By DIMITAR GANEV From CDR

A litigator specialising in cross-border insolvency disputes has jumped to Kobre & Kim in London from the Cayman Islands office of Mourant Ozannes.

Litigation-focused firm Kobre & Kim has hired Mark Griffiths in its bankruptcy and debtor-creditor disputes team in London. He has joined from the Cayman Islands office of offshore firmMourant Ozannes, where he worked as counsel for a year.

Prior to that, Griffiths spent four years as senior counsel at Proskauer Rose’s London office, and a year as counsel at defunct firm Dewey & LeBoeuf. His experience also includes a three-year stint at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, where he co-founded its London insolvency and restructuring practice.

Griffiths’ practice revolves around multi-jurisdictional insolvency disputes, with a particular specialism in fraud, corporate investigations and asset recovery.

He represents financial institutions, funds, accounting companies, market intermediaries, corporate executives and high-net-worth individuals, and conducts investigations relating to debt recovery, wind-up proceedings, assignment of claims and retention of title disputes. He also assists corporates with arbitration and litigation involving shareholder claims, and product liability and competition issues.

Griffiths’ clients include Bank of America’s creditors’ committees, the statutory creditors’ committees of defunct financial derivatives broker MF Global Holdings and the board of directors of automobile manufacturer Renault.

The move comes after Kobre expanded its bankruptcy and debtor-creditor disputes unit in New York with the March addition of Farrington Yates, who joined after nearly 15 years at Dentons, where he most recently served as a co-chair of that firm’s United States restructuring, insolvency and bankruptcy practice.

In October, the firm hired former US Department of Justice (DoJ) prosecutor Robert Watsonas a partner in its Latin America team in Miami, and Alexander Heylin from offshore firmCayman Law in its British Virgin Islands office.

The firm’s previous London hire took effect in July, when Jason Masimore, also a former DoJ prosecutor, joined the government enforcement and investigations team.

Offshore firms have recently been keen on recruiting insolvency disputes practitioners, with Ogieradding counsel Alex Horsbrugh-Porter and associate Michael Rogers in February, andConyers Dill & Pearman hiring counsel Bernadette Carey in January.

For more on this story go to: https://www.cdr-news.com/categories/people-and-firms/7229-ex-cayman-insolvency-litigator-joins-kobre-in-london