born in San Benito, Texas and his mom was born in Brownsville, Texas. Both his dad and uncle served in the United States Army in Japan in WWII and, upon returning to Brownsville, together they opened a barber shop. Eduardo spent summers with his dad and uncle at the barbershop, where he earned a dollar a day sweeping the floor. Later, he opened a shoeshine service at the shop and did well financially. He got to know the customers at the shop, who included lawyers and judges. One of these was Judge Reynaldo G. Garza, the first Hispanic United States district court judge in the country, who became a mentor to Eduardo.
Eduardo’s mother was a legal secretary and worked for a firm where one of the partners shared the Rodriguez last name. Eduardo often went with his mother when she worked on Saturdays and admired the Rodriguez nameplate on the door. The partners in the office talked with Eduardo and he became interested in their personal injury practice. The world is pretty small: at some point, his mother went on to work for one of the barbershop customers, United States District Judge Reynaldo G. Garza. Eventually she also went to work for Judge Richardo Hinojosa before she retired. At the young age of ten, Eduardo already wanted to become a trial lawyer.
Eduardo later attended college, where he majored in psychology but took an accounting class and found it intriguing. He later earned an MBA degree with the highest honors, and it was during that time that he had the opportunity to try out his developing entrepreneurial and organizational skills. As a project for a class, he decided to build several apartments, so he borrowed the money and built a duplex. He not only earned an A; he also made actual money. This successful business venture continued until he designed, built, owned and operated 30 apartments. Next, he helped a friend who owned a Precision Tune Auto Care that was losing money. Eduardo was able to turn the business around. Eventually his friend sold him the business and he expanded it to a second shop. Not wanting to miss out on understanding the auto mechanics at work in Precision Tune Auto Care, he took an auto certification course to make sure he understood the business!
When Eduardo saved up enough for law school, he took the LSAT and was immediately admitted to Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. Upon passing the bar, Eduardo joined a boutique firm and opened up his own private practice, where he stumbled upon a bankruptcy case and assisted his first client on a pro bono basis. Although he knew nothing of bankruptcy, he discovered that there was trial work in bankruptcy court and eventually received his board certification in consumer bankruptcy law by the State Bar of Texas. As a lawyer, Eduardo represented both debtors and creditors in multiple forms of bankruptcies and has acted as both receiver and Chapter 11 Trustee in various chapter 11 bankruptcy cases.
When he was nominated by the Fifth Circuit to become a United States Bankruptcy Judge for the Southern District of Texas, McAllen Division, Eduardo was sworn in on July 31, 2015 by two of his mother’s former employers: United States District Judges Reynaldo G. Garza (who had also been his father’s customer) and Ricardo Hinojosa. He has been serving as Chief Bankruptcy Judge since November of 2022. He has written and published numerous articles on consumer and business bankruptcy and Subchapter V related issues and is a frequent speaker at bankruptcy seminars around the country. Edwardo has been active in many pro bono programs throughout his career and was the recipient of the 2018 Judge Merrill Hartman Pro Bono Judge Award for his commitment to the provision of legal services to the poor.
Maria Chavez-Ruark (Greenbelt, District of Maryland, 4th Circuit)
The Chavez name originated in the year 1161 when Spain was still under the dominance of the Moors. Two brothers raised a small army and liberated the town of Chaves from the Moors in what is now Portugal. (Portugal was then a province of Spain.) In appreciation for their service, the King of Spain knighted the brothers and gave them the surname “Chaves,” which means “keys” in Portuguese. The brothers began what led to many generations of service by the Chaves family to the Kings and Queens of Spain.
In the early 1500s, one of the Chaves descendants migrated to the new world, and the family eventually settled near what is now Albuquerque and Los Angeles. The Chaves family’s “business” in the new world was public service, yielding numerous military men, several sheriffs, and a mayor of Los Angeles. (Chavez Ravine, where the Dodgers play, was part of the ranch owned by Julian Chavez, who served as a “judge of waters,” then a “judge of the plains,” and then mayor of Los Angeles in the mid-1800s.) With the exception of a few years after the Spanish were driven out of New Mexico in the late 1600s, most of the Chaves family has lived in New Mexico for more than 500 years. Over time, the family began to spell the surname “Chavez.”
Maria’s father was one of eight children. He was a master welder who worked on the Alaskan pipeline as a young adult and then ventured to the Las Vegas area where he contributed to the construction of several of the iconic hotels on the strip, including the Flamingo, the Sahara, Caesars Palace, and Circus Circus. The Chavez family continues its dedication to public service with many military men and women, including an Admiral in the United States Navy, a Seal Team 6 (DEVGRU) team leader, and a cousin whose bravery and sacrifice was recognized when the United States Navy named a ship after him.
Public service continues to be the “family business.” Maria earned a B.S. in accounting and an MBA from Salisbury University, followed by a J.D. from the University of Baltimore School of Law. Like many of her colleagues featured here, she also clerked early in her career, spending one year at the Circuit Court of Baltimore City and two years in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Maryland, where she would return as a judge. Maria’s husband and three daughters are public servants, and Maria was honored to become a public servant when she joined the bench four years ago as the first Hispanic appointed to the federal bench in the District of Maryland.
Chris Lopez (Houston, Southern District of Texas, 5th Circuit)
Chris’s parents both emigrated from the Dominican Republic, his mother when she was very young and his father when he was 18 years old. His father came with no money, escaping a dictator and looking for opportunity. His father was able to get to New York and found a job on Coney Island assembling beach chairs. His mother was raised in New York and went through high school. After telling her guidance counselor that she wanted to be a lawyer, she was told that she should be a secretary and was discouraged from becoming a lawyer. She became a secretary but emphasized to Chris that he should follow his dreams. Both of his parents believed in the American Dream and worked very hard to make a life for Chris.
Education was of paramount importance and Chris went to the University of Houston as a Division 1 athlete and had the opportunity to train for four years with Carl Lewis. He also earned a Master of Arts in Religion from Yale Divinity School, and a law degree from the University of Texas School of Law. He remained in Houston and joined Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP. While in private practice, he focused on representations ranging from top global corporations in mega-restructurings to middle-market debtors and creditor representations. He has been an active member of the Houston civic community, serving on the boards of charitable organizations.
Chris was appointed as United States Bankruptcy Judge for the Southern District of Texas on August 14, 2019. He believes that he needs to be his very best and constantly feels that he is living out his mother’s dream, always wondering what she might have accomplished had she had the opportunity and encouragement that he received.
Magdalena Reyes Bordeaux (Riverside, Central District of California, 9th District)
Magdalena, or “Maggie,” was born Compton, California. Her family story is one where she experienced great hardship early in her life, as well as one where she was inspired by the courage and perseverance of her loving and hardworking mom. Maggie’s mother came to the United States from Durango, Mexico. When Maggie was only two years old, her mother escaped an abusive marriage enabling her mother to provide a safe home for her, as well as her older sister and younger brother. Inspired by her mother’s courage and hard work—and by the public interest attorney who helped her mother navigate a complex legal system during her divorce—she knew at five years old that she wanted to pursue a career in law.
After graduating from U.C. Irvine, she went on to attend UCLA Law School and originally planned to pursue a career in criminal law. After graduating, however, she worked at a small bankruptcy law firm and soon discovered that she found the practice of bankruptcy law interesting and engaging; it was moreover an area of law that allowed her to provide meaningful assistance to clients going through some of the most difficult periods in their lives. She especially enjoyed being able to provide clients a new beginning, a financial fresh start, and to assure them that they can and would get through this. Prior to her appointment to the bench, she was the Supervising Attorney for Public Counsel’s Debtor Assistance Project, and an adjunct professor at Loyola Law School.
In January of 2022, Judge Magdalena “Maggie” Reyes Bordeaux made history by becoming the first Latina bankruptcy judge in the Central District of California. She is proud to serve in the Riverside Division, a community that is diverse and growing, and where she feels fortunate to work with wonderful and supportive colleagues. As a judge, Maggie has never forgotten the importance of treating everyone with dignity and respect, and she works hard to ensure everyone appearing before her feels welcome, gets heard, and understands the process.
Corali Lopez-Castro (Miami, Southern District of Florida, 11th Circuit)
Corali’s story is a familiar story in Miami, Florida–her parents were forced to leave Cuba when Fidel Castro came to power. Corali’s mother left Cuba in 1960, and her father followed a few months later as her grandfather worked for the previous government and leaving the country presented challenges. Her parents expected to return to Cuba in a few months, but that did not happen. Her father was lucky enough to be able to finish college in the United States and eventually settled in Tampa, Florida, but later moved to Puerto Rico where there was a large Cuban community. From the beginning, Corali’s family embraced opportunities when they arose, and this often meant moving where a job or educational opportunity existed. While they loved Puerto Rico, where Corali was born, a better job for her father presented itself in Miami and they seized it. Her parents became active members of the Cuban-American community in Miami.
Corali grew up in a community that was predominantly Cuban and Catholic, and it was not until she attended Brown University as a freshman that she experienced a community where she was a minority. She found those years important to her development and understanding of herself–learning that “not everyone was of Cuban descent”–and her worldview greatly expanded. Although she received her undergraduate degree in Business Economics, she decided she wanted to be a lawyer after participating in a mock trial in an engineering class.
Ready to go back home to Miami, the University of Miami School of Law was an easy choice. She loved her time at UM Law and made lifelong friends. She became the Special Features and Reports editor for the Inter-American Law Review. In 2021, the Law Review presented her with the Lawyer of the Americas Award, “which honors a member of the legal community who has demonstrated outstanding and exemplary legal service on a domestic and international scale.”
As an attorney, Corali tried many cases in bankruptcy court and in the state courts. She also became very involved in projects aimed at providing better and more extensive pro bono services to those in need. She served as the Cuban American Bar Association’s (CABA) President in 2006. During this time, she relocated CABA’s pro bono project to increase its reach in the Hispanic community. The Florida Bar then asked her to co-chair the Bar’s Pro Bono Standing Committee. In this role, she helped create the ONE campaign to promote the need for pro bono representation: the slogan was “One Client, One Attorney, One Promise.” She remains active with CABA and the Florida Bar.
Corali has been a fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy since 2014. As she and her husband sent their last child off to college, she was ready for the challenge to join the bankruptcy bench in the Southern District of Florida. Appointed in 2023, she is the first Hispanic bankruptcy judge in Florida.
Ronald A. Clifford, III (Santa Barbara, C.D. California, 9th Circuit)
Clifford family “legend” is that Ronald’s family arrived in Cuba with Christopher Columbus on one of his ships and farmed on the southern part of the island near Guantánamo Bay growing sugar cane, until the land was depleted. Political changes in Cuba, plus the family’s economic struggles, prompted his grandfather to make the journey for a better life to the United States. The family traveled through Mexico with his infant father and ultimately made their way to northwest Pasadena, California. At the time he emigrated, his grandfather changed his last name to make it more American, with the hope of fitting into the new country. Like many Cubans who came to the States, his grandfather wore the key from his Cuban home around his neck for his entire life. The family arrived with no money and in Pasadena they were the only black Cuban family. Life was difficult without English, even in southern California. But the Cuban heritage – music and food and strength to work to make a better life–made it possible.
Northwest Pasadena, where both Ronald and his father were raised, was a place for “people that did not fit in” – his grandfather, for example, never became a fluent English speaker. But his father did, and he went to college and became a mathematician. As Ronald was growing up in segregated Pasadena, Chief District Court Judge Manuel L. Real entered an order in 1970 to desegregate the Pasadena Unified School District (the first order of its kind on the West Coast). Ronald was bussed to a school many miles from his home. Although other children in his neighborhood were not bussed, his father thought it was a good opportunity for him, even though he was one of only a very few black children in the new school. His father was a “maniac” about education and there was never a moment when college was not in his future.
Ronald attended California State Polytechnic University and Whittier College School of Law, where he was Lead Articles Editor of the Whittier Law Review and graduated magna cum laude. After practicing for more than fifteen years, he was appointed to the bench by the Ninth Circuit in 2022.
María de los Ángeles González-Hernández (Ponce, D. Puerto Rico, 1st Circuit)
María was born and raised in Ponce, Puerto Rico, where she now sits as a bankruptcy judge. Her parents were both born and raised in Puerto Rico, descendants of Spaniards (mostly from the Basque Country and the Canary Islands) and Corsicans. In the early 20th century, her paternal grandfather studied pharmacy by correspondence and began a pharmacy business in his hometown of Ponce. Her father, the fourth of ten children, returned from Fordham University with a pharmacy degree and a few years as Captain in the US Army–in places including Alaska– to take over the pharmacy business, which at the time included three stores. By the 1980’s, the pharmacy chain grew to eighteen stores, before competition from larger pharmacy chains and health issues prompted the closing of some stores and eventually the sale of the remainder.
Growing up, María’s mother, who came from a very traditional religious family, instilled in her four children strong core catholic values, especially faith, love, family, truth, respect, service and justice. María studied the last two years of high school in Connecticut at her father’s insistence, to learn and become proficient in English and to become self-sufficient and independent. Her father had been sent to military school in Indiana when he was a 12-year-old boy, and he wanted a similar experience for his children.
She went on to Colgate University, where she graduated in 1987. She returned to Puerto Rico after college, went to law school there, and clerked for Judge Lamoutte. María also served as Clerk of Court of the District of Puerto Rico Bankruptcy Court and taught bankruptcy law at the University of Puerto Rico Law School. She has dedicated most of her professional life as a public servant working in different positions for the US government. On February 11, 2022, María was sworn in as a U.S. Bankruptcy Judge for the District of Puerto Rico. María’s parents’ legacy: study hard, work hard, do it with love and respect and remember, family is always first.
Alfredo Rey Pérez (Houston, S.D. Texas, 5th Circuit)
Alfredo’s grandfather was a Spanish citizen who moved to Cuba from Spain in 1913. Alfredo was born in 1955 in Cuba and left in 1961, right after the Cuban Revolution, as Catholic schools were closed. His parents were relatively young when they left. Originally, his mother brought only his brother and him, and his father came a few months later.
His family emigrated to Miami, where he attended school through his senior year of college. He attended Haverford College in Pennsylvania, majoring in chemistry so that he could please his mother who wanted him to become a doctor. There was a problem: he could not stand the sight of blood. As a result, he went to law school.
Since graduating from the University of Chicago Law School, Alfredo has been active in legal and restructuring associations, serving as a Fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy and as a past chair of the Bankruptcy Section of the Houston Bar Association. He was the managing partner of Weil, Gotshal & Manges and retired from Weil’s partnership in 2023. Alfredo was appointed to fill the vacancy in the Southern District of Texas Bankruptcy Court and was sworn in on July 16, 2024.