Rusty Hardin's Comments About Lara

Lara grew up in Houston and comes from a family of lawyers. She received her undergraduate degree from Baylor University and then attended Baylor Law School. After graduating second in her class from Baylor, she clerked for Judge Sam D. Johnson on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. After completing this clerkship, she and Derek Hollingsworth, another attorney at the firm, married. They then both clerked at the Texas Supreme Court. She worked with Justice James A. Baker. After finishing their clerkships, Derek and Lara moved to Dallas. Lara went to work for Carrington, Coleman, Sloman & Blumenthal, P.C. and did both litigation and appellate work. She returned home to Houston in June 2000, and went to work as an appellate attorney at her family's firm, Hudgins, Hudgins, and Warrick, P.C. She continued to do appellate work there until her daughter, Carter, was born in February 2003, at which time she took temporary leave from the practice to stay at home with Carter. She has now returned to practice to work with us. Derek and Lara also have two sons, Beck and Rafe.

Lara is uniquely qualified to help us with our appellate and legal briefing needs and has done so with outstanding results in the capacity of "of counsel." She successfully defended Rice University in an appeal by a student suspended for cheating, and she assisted us in much of the appellate work in the Arthur Andersen civil cases, which included a successful mandamus action before the Texas Fourteenth Court of Appeals and the resulting briefing in response to a petition for review filed in the Texas Supreme Court. She has been immeasurably valuable in taking the lead in the briefing and general legal work in our representation of LifeGift, an organ donor organization with frequent and varied legal issues with governmental agencies.