Candace B. "Candi" Peeples

Dana Thrasher specializes in ERISA, regularly advising employers, trustees and service providers concerning qualified retirement plans, non-qualified plans, fringe benefits, welfare benefits and executive compensation issues. She has developed significant expertise in the ERISA/employee benefits practice area, representing a large and diverse client base. She regularly advises clients regarding planning and evaluating benefit programs, establishing and administering employee benefit plans, mo...

Parker Griffin regularly represents creditors in both bankruptcy cases and out-of-court workouts and debt restructurings, much of which involve real estate and other forms of asset-based lending. Parker currently serves as the chair of the Creditors’ Rights Subcommittee for the American Bar Association, and previously served as the co-vice chair of the subcommittee from 2014 to 2017. In his representation of creditors, Parker is routinely involved in insolvency and bankruptcy-related li...

James Webb’s primary areas of practice include the representation of lenders, borrowers, developers and companies in all aspects of commercial real estate transactions throughout the United States, including lending, leasing, development, acquisitions and dispositions. In his lending practice, James represents both lenders and borrowers on acquisition, construction and permanent financing, with an emphasis on real estate secured financing. While he has experience in the representation o...

DAN McCRARY is a partner at Balch & Bingham LLP, where he serves as Chair of the Energy Practice Group. Over the course of his career, he has represented energy companies in a wide variety of regulatory, transactional and litigated matters. These include numerous proceedings before the FERC involving rate filings, complaints, market-based rate authority (including triennial screens and Delivered Price Test analyses), energy auctions, affiliate transactions, transmission tariffs, fuel buyo...

Bill Athanas represents companies and individuals in government enforcement matters, focusing on federal grand jury investigations. He has almost 30 years of white-collar experience, roughly a third of which was spent as a federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C. and Birmingham. Bill has handled hundreds of complex criminal cases and represented clients in all facets of those matters – whether as subjects, targets or witnesses, or those who simply receive subpoenas for documents. In repre...

Jess Nix is a top attorney recognized by Best Lawyers in the practice area(s) of Commercial Litigation. Jess, who practices law in Birmingham, Alabama, has been recognized since 2026. This recognition is based on an exhaustive peer-review survey, reflecting the high esteem in which Jess is held by other top lawyers in the same geographic and legal practice area.

Daniel James Ruth is a top attorney recognized by Best Lawyers in the practice area(s) of Corporate Law and Tax Law. Daniel James, who practices law in Birmingham, Alabama, has been recognized since 2026. This recognition is based on an exhaustive peer-review survey, reflecting the high esteem in which Daniel James is held by other top lawyers in the same geographic and legal practice area.

Gerald Burnett practices on a multi-regional basis in all areas of commercial real estate, tax-free exchanges, tax law and disputes, commercial transactions, timber law and wealth transfer planning. He has had substantial experience in the litigation of tax controversies, having tried jury and non-jury tax cases in eight states. He has served as lead counsel in, negotiated and closed commercial real estate transactions in eighteen states. Some of his out-of-state work includes commercial proj...

Chris was born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama on October 2, 1968. He attended college at the University of Alabama and graduated with a B.A. in business in 1990. Upon graduation, he entered the University of Alabama School of Law and obtained his J.D. Degree in 1993. While in law school, he served as the student representative to the Board of Trustees. He was admitted to practice law in the State of Alabama in 1993, and the State of Colorado in 1994. Since obtaining his law license in the State of Al...

George M. “Jack” Neal, Jr., Counsel in Dentons Sirote’s Birmingham, Alabama office, where he is a member of the Litigation and Dispute Resolution practice group. Jack regularly serves as mediator and arbitrator in civil cases of all kinds, excluding domestic relations. He is also a certified appellate mediator and serves on numerous panels of neutrals for arbitration and mediation. Jack practices general civil litigation in both state and federal courts. He has represented m...