Larry Childs is committed to providing outstanding representation and responding to our clients’ needs in the most efficient and economical manner possible. Childs leads Waller Lansden’s efforts to provide excellent representation to assist our clients in resolving disputes. For more than 30 years, Childs has been privileged to represent clients in a wide variety of important and complex matters. His greatest pleasures in the practice of law have come from gaining an understanding of our clients’ businesses to help them resolve their legal problems.
Larry Childs’ legal practice focuses on the financial services industry, but he also represents clients in a number of other industries, including healthcare, construction and manufacturing. In addition to working with companies in Alabama and Tennessee, Childs has been fortunate in establishing relationships with clients from all over the United States, as well as Canada, Japan and Germany. He has extensive trial and appellate experience and has handled several large arbitrations, including two cases that were conducted in London, England in the International Court of Arbitrations. He is admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court and five United States Courts of Appeal around the country.
During his 33 years as a litigator, Childs has been involved in all kinds of lawsuits, ranging from consumer class actions to serious industrial accidents. For example, he helped a client deal with the effects of an explosion at its chemical plant that killed five employees and caused millions of dollars of property damage. In another case, he served as lead counsel for the State of Alabama in its successful effort to end a long-running class action suit involving the State's child welfare system. Childs also has represented companies and witnesses in grand jury testimony, criminal investigations and board of directors’ investigations.
In the financial services area, Childs has defended banks against virtually every kind of claim, including lender liability suits, bookkeeper embezzlement cases, personal and corporate trust matters, lending discrimination claims and cases under the Uniform Commercial Code. Last year he led our firm’s representation of a corporate trustee in a multibillion dollar governmental bond default. The litigation resulted in our client’s obtaining entry of a judgment in excess of $500 million and the appointment of a receiver to remedy the defaults.
In addition to representing financial institutions, Childs presently represents directors and officers of banks and financial holding companies against a variety of claims, including securities and ERISA class actions, shareholder derivative lawsuits, TARP-related claims and regulatory claims. Several of the claims arise out of bank failures during the present economic crisis. He is also representing a group of banks in an important dispute involving a lending syndicate.
Childs, who is co-head of the firm’s litigation practice, enjoys speaking and writing about financial services topics and complex litigation issues. He is recognized in The Best Lawyers in America (Woodward White, Inc.) under four categories and is also listed in the Alabama Super Lawyers.
Education
J.D., University of Virginia, 1977
Order of the Coif
National Moot Court Team
Hardy Dillard Writing Fellow
B.A., magna cum laude, University of Alabama, 1974
Member, Phi Beta Kappa
Clerkships and Previous Affiliations
Law Clerk to the Honorable Seybourn H. Lynne, United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama
Professional Activities
Member, Birmingham, Alabama and American Bar Associations
Member, Business Entities Committee of the Alabama Law Institute, which redrafted the corporate statutes for the State of Alabama
Former Member, Alabama Consumer Information Privacy Study
Civic and Other Activities
Founding Chairman, Board of Directors of Grace House Ministries, Inc.
Finance Chairman, Election Campaign of former Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor
Counsel, Reelection Campaign of Alabama Supreme Court Justice Harold F. See
Court Admissions
United States Supreme Court
Supreme Court of Alabama
Supreme Court of Tennessee
United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eleventh Districts
United States District Courts for the Northern, Middle and Southern Districts of Alabama
United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee
