Law firm sues Henry in recordings fight

Ray Peña files suit over alleged call records, saying it didn’t break rules to seek info

Thomas J. Henry’s law firm, which specializes in filing lawsuits on behalf of people injured in car wrecks, is now on the other side of a legal spat.

Henry’s firm has been sued by San Antonio defense law firm Ray | Peña | Mcchristian, which is trying to get recorded communications Henry’s lawyers may have had with expert witnesses in some personal injury cases.

In its lawsuit, filed Friday in state District Court in San Antonio, the Ray Peña firm asked the court to rule that it did not violate any Texas rules or seek to obtain any “confidential” information or “trade secrets” by contacting some former Henry employees.

The Henry firm is attempting to temporarily stop six personal injury cases it filed so it can investigate whether Ray Peña attorneys should be disqualified for soliciting information from the ex-employees. Ray Peña represents defendants in those six cases.

“We believe there has been serious misconduct” by Ray Peña attorneys, Anne Mcgowan Johnson, a Dallas attorney representing the Henry firm, said at a hearing last month in one of the cases.

Ray Peña’s lawsuit says claims that it acted unethically are “spurious.” It adds that the allegations may “create questions with the public” about the firm and its attorneys in other cases they’re defending that don’t involve the Henry firm.

Attorneys for the Henry firm sought to stay the six cases after Ray Peña attorneys asked multiple courts to order the Henry firm to produce any recorded communications with its retained expert witnesses and others as part of discovery — the exchange of evidence and legal information ahead of trial.

The motions to stay the cases have not yet been heard by any