The Tribune

Callenders & Co’s youngest partner has been named as one of the Bahamas’ top five asset recovery attorneys by the International Who’s Who of Business Lawyers.

In what was considered a male-dominated area of law until recently, Courtney Pearce described her role as “part lawyer, part detective”.

“You have a client who has suspicions about what happened that caused what appeared to be a good plan, investment or partnership to go bad,” she said.

“You have a lot of paper, and you have to follow the paper and follow the assets, building the case around what your skills helped you track down. After you follow the evidence, you attack, finding the legal means of undoing what is sometimes a very clever scheme.”

Her ranking by the International Who’s Who of Business Lawyers came as a result of the UK-based publication’s independent research and strict vetting system, which included client and peer recommendations, as well as court case reviews.

Of the five Bahamian attorneys, less than one tenth of 1 per cent of the attorneys in the country, Ms Pearce was the youngest and one of only two women awarded the title.

“We are extremely proud of Courtney Pearce and pleased that she has been recognised internationally,” said the firm’s managing partner, Colin Callender.

“Courtney is not only a brilliant and incisive lawyer; she is one of the hardest working legal minds in the land today.”

For Ms Pearce, recovering assets is like solving a riddle. “It’s hard,” she acknowledges. “Most of the time you are dealing with international people who have made great efforts to hide or relocate assets.

“They have taken steps to avoid their assets being discovered. You wade through trust structures, go behind shell companies until you find the one thread that allows you to unravel everything. And with the high net worth individual, you are not only trying to trace the cash, you may be dealing with land, shares, ships, even planes.”

Ms Pearce was one of three new partners named this year, bringing Callenders to a complement of seven partners in Nassau and Grand Bahama. It is the only firm in the Bahamas to have two Queen’s Counsel barristers, the highest ranking in the Commonwealth.