News

Liskow is pleased to announce that shareholder Kathryn Gonski has been certified as an Appellate Practice Specialist by the Louisiana Board of Legal Specialization, a designation held by only 20 other attorneys in the state.

Kathryn has handled dozens of appeals in the Louisiana Courts of Appeal, Louisiana Supreme Court, and United States Fifth Circuit. Her appellate experience has also included assistance with appeals in the United States Second, Sixth, Ninth, and Federal Circuits. She regularly represents local, national, and global retail, chemical, marine, transportation, and energy companies in a wide array of practice areas, including commercial, energy, environmental, maritime, and tort litigation. In addition to her extensive appellate practice, Kathryn has successfully represented her clients in all phases of litigation, including dispositive motion practice, jury trials, and arbitration. She is also frequently retained to write amicus briefs on behalf of organizations in matters of industry-wide significance.

Kathryn currently serves as the Louisiana State Chair of the American Bar Association Council of Appellate Lawyers and is recognized by Chambers USA in Litigation: Appellate in Louisiana. She is a member of the firm’s Board of Directors and is based in the New Orleans office.

Liskow is proud to announce that attorney Alec Andrade has been selected to serve on the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry’s (LABI) 2026 Emerging Leaders Council. Alec joins a group of 49 professionals with diverse backgrounds who share a commitment to making Louisiana the premier state for business and family life.

Alec is a litigator practicing in the areas of mass tort, products liability, personal injury defense, and commercial litigation. He also has experience in government relations and advises clients on the legislative and business considerations affecting their operations, particularly where regulatory and policy issues intersect with litigation risk.

Learn more about this selection and other council members here.

Liskow attorney Ellie George was recently featured in New Orleans CityBusiness’ Guest Perspective section with her article, “2026 Brings 27-Paycheck Challenge for Employers.” The article examines an uncommon payroll issue employers may face in 2026, when the biweekly payroll calendar results in a 27th paycheck and creates budgeting, compliance, and employee communication considerations.

In the article, Ellie explains how the extra pay period occurs and outlines the practical implications for employers that have budgeted for only 26 pay periods. She discusses the financial impact of issuing an additional paycheck, as well as alternative approaches such as spreading annual salaries across 27 pay periods, noting potential wage-and-hour and overtime exemption risks under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

The article concludes by emphasizing that while a 27-paycheck year can create challenges related to payroll costs, overtime compliance, and benefits administration, the issue is manageable with proactive planning. With that in mind, Ellie highlights the importance of reviewing payroll calendars early, coordinating with benefits administrators and counsel, and clearly communicating with employees to avoid confusion and compliance issues.

To read the entire article, please click here.

The firm is pleased to announce that four attorneys have been selected to participate in The Leadership Council on Legal Diversity’s (LCLD) programs for 2026. CJ Miller and Emily von Qualen were named 2026 LCLD Fellows and Margaret Chavez and Hailey Maldonado were selected to join the 2026 LCLD Pathfinders Program. These programs support the advancement of diverse attorneys through leadership development, career-focused training, and opportunities to build lasting professional relationships.

Now in its fifteenth year, the LCLD Fellows Program is a highly structured, year-long initiative designed for high-potential, mid-career attorneys at LCLD Member organizations. The program provides immersive leadership training and opportunities to engage with senior legal and business leaders from leading corporations and law firms nationwide.

The LCLD Pathfinder Program focuses on high-potential, early-career attorneys and is designed to supplement existing training initiatives at LCLD Member corporations and law firms. Founded in 2009 by leading general counsel and law firm managing partners, LCLD is committed to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion within the legal profession. The organization includes more than 400 corporate chief legal officers and law firm managing partners and has impacted more than 25,000 legal careers through its talent development initiatives.

Liskow is pleased to announce that attorney Chelsea Crews has been selected as an honoree on New Orleans CityBusiness’ Power List for Port and Maritime 2026. Chelsea is recognized for her leadership in maritime law and her impact on the port and maritime industry in New Orleans and across the globe.

Chelsea is a maritime attorney in Liskow’s New Orleans office and a member of the firm’s Maritime Industry Group. She represents vessel owners, maritime companies, and other industry stakeholders in complex maritime litigation, commercial disputes, and regulatory matters. Chelsea also drafts and negotiates a wide range of maritime contracts.

Prior to joining Liskow, Chelsea worked in-house at the world’s third-largest ocean carrier, gaining first-hand experience navigating the legal and commercial challenges faced by global maritime operators. Read more about Chelsea and other’s featured here.

Liskow is pleased to announce the election of three new shareholders, effective January 1, 2026.

Melanie Derefinko is a member of the Commercial Litigation practice group in the New Orleans office. Her practice focuses on complex business disputes, including intellectual property disputes, construction litigation, contract disputes between businesses, labor and employment matters, and collection actions. She has extensive experience drafting dispositive and Daubert motions, as well as pre- and post-trial briefs in federal court, and regularly manages e-discovery for cases, including the development of tailored ESI protocols. Prior to joining the firm, she served as a judicial intern to the Honorable J. Sterling Snowdy of the Fortieth Judicial District Court and the Honorable Fredericka Wicker of the Louisiana Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal.

Bradford Laperouse is a member of the Business Transactions practice group in the Houston office. His practice is primarily focused on upstream oil and gas matters. He advises clients on onshore and offshore transactions and regularly drafts purchase and sale agreements, operating agreements, farmout agreements, participation agreements, option agreements, master service agreements, confidentiality agreements, and assignments of ownership. Bradford’s energy work includes handling due diligence projects and offshore title examination. In addition to energy transactions, his practice also encompasses providing counsel on entity formation, governance, and compliance with annual filing and meeting requirements, drafting various real estate instruments, and advising on financing and lending transactions. Prior to joining the firm, Bradford worked in-house in the legal department of an offshore energy company and practiced law focusing on energy transactions.

Emily von Qualen is a member of the Environmental Regulatory practice group in the New Orleans office.  She represents a variety of industry clients in environmental regulatory matters, including responding to air, water, and waste enforcement proceedings with the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality and the Louisiana Department of Conservation and Energy. She has also aided clients in federal matters, including EPA information requests, liability under the Oil Pollution Act, and natural resource damage assessments. As part of the environmental regulatory team, she has helped companies navigate the complex regulatory and permitting requirements at the state and federal levels. She has drafted and analyzed state Public Trust and federal NEPA reviews to ensure that they have sufficiently analyzed the effects of a project, including environmental justice concerns. Emily is a frequent publisher and presenter on environmental regulatory topics. After law school, Emily served as a judicial intern to the Honorable Patricia Minaldi of the United States District Court of the Western District of Louisiana.

Liskow, in partnership with appellate attorneys at Wright Close & Barger, LLP, has secured a significant victory on behalf of Industrial Specialists, LLC (“ISI”) at the Court of Appeals for the First District of Texas in Industrial Specialists, LLC v. Blanchard Refining Company LLC and Marathon Petroleum Company LP, which overturned a Galveston County District Court’s July 24, 2023 judgment that awarded in excess of $70 million to Marathon.

The case involved an action for contractual indemnity brought by Marathon against ISI for settlement payments made to resolve personal injury claims arising from a January 2016 fire during turnaround construction at Marathon’s Galveston Bay Refinery.  After the fire, four separate lawsuits were filed by the injured employees asserting negligence claims against Marathon and other contractors on the jobsite.  Those suits were consolidated in a multi-district litigation.  ISI was not named as a defendant in the consolidated matter, but was designated as a responsible third party.  

After purporting to settle all claims arising out of the January 2016 fire, and expressly excluding claims against ISI from the scope of its settlement, Marathon filed suit against ISI seeking contractual indemnification for the portion of its settlement payment that was not attributable to its own negligence.  After a jury trial allocating fault for the underlying January 2016 fire took place in May 2023, the trial court issued a judgment for Marathon later that summer. 

On appeal, ISI successfully argued that Marathon’s contractual indemnity claim requested a form of “comparative indemnity” that requires compliance with the express negligence doctrine.  Because the parties’ indemnity provision did not expressly state that ISI would indemnify Marathon when Marathon’s concurrent negligence caused the liability, loss, or damage for which it sought indemnification, ISI argued that the indemnity provision was unenforceable as a matter of law.

The court of appeals agreed and held that Marathon’s request for—and the trial court’s award—of comparative indemnity was not contemplated by the parties’ agreement.  Instead, the court concluded that “the plain language of the parties’ indemnity agreement unambiguously sets forth an ‘exclusion from liability for indemnification’ for liability, loss, or damage attributable to or caused by any negligence—sole, joint, concurrent, or otherwise—of Marathon.”  Because the jury found that Marathon was found 38% responsible for causing the January 2016 fire—more than any other party—its request for indemnification was barred by the plain terms of the contract.  Consequently, the court of appeals reversed the trial court’s judgment in favor of Marathon and rendered a take-nothing judgment in favor of ISI. 

The Liskow trial and appellate team was led by Michael Golemi and J.T. Kittrell, working alongside Wright Close & Barger, LLP as appellate counsel.

Liskow is proud to announce that Shareholder April L. Rolen-Ogden was recently sworn in as the President of the Lafayette/Acadiana Chapter of the Federal Bar Association. The FBA is a leading national organization dedicated to strengthening the federal legal system and supporting the professional development of federal practitioners. In her role as chapter president, April will help guide programs, advocacy efforts, and engagement across the region’s federal bench and bar.

April brings extensive leadership experience to this position. She serves on Liskow’s Board of Directors, leads the firm’s Upstream Industry Group, and co-hosts Energy Law This Week, a podcast focused on developments in energy and the law. Her leadership is backed by years of first-chair trial and appellate work in high-stakes commercial, energy, and environmental litigation.

As a seasoned trial and appellate lawyer, April represents oil and gas companies in complex disputes in state and federal courts, as well as arbitration tribunals. Her work includes traditional oil and gas matters involving royalties, servitudes, unleased owner litigation, title disputes, statutory penalties, joint operations, complex accounting, and gas-marketing issues. She also defends companies in environmental legacy suits, coastal loss claims, personal injury matters, and cases involving fraud, unfair trade practices, and trade secrets.

Liskow is pleased to announce the addition of six associates to the firm.

The firm recently welcomed the following associates:

Jack Aguillard is in the firm’s Business Transactions practice group in the Lafayette office. He represents private companies and individuals in commercial transactions including acquisitions, dispositions, and mergers. In addition, he guides clients through commercial loan projects, corporate governance matters, and business succession planning. Before joining the firm, Jack practiced in the Houston office of an international law firm, where he focused on commercial and acquisition financings, as well as mergers and acquisitions. Jack received his Juris Doctor, summa cum laude, from the Paul M. Hebert Law Center at Louisiana State University in 2023, where he was a member of the Order of the Coif and a Senior Associate of the Louisiana Law Review.

Dominic Berthelot is in the firm’s Commercial Litigation practice group in the New Orleans office. Before joining the firm, Dominic served as a law clerk to the Honorable Jerry Edwards, Jr. of the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana. He also gained experience through clerkships and internships with the Supreme Court of Louisiana, the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana in Lafayette, and several District Attorney’s Offices across the state. Dominic received his Juris Doctor from Loyola University New Orleans College of Law in 2024.

Chelsea Crews is in the firm’s Maritime practice group in the New Orleans office. Before joining Liskow, she served in the legal department of the world’s third largest ocean carrier. Over the course of her time in-house, Chelsea held both litigation and commercial titles while also advising on regulatory matters and providing general legal support to the business. Chelsea litigates complex and high-stakes matters for clients of all types, from vessel owners in commercial disputes to a state government in a billion-dollar allision case. In addition to her litigation practice, Chelsea drafts and negotiates a variety of maritime contracts and advises clients on regulatory matters. She earned her Juris Doctor, cum laude, from Tulane University Law School in 2018 with a certificate in Maritime Law. While in law school, she served as legal extern to the U.S. Coast Guard and to a federal judge and she served on the Tulane Maritime Law Journal.

Parker Jamison is in the firm’s Energy Litigation practice group in the Houston office. Before joining the firm, he represented insurers and their insureds in first- and third-party commercial litigation matters involving damage to commercial property, construction defects, catastrophic personal injury, and defense and indemnity issues. He has also represented clients in worker’s compensation claims under the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act. Parker earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Houston Law Center in 2023. While in law school, he served as Senior Articles Editor for the Houston Journal of Health Law and Policy and as Vice President of the Student Animal Legal Defense Fund.

John LeJeune is in the firm’s Maritime practice group in the Houston office. Prior to joining the firm, he worked for a global technology company as a field engineer on Alaska’s North Slope and in the Gulf of America. He later served as a technical design engineer, where he managed well programs, conducted simulations and risk assessments, prepared technical reports, and coordinated logistics for operations in the Gulf of America. John earned his Juris Doctor from the Paul M. Hebert Law Center at Louisiana State University in 2025. He also holds a Master of Legal Studies in Oil, Gas, and Energy Law from the University of Oklahoma College of Law.

Chelsea Young is in the firm’s Energy Litigation practice group in the New Orleans office. She received her Juris Doctor, cum laude, from Southern University Law Center in 2024, graduating in the top 5% of her class. During law school, Chelsea served as a senior editor of the Journal of Intellectual Property, Technology, and Law and as secretary of the Southern University Trial Advocacy Board. Before joining the firm, Chelsea worked in the Louisiana Department of Education’s Office of Governmental, Administrative, and Public Affairs. She also gained experience as a law clerk with the Orleans Public Defender’s Office.

Landman magazine, in its November/December issue, has published “Separation Anxiety ─ When surface and mineral rights diverge in Louisiana and Texas,” written by Liskow shareholders April L. Rolen-Ogden and Jamie Rhymes. The article explores what owners and operators need to know about the enigmatic Louisiana mineral servitude for operations and ownership in Louisiana verses Texas, including how technological advancements are driving laws in both states to apply in new ways to the separate ownership of surface and mineral rights.

The authors discuss the similarities and differences between the Louisiana mineral servitude from the Texas severance model and explain the unique risks and opportunities that the Louisiana model presents for operators and owners particularly in how the law has been applied in recent Louisiana appellate court decisions. The authors note that “Unlike Texas law, separate ownership of the surface and mineral rights in Louisiana is not permanent. Indeed, a mineral servitude owner is not even required to exercise the mineral servitude he owns.”

The article concludes by noting that “the split between surface and mineral rights has long shaped oil and gas operations in Louisiana and Texas, but the practical realities of servitudes, prescription, accommodation and emerging issues, like pore space and produced water ownership, show that this is an area of law that continues to evolve.” With that in mind, the authors highlight the need to stay vigilant as to how these doctrines are applied.

To read the entire article, please click here.