David T. Sykes [ Of Counsel ]
Duane Morris LLP
30 South 17th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103-4196
USA
Phone: 215.979.1500
Fax: 215.979.1020
Email:
Sykes@duanemorris.com
David T. Sykes practices in the areas of business reorganization and bankruptcy, insurance company rehabilitation, corporate and commercial finance, professional guidance, arbitration, mediation and commercial trial and appellate work. Mr. Sykes directed the firm's representation of creditors and debtors in workouts and bankruptcies throughout the country for more than 35 years. He was also managing partner and vice chairman of the firm for a decade.
Recent experiences include: service as sole arbitrator in commercial matters; expert witness in several litigation matters; and counsel to venture capital firms with troubled investments.
Mr. Sykes has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America for 20 years, and was ranked in a poll of Pennsylvania lawyers conducted by Law & Politics Media and Philadelphia magazine as one of the top 100 lawyers in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania. In the Chambers USA: Guide to America's Leading Business Lawyers, Duane Morris is listed as having one of the top three insolvency practices in Pennsylvania and Mr. Sykes is described as "one of the deans of the Pennsylvania bar." He is certified as a business bankruptcy specialist by the American Board of Certification. A charter fellow and Chair of the American College of Bankruptcy, he is also a fellow of the American College of Investment Counsel and the American Bar Foundation. He is a past chair of the American Bar Association Business Bankruptcy Committee's Secured Creditors Subcommittee and has served as chair of the Business Law Section and the Committee on Banking and Financial Institutions of the Philadelphia Bar Association. He is a member of the American Bar Association's Center for Professional Responsibility, the International Insolvency Institute and the Philadelphia Bar Association's Professional Guidance Committee. Mr. Sykes is the co-founder of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Bankruptcy Conference, of which he is a past chair, and he was the first president and a co-founder of the Consumer Bankruptcy Assistance Project. He is a past chair of the Committee of Seventy, a nonpartisan political watchdog group dedicated to advancing good government in the Philadelphia region.
A frequent lecturer on bankruptcy law for various professional associations, such as the American College of Bankruptcy, the American Bar Association and the Pennsylvania Bar Institute, Mr. Sykes has also been a lecturer in law at Temple University School of Law. He has authored numerous articles on bankruptcy and commercial law.
Mr. Sykes is a graduate of Temple University School of Law and Hamilton College. He served as a shipboard officer in the United States Navy from 1959 to 1962. After 42 years with Duane Morris LLP, Mr. Sykes will continue the active practice of law as of counsel to the firm in 2007.
Areas Of Practice
- Banking Law
- Bankruptcy and Insolvency Law
- Business Reorganization
- Commercial Litigation
- Corporate and Commercial Finance
- Corporate Law
- Surety and Other Bonding Claims
- Uniform Commercial Code
- Professional Responsibility
- Mediation and Arbitration
- Insurance Insolvency
Professional Activities
- Certified Business Bankruptcy Specialist, American Board of Certification
- Planning Committee, Pennsylvania Bar Institute's Fourth Annual Bankruptcy Institute, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, August 12, 1999
- American Bar Association
- Business Law Section
--Business Bankruptcy Committee
---Past Chair, Secured Creditors Subcommittee - Pennsylvania Bar Association
- Corporation, Banking and Business Law Section - Philadelphia Bar Association
- Professional Guidance Committee
- Past Member, Board of Governors
- Chairman, Business Law Section, 1983
- Chairman, Banking and Financial Institutions Committee, 1989 - American College of Bankruptcy
- Charter Fellow
- President, 2005-2007
- Director, 2001-2005
- Vice President, 1997-2001
- Past Member, Board of Regents - American College of Investment Counsel
- Fellow - Commercial Law League of America
- Eastern District of Pennsylvania Bankruptcy Conference
- Co-Founder and Past Chair - International Bar Association
- Business Law Section
-- Banking Law Committee
-- Insolvency and Creditor's Rights Committee - Association of Commercial Finance Attorneys
- American Bankruptcy Institute
Admissions
- Pennsylvania
- Supreme Court of the United States
- United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
- United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
- Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
Education
- Temple University School of Law, LL.B., 1965