Paul R. Glassman

  • Of Counsel
  • Chair, Bankruptcy and Restructuring 
  • Los Angeles

As chair of Stradling’s Bankruptcy and Financial Restructuring team, Paul Glassman has earned a reputation as one of the country’s leading insolvency and restructuring lawyers and has handled numerous complex and precedent-setting corporate and municipal insolvency cases.

For several decades, Paul has guided international corporations, portfolio companies, strategic buyers, mutual funds, cities and counties through all facets of a reorganization, from restructurings to workouts, bankruptcies, foreclosures, financings, distressed mergers and acquisitions and related litigation.  He has represented purchasers, creditors' committees, secured creditors, unsecured creditors, debtors, landlords, equity sponsors, trustees, and other parties from every aspect of complex restructuring and virtually every sector of the economy.

Paul achieves results that are regularly lauded by his clients and peers.  He has frequently lectured to various insolvency organizations including the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges, the American Bankruptcy Institute, the California Bankruptcy Forum, as well as at law schools and city attorney and county counsel associations.  His numerous thought provoking articles have appeared in publications including the American Bankruptcy Law Journal, the American Bankruptcy Institute Journal, the Norton Bankruptcy Advisor and the Business Lawyer.

Some highlights of Paul’s career include:

Paul served as lead counsel for the City of San Bernardino, California as the third-largest city in the country to file a chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy case.  The case, which enabled the city to cut $350 million in debt and expenses, is regarded as the most significant and highest-profile bankruptcy case in Southern California in the past decade.

Paul acted as lead counsel for the official subcommittee of Orange County cities and the City of Irvine in the chapter 9 bankruptcy case of Orange County, which resulted in the collection of more than $1 billion for the cities, and later represented Orange County in winding down and closing the case.  The case is one of the largest municipal bankruptcy cases ever filed.

Paul acted as lead bankruptcy counsel to the South San Joaquin Irrigation District in the PG&E bankruptcy case as a potential acquiror of retail-distributions assets valued at over $100 million dollars and litigation concerning the potential acquisition.

Paul was lead counsel for BlackRock Financial affiliated funds in restructuring hundreds of millions of dollars in mezzanine debt and senior CMBS debt secured by commercial real estate in the Bay Area.

Paul served as lead counsel for MemorialCare healthcare systems group as a major creditor and counterparty in a series of large hospital and health care plan bankruptcy cases in Southern California, including Verity, Watts Health Foundation, and as the unsecured largest creditor, and  creditors' committee chair in the chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy case of Valley Health Systems, a health care district in Riverside County.

Credentials

Education
  • Stanford Law School, J.D., 1977
  • University of Pennsylvania, M.A., economics, 1974
  • University of Pennsylvania, B.A., magna cum laude, 1974
  • American Bar Association
  • Los Angeles County Bar Association (past board member; past chair; Bankruptcy Committee)
  • American Bankruptcy Institute
  • Los Angeles Bankruptcy Forum
  • Financial Lawyers Conference
  • Century City Bar Association (past president)
  • Phi Beta Kappa
  • California
  • District of Columbia