Airline Pilot Central Forums

On a happy note, we now have a law firm retained for our possible merger. Who are we merging with again?

The Comair Merger Committee is pleased to announce its retention of one of the nation's top law firms and attorneys to represent the pilots of Comair as they prepare for a potential merger. Bredhoff and Kaiser, a prestigious Washington, D.C.-based firm with a specialty in labor law, is being retained to represent the ALPA pilots of Comair.

Jeffrey R. Freund will lead the Bredhoff and Kaiser team of attorneys working on behalf of the pilots of Comair. Freund is considered to be one of the nation’s premier labor attorneys. He is a frequent lecturer on airline industry labor matters, including mergers, bankruptcies, and negotiations.

Freund has been a member of Bredhoff and Kaiser and its predecessor firms since 1977. He received his BA with honors from Northwestern University in 1967 and his JD from the University of California at Berkeley (Boalt Hall) in 1970, where he was the executive editor of the California Law Review. He served as a law clerk to Judge Alphonso Zirpoli of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (1970–1971) and then was hired as legal assistant to Commissioner Nicholas Johnson on the Federal Communications Commission (1971–1972).

From 1972 to 1977, Freund worked at the District of Columbia Public Defender Service, where he tried dozens of jury cases and argued numerous appeals. In his last year at PDS, he was training director, running the new-lawyer training program and supervising these new lawyers in their early cases. Freund has served as a member of the District of Columbia Board on Professional Responsibility (1984–1991), an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law School, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Visitors Services Center, a District of Columbia nonprofit that provides social services to the families of District residents awaiting trial in the DC jail.

Over the past 30 years Freund has represented international and local unions in the entertainment, baking, airline, hospitality, newspaper, construction, steel, rail, bus, and service industries in negotiations, litigation (both trial and appellate and before courts, administrative agencies and arbitrators) and as general counsel. He is currently the general counsel of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union and the American Federation of Musicians.

The law firm of Bredhoff and Kaiser and Mr. Freund have had extensive dealings with the pilots of ALPA and the airline industry. In the 1980s, the firm was retained by a number of ALPA MEC merger committees in connection with mergers and consolidations that were then taking place. Their first such representation was of the Delta Air Lines Merger Committee in connection with Delta’s acquisition of Western Airlines, the largest airline merger in which seniority issues were resolved by negotiations rather than by arbitration. They continued to represent the Delta Merger Committee in a subsequent dispute over the meaning of the merger agreement and in connection with Delta’s acquisition of certain Pan Am routes and equipment, and to this day they serve as the Delta pilots’ merger counsel.

Bredhoff and Kaiser also is merger counsel to the United Airlines Merger Committee. The firm assisted that committee when United was considering an acquisition of US Airways in 1995 and again in 2001 and is currently advising the committee in connection with the anticipated continuation of consolidations.

In the last several years, Bredhoff and Kaiser has served as merger counsel in three hotly contested seniority integration matters. In 2006 the firm represented the Atlas Air Merger Committee in the merger of Atlas and Polar Air Cargo. Later that year, and continuing through 2007, the firm represented the America West Merger Committee in the merger of America West and US Airways. In 2008, it represented the Delta Air Lines Merger Committee in Delta’s merger with Northwest Airlines and their seniority list integration. All three of those matters involved lengthy and complicated seniority integration arbitrations under ALPA Merger Policy.

The firm has also served as counsel to other merger committees in smaller mergers. It represented the Alaska Airlines Merger Committee in Alaska’s merger with Jet America and conducted both a negotiation and an arbitration in that matter. The firm represented the Northwest Airlines pilots’ Merger Committee in negotiations surrounding the company’s proposed acquisition of the Trump Shuttle and Midway Airlines. Neither of those transactions was completed, but in both instances they negotiated agreements with the Merger Committees of the other airline.

This previous work for other pilot groups and the law firm’s understanding of the ALPA policies and procedures as presented in Section 45 of the ALPA Merger and Fragmentation Policy will be invaluable to the pilots of Comair. Based on their understanding of ALPA policy and the Comair MEC’s commitment to fiscal responsibility, Bredhoff and Kaiser has graciously agreed to enter into a representation agreement with no retainer fee and only a signed letter of intent by all parties. This will keep our merger fund intact and unused until a merger is in process or until such time as the funds can be returned to the pilots.

With the legal expertise that Mr. Freund and Bredhoff and Kaiser bring in regard to airline labor relations and mergers, we are pleased to have the best possible representation for our members should a merger occur.