Annual Business Law Seminar 2025

Why Attend?

This seminar will:

• Demystify the legal and strategic aspects of poison pills, covering how they work, when they should be used, and their effectiveness in deterring aggressive acquisition attempts.
• Review key features and compliance obligations associated with Virginia’s consumer data privacy law.
• Provide updates on new state data privacy laws slated to go into effect in 2025.
• Give participants practical tips on how to navigate complex and novel data privacy issues in an ever-evolving regulatory environment.
• Furnish practical tools for business growth, efficiency, and maintaining well-being, ensuring long-term professional and personal fulfillment.

Join your colleagues at our informative full-day program! Our faculty will provide updates and guidance on topics that are vital to business law practitioners in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Take advantage of the opportunity to network in person and connect with your colleagues, old and new. Lunch which will be provided for on-site attendees.

Registration Deadlines:

Cancellation Policy: Cancellation/transfer requests will be honored until 5:00 p.m. the day preceding the seminar. You will, however, be charged $90 if you cancel or transfer your registration to a different seminar after the link to the materials has been e-mailed by Virginia CLE^®.

Full refunds or transfers are available up to two days after a webcast in the unlikely event that you experience technical difficulties.

Dietary Restrictions: If you have dietary restrictions and are attending the seminar in person, please email tfitzgerald@vacle.org.

Inclement Weather Policy and Updates.

MCLE Credit Caveat: The MCLE Board measures credits by the time you spend in attendance. If you enter a seminar late or leave it early, or both, you must reflect those adjustments accurately in the credits you report on your credit reporting form. A code will be given at the end of the seminar, which must be written on your MCLE form.

Can’t Attend?

E-mail distance_ed@vacle.org to be notified when/if this program is made available as an online or USB seminar.
E-mail publications@vacle.org to be notified when/if this program’s seminar materials are made available for sale.

Course Schedule

• Q&A will be handled via chat room for Webcast attendees.
• Q&A will be handled via e-mail for telephone seminar attendees.

Faculty

Patrick J. Austin, Woods Rogers / Richmond

Stephen T. Gannon, Davis Wright Tremaine LLP / Richmond

Faisal Moghul, Fox & Moghul—Attorneys at Law / Fairfax

Bruce H. Russell, II, Bruce H. Russell II, P.C. / Lebanon

Moderator

Bruce H. Russell, II, Bruce H. Russell II, P.C. / Lebanon

About the Speakers

Patrick J. Austin, Woods Rogers / Richmond

Patrick Austin focuses exclusively on cybersecurity and data privacy issues. His clients span industries such as banking, healthcare, manufacturing, high-tech, and energy. Mr. Austin helps clients navigate complex and novel regulatory compliance issues associated with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act (VCDPA), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), and other information technology laws and frameworks.

Mr. Austin’s credentials in the field of cybersecurity and data privacy law are extensive. He is a Certified Information Privacy Professional in both U.S. and European law (CIPP/US & CIPP/E) by International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP), which is accredited by the American Bar Association.

Mr. Austin received his undergraduate degree from Old Dominion University and his law degree from George Mason University School of Law where he served as Editor-in-Chief of the National Security Law Journal.

Stephen T. Gannon, Davis Wright Tremaine, LLP / Richmond

Steve Gannon is a financial services industry leader who has previously served as a senior legal executive at Citizens Financial Group, Capital One Financial Corporation, and Wachovia Securities. He has spent the last two decades as an advisor on the highest levels of strategic decision-making for several of the country’s largest financial institutions. Mr. Gannon previously served as the general counsel of Citizens Financial Group, the nation’s 12th largest retail and commercial bank, where he served on the executive committee and directed all legal, corporate governance, corporate transactions, government relations, regulatory relations, and litigation functions for the company. He advises the banking industry on regulatory and strategic matters ranging from public policy and corporate governance to litigation, compliance, and administrative actions. He also focuses on helping the industry adapt to and stay on top of the burgeoning fintech and digital asset spaces, about which he speaks and writes frequently.

Faisal Moghul, Fox & Moghul—Attorneys at Law / Fairfax

Faisal Moghul’s accomplishments in the areas of business and commercial litigation are extensive and distinguished. He was selected into the elite group of America’s Top 100 Civil Defense Litigators (2021–2023), named among the Virginia Lawyers Weekly “Go-To” Business Litigation Lawyers (2023), and has been consistently featured on the prestigious Super Lawyers Rising Stars shortlist every year since 2016.

Mr. Moghul is a prolific author whose works have received critical acclaim in both state and national media. He is a regular contributor to several premier legal publications, including LexisNexis and the American Law Institute. He recently co-authored a notable publication with the American Law Institute on “Direct vs Derivative Claims: Permitting Direct Shareholder Actions for Closely Held Corporations” (July 2022), which explores and analyzes critical issues related to recovery of damages in derivative litigation.

Mr. Moghul has extensive experience in “business divorce” cases involving dissolution, valuation, and other disputes among co-owners of closely held business entities, such as limited liability companies, corporations, and partnerships. He represents both majority and minority shareholders/members/partners and frequently counsels business owners prior to litigation, assisting them in designing and negotiating complex buyouts, sales, and division of business assets.

As a former member of the American Bar Association’s Committee on LLCs, Partnerships, and Unincorporated Entities, Mr. Moghul has substantial experience in designing complex asset protection structures involving a combination of different business entities for high-net-worth individuals and executives in the real estate, technology, and retail industries.

In addition to his litigation and advisory roles, Mr. Moghul was the Moderator and a Presenter at the Annual Business Law Seminar in both 2023 and 2024. His presentation last year, “Protecting LLC Assets: Understanding Charging Orders and Asset Protection Strategies,” was well-received and highlighted his deep expertise in LLC law.

Bruce H. Russell, II, Bruce H. Russell II, P.C. / Lebanon

Bruce Russell has practiced law for more than twenty years, mainly in the courts of his native Southwest Virginia. In that time, he has been a prosecutor, law professor, member of a small firm, and solo practitioner, and is proud of his service to his Commonwealth and community in each of these roles. Currently, Mr. Russell has a large and diverse general practice, and represents both individuals and businesses in numerous matters, from business formation to contract disputes and beyond. In recognition of his extensive and continuing service to the bench, bar, and public, he was named the 2023 Virginia State Bar Local Bar Leader of the Year.

Mr. Russell graduated from Richlands High School, the University of Virginia (where he served on the Honor Committee and its Executive Committee as Chairman of the Bad Check Committee), and the University of Richmond’s T.C. Williams School of Law. He began his legal career in Charlottesville at the turn of the century with the boutique firm of Thompson & Hagy, focusing on representing small high-tech companies, primarily start-ups. He soon returned to the hills of his youth in Southwest Virginia pursuing an opportunity to join the Buchanan County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office as that office’s only full-time assistant. While there, he prosecuted everything from murder to the theft of fighting roosters. Shortly after arriving in Grundy, the Appalachian School of Law brought him onboard as an adjunct faculty member at the then-fledgling school.

Returning to private practice in 2003, Mr. Russell joined the law firm of Bolling & Hearl (eventually Bolling Hearl Russell), working out of Abingdon and Richlands, plus parts in-between. He established his own firm in 2009, sharing space in Lebanon with the Hall-of-Fame attorney Steve Quillen. Currently, he serves as President of the Russell County Bar, the 28th Circuit Criminal Defense Bar, and the Patrick Henry American Inn of Court.  He is also Chairman of the Southwest Virginia Law Foundation and serves on the Board of Southwest Virginia Legal Aid. He is a member of the Virginia State Bar Council, as well as that body’s Executive Committee. Additionally, he serves on the VSB Special Committee on Bench-Bar Relations and is a faculty member of the Harry L. Carrico Professionalism Course. He is a member of the Boyd-Graves Conference.

Mr. Russell has been named a Fellow of the Virginia Law Foundation, and a Virginia Lawyers Weekly Leader in the Law. He is rated AV Preeminent by Martindale-Hubbell.