Hugh retired in 2024. He was primarily engaged in a business law practice focusing on corporations and other business organizations, real property and commercial law and transactions involving those organizations and commercial real estate.
His corporate and commercial practice focused on the representation of corporations, partnerships and limited liability companies with respect to corporate and business governance, corporate finance, private equity funding, the purchase and sale of businesses, mergers and joint ventures and general business advice.
In real estate transactions, Hugh represented equity investors, lenders and large private landowners on development projects, financing transactions, joint ventures and the purchase and sale of developed and undeveloped real estate.
His healthcare practice focused primarily on the representation of life care facilities, nursing homes and other ambulatory care facilities and physician groups with a current emphasis on practice management, risk management and reimbursement issues. He has worked with hospitals and hospital medical staffs on medical staff bylaws and represented physicians with medical staff issues.
Experience
- Negotiated the separate but concurrent sale of a 70-store chain of convenience stores, the petroleum gas transport business servicing this chain of stores and other third party dealers, and the distributor's propane gas and fuel oil delivery business to several buyers.
- Negotiated the construction, long-term financing and numerous refinancings for the construction and expansion of a 20-story high rise, life-care facility located on the Chesapeake Bay, the construction contracts for this facility, the life-care agreements used by residents to purchase their units and various operating agreements and contracts.
- Reorganized the debt structure of large farming operation by negotiating new long-term debt and line of credit financings with financial institutions, the extension of existing commercial debt and the subordination of existing debt to Farmers Home Administration.
- Represented a substantial equity investor in the purchase of a mid-size office building in Norfolk, Virginia with assumed and refinanced loan of $5,285,000, the formation of separate limited liability companies to facilitate this transaction and the negotiation of co-tenancy and management agreements with managing owner.
- Represented two of four equity investors in purchasing a large apartment project in Greenville, South Carolina with an equity investment of $4,500,000 and a loan of $12,000,000, the formation of several separate limited liability companies to facilitate this transaction and the negotiation of co-tenancy and management agreements with managing owners.
- Represented a development group in purchasing a 120 acre industrial park on the Eastern Shore of Virginia from a joint county and town industrial development authority and the negotiation of leases to provide access to the adjacent harbor waterfront, the organization of a limited liability company providing for multiple investors with substantial equity investment and additional financing for this project through a bank in Maryland.
- Represented numerous owners of real estate in connection with the property sales and the acquisition of replacement property in like-kind exchange transactions qualifying under § 1031 of the Internal Revenue Code.
- Negotiated the leveraged buyout from a British concern of its industrial gas equipment division by several key employees and the Bank financing necessary to consummate this transaction.
- Negotiated the formation of a joint venture limited liability company between Virginia's largest primary care group and Trigon Blue Cross/Blue Shield to provide primary care at ambulatory care centers in the Richmond and South Hampton Roads areas of Virginia.
- Negotiated the integration of several large primary care and specialist groups to provide outpatient medical care for Johns Hopkins Health System Corporation and The Johns Hopkins University in the Baltimore metropolitan area of Maryland.
- Organized U.S. corporate subsidiaries of many large, foreign organizations opening offices in Virginia.
- Negotiated the purchase of a number of automobile franchises with attendant financing.
- Negotiated and documented a long-term agreement for the distribution of a U.S. manufacturer's industrial products throughout South America by several European companies.
- Handled numerous private placements of debt and equity securities for small companies and negotiated numerous asset based loans and lines of credit for these businesses.
- Organized all types of business concerns and negotiated numerous shareholder agreements to facilitate the organization and operation of close corporations.
- Organized a health care system consisting of a holding company and a number of nonprofit and for-profit subsidiaries which included bylaw provisions to insure holding company control and prepared filings to obtain Internal Revenue Service approval.