Four from BCLP named to 2024 LCLD programs

BCLP is excited to announce that Partner Angelia Duncan has been named a member of the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD) 2024 Fellows Program, a landmark program created to identify, train, and advance the next generation of legal professionals. Fellows have distinguished themselves by being deeply engaged, indispensable to key clients and teams, invested in attorney mentoring and professional development, and on a trajectory toward leadership positions.

Angelia is the managing partner of the firm's Charlotte office. She is a commercial litigator whose practice focuses on a wide range of business and real estate disputes and the advising of membership organizations. She also represents and advises on matters involving servicers and special servicers. Angelia frequently litigates claims arising out of business and servicing relationships before state and federal courts across the country. She has also handled a vast array of property and construction-related disputes throughout Georgia and North Carolina, representing lenders, investors, property owners, and contractors in loan default, eminent domain, foreclosure, and issues related to nonpayment, defective construction, and defective design for contractors, design-builders, subcontractors nationwide.

Angelia serves as outside counsel to an international membership-based organization with over 80,000 members and advises on various pre-litigation and active litigation matters in that capacity. In addition to her role as managing partner, Angelia also served as co-chair of BCLP's Race and Ethnicity Inclusion Network (REIN) and sits on the firm's U.S. Women's Leadership Board. She is committed to pro bono work and community service outside the firm. She has volunteered at the Cobb Justice Foundation, assisting victims of domestic violence in obtaining protective orders, and the Atlanta Volunteer Lawyers Foundation. In addition, Angelia previously served on the Corporate Board of Directors for the Boys and Girls Club of Metro Atlanta, Partnership Against Domestic Violence. She was a two-term member of the Mecklenburg County Bar's Diversity and Inclusion Committee in Charlotte.

Additionally, associates Brigid Ndege, Kathryn Scott, and Olaniyi Solebo were selected to participate in the 2024 LCLD Pathfinder mentoring program. This program is designed to train early career attorneys in critical career development strategies, including leadership and the building of professional networks. Pathfinders are identified as early-career emerging leaders who have distinguished—or have the potential to distinguish—themselves within their organizations.

Brigid Nedge is a finance transactions associate in the firm's Chicago office. She has experience representing corporate clients in restructuring and insolvency proceedings, out-of-court loan workouts and restructurings, and corporate litigation matters. This representation includes contested bankruptcy matters such as plan objections, claim objections, objections to discharge, preference, and fraudulent transfer actions. Brigid regularly represents debtors, equity holders, and other secured and unsecured creditors.

In addition to her bankruptcy and insolvency matters, Brigid has experience successfully representing clients across various industries in complex litigation matters, including trade secret and restrictive covenants, breach of contract, issues pertaining to state court receivers, and fiduciary issues.

Before joining BCLP, Brigid handled commercial litigation, bankruptcy and insolvency matters, and served as a judicial law clerk in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Illinois. She also has experience working at a legal services organization as a consumer attorney.

Kathryn Scott is a labor and employment associate in the firm's St. Louis office. She focuses her practice on employer-side labor and employment law, including traditional labor, compliance counseling, best practices, employee policies, and human resources training. She represents businesses in disputes alleging wage and hour violations, discrimination, harassment, retaliation, wrongful termination, and similar claims.

Olaniyi Solebo is an associate in the litigation & dispute resolution and appellate & supreme Court practice groups in the firm's San Francisco office. He specializes in mass torts and class actions. He has experience advising a diverse range of clients on several sophisticated issues, including environmental litigation and enforcement defense, intellectual property disputes, and antitrust and competition matters.

Previously, Olaniyi served as a law clerk to Judge Charles R. Wilson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and Judge Matthew F. Kennelly of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Before attending law school, Olaniyi was a Teach for America corps member. He maintains an active pro bono practice and has successfully represented indigenous clients on appeal in both state and federal courts.

Founded in 2009, LCLD is a growing organization of more than 400 corporate chief legal officers and law firm managing partners who are personally committed to creating an inclusive legal profession. The organization's programs are designed to attract, inspire, and nurture talent, thereby helping a new generation of attorneys reach leadership positions. LCLD strives to produce tangible results in legal institutions and works to promote inclusiveness in our organizations, our circles of influence, and our society, with the ultimate goal of building a more equitable legal profession.

BCLP has been a member of LCLD since its inception and has been named one of the LCLD Top Performers every year since 2016. The annual designation goes to those LCLD members who have committed the most time and energy to participating in LCLD programs. The firm has had a partner or attorney in the LCLD Fellows Program each year and was an early participant in the LCLD Pathfinder Program. In addition, the firm has participated in the 1L LCLD Scholars Program each year since 2013 and has joined the annual LCLD Success in Law School Mentoring Program since 2012.