Meet the Team
Brent Coon
With humble, blue collar beginnings, Brent Coon earned his Doctor of Jurisprudence from the University of Houston Law Center in less than two years and began his law career in 1986. He quickly rose to become a partner in a leading litigation firm in Southeast Texas. Excelling in trial litigation, Mr. Coon became board certified by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization in Personal Injury Trial Law and by the National Board of Trial Advocacy in civil trial law.
Mr. Coon is considered a “lawyer’s lawyer” in seeking justice for his clients and has received national recognition for his work in advancing asbestos and tobacco litigation. His peers acknowledge “his commitment to the legal community and his clients" and that he "has and always will continue to buttress the integrity of our legal system”
As Lead Counsel on what many consider one of the most important public policy cases of the past decade, Brent Coon stood against British Petroleum, taking the worst industrial accident since 1989 and the fight for industry change all the way to the Texas Supreme Court. Mr. Coon’s firm reviewed over seven million documents and worked hand-in-hand with the Department of Justice and U.S. Chemical Safety Board, spending millions to ensure justice for his client, Eva Rowe, who had lost both of her parents in the tragic explosion.
By refusing to allow BP to seal the documents as part of the settlement, Mr. Coon was able to hold an entire industry accountable for its mistakes. As a key part of the settlement, Brent Coon forced BP to give 32 million dollars to universities and charities, which has been considered a dawn of a new age of dispute resolution by media and journalists worldwide. Finally, Brent Coon wrote the “Remember The 15 Bill” to forever improve refinery safety conditions, and introduced it into the Texas Legislature during a ceremony held at the Capitol, commemorating the second anniversary of the blast that killed 15 people.
For his efforts, Mr. Coon was named “Lawyer of the Year” in 2007 and was awarded the prestigious Steven J. Sharp Award for Excellence by the American Association of Justice.
In the last year, Brent Coon has been featured, interviewed, or served as an expert for 60 Minutes, Good Morning America, The Today Show, CBS Early Show, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, Financial Times, Houston Chronicle, The Fox News Channel, BBC radio, Business Week, Time Magazine, Agence France-Presse, CNN, Reuters, Dow Jones, Bloomberg, The Associated Press and many others.
Mr. Coon remains active in various trial organizations, including: serving on the board of directors; Legislative Task Force; Sustaining Member and Fellow with the Texas Trial Lawyers Association; Executive Committee Member and past President of the Southeast Texas Trial Lawyers Association; Leaders forum and Labor Liaison Committee member of the American Association of Justice (AAJ). He has also been admitted to the Texas Bar Foundation, an elite academy of noted attorneys whose members gain entrance by invitation only.
John Thomas
Mr. Thomas, a graduate of the South Texas College of Law, has over 20 years of experience practicing law in Texas and Mississippi. He has been an insurance and asbestos defense attorney, an asbestos plaintiff's attorney, and a personal injury attorney. John has also worked with various unions and currently works with the Texas Municipal Police Association (TMPA). He states that his passion is for “helping people” and he relishes the ability to do that every day.
Philip Kanayan
Mr. Kanayan,a graduate of the South Texas College of Law has been practicing law in the state of Texas for over a decade. Philip oversees one of the largest nationwide asbestos dockets at Brent Coon & Associates. In addition to his role with the National Attorney Network, Philip focuses on centralizing the firm’s entire docket and using a multijurisdictional approach to spread defendants out and leverage the docket with its strongest cases.
Philip is a trial lawyer at heart and emphasizes that defendants must know that you’re willing to go all the way to trial in order to obtain the best results for the client. His aggressive approach and fundamental understanding of the business aspects of litigation makes Philip a standout amongst his peers.
“When you’re overseeing an entire docket rather than focusing on independent cases, it’s important to be able to see the big picture,” said Kanayan. “To be a good trial lawyer, you have to be emotionally invested in the client, but it’s also important to follow logical business principles too.”
Philip said he learned his business acumen from his father, a longtime executive at Shell. His grandfather, a Military General, was an Armenian war hero, so Philip’s ability to lead and direct a large scale docket almost seems hereditary.
Jay Jackson
Jay Jackson is bringing all of his 12 years of legal communications, technology and business development experience into play for BCA's National Attorney Network.
Communications - A veteran of the PR wars against oil giant BP, he serves as Mr. Coon's right-hand man as the two remain at the epicenter of nation news network in the on-going oil spill litigation. With regular of appearances on CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, the two work seamlessly to craft an image and messages that make BCA the go-to "experts" for the media. Mr. Jackson is credited with creating the Rapid Response Drill inside of the legal community, and with his team, can have a website launched, disseminate media alerts and press releases and hold a full national press conference within hours after a major news event. As the Communications Director for BCA, Mr. Jackson oversees relationships with hundreds major news reporters from the New York Times to CBS's 60 Minutes and can bring the "big guns" in for issues important to the National Attorney Network.
Technology - As the founder and CEO of I-DEP, the landmark Internet Deposition company, Mr. Jackson developed several groundbreaking legal technologies including a remote deposition service used by over 25% of the Fortune 100 and the auto-synching of transcripts to video. He holds the US Patent's on them to this day.
Business Development - Within weeks of the oil spill Mr. Jackson assembled a Joint Venture Partner approach to merging and unifying BCA's unequalled experience unique skill sets to fighting BP into an associated campaign with over 15 JV partners. From pooling and overseeing marketing materials and media buying, to generating hundreds of viable leads per week through effective campaign management, Mr. Jackson helped BCA remain at the center of the action. Redesigning BCA's intake department, procedures and reporting capabilities, Mr. Jackson turned a case-by-case system into an efficient processing system with top-tier tracking and reporting capabilities. For National Attorney Network, this means our partners will know the status of each and every case, lead and potential opportunity at all times.
Since 2009, Mr Jackson and his team have one 3 prominent national awards for excellence in legal marketing and on-line strategies. And having published numerous articles on legal marketing and communications and having several more written about him, Mr. Jackson continues to push the envelope as to what can be done for an effective legal network.
