J Henry Walker IV

Practice Areas

Class Action Defense

Complex Commercial Litigation

Cybersecurity, Privacy & Data Governance

Litigation

Trade Secrets

Career

Henry Walker serves as the Chair and Chief Executive Officer of Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP. In this role, he oversees the strategic direction and growth of the firm. Mr. Walker leads the firm’s Executive Committee working closely with them to define and execute the firm’s strategic objectives. Prior to his election as the Chair, he served as the firm’s Managing Partner. In 2019, the Atlanta Business Chronicle named Mr. Walker one of Atlanta’s Most Admired CEOs.

Mr. Walker continues to handle select matters for clients as a partner on the Firm’s Complex Commercial Litigation Team. He has spent more than 30 years litigating large complex cases for clients, focusing on technology and telecommunications matters. Based on his involvement in thousands of cases and previous in-house counsel experience, he has also provided extensive client counseling on the best ways to minimize risks and prevent litigation in business initiatives.

Mr. Walker has been first chair in numerous trials and arbitrations involving multimillion dollar business litigation, including claims for breach of contract, violations of regulations, fraud, and tortious interference. He has served as lead counsel in numerous successful efforts to defeat class certification, including major federal court litigation alleging hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. He has provided litigation-related advice on compliance with SEC regulations and other laws affecting publicly-traded corporations, including drafting board talking points and disclosure documents. He has also provided litigation risk analysis on multibillion dollar acquisitions.

Mr. Walker rejoined the firm—where he practiced as a partner until 1996—in 2007 after serving as Chief Litigation Counsel to BellSouth Corporation. Mr. Walker’s mixture of in-house experience and outside counsel experience provides him with a strong understanding of the challenges facing clients and in-house counsel. At BellSouth, Mr. Walker managed a team of lawyers and paralegals responsible for a large and challenging litigation docket while taking frontline responsibility for numerous large litigation matters. He was one of the lead in-house counsel in numerous major antitrust matters, including two successful landmark United States Supreme Court cases (Twombly and Trinko). He received the BellSouth President’s Award and the General Counsel’s Award for Excellence.

Mr. Walker is very active in the business community and the State Bar of Georgia. He has served on the State Bar Board of Governors since 1995 and is a former President of the Younger Lawyers Division. He is a member of the Georgia Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors serving as the Chair of the Georgia Chamber's Law and Judiciary Committee and is on the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Walker also served on the State of Georgia Judicial Nominating Commission which interviewed candidates and provided a “short list” to the Governor for judicial appointments. Among other recognitions, Mr. Walker was recognized in The Best Lawyers in America® for Commercial Litigation and Technology Law in 2022 and the nine years immediately preceding. He was also named a 2017 "Atlanta Lawyer of the Year" in the area of Technology Law by The Best Lawyers in America®. Mr. Walker was named a Georgia "Super Lawyer" in 2022 and the seven years immediately preceding for Civil Litigation Defense by Super Lawyers magazine. In 2020 and 2021, Mr. Walker was selected by Atlanta Magazine as a member of its “Atlanta 500”, a prestigious list of Atlanta’s 500 most powerful leaders. He is AV® rated by Martindale-Hubbell.

Personal

Mercer University Walter F. George School of Law, J.D., cum laude (1986)

University of Virginia, B.A., American Government (1983)