Carolyn ("CJ") Johnsen is Chair of the Jennings Strouss Business Restructuring and Reorganization Section, She has extensive experience in all aspects of commercial reorganizations, representing debtors, creditors and trustees. She has been solely responsible for confirming multiple and complex plans of reorganization for clients in the real estate, manufacturing, refining and hotel industries. She has been lead counsel for numerous unsecured creditor committees in significant Chapter 11 proceedings. Other clients have included large publicly-held software and health care companies. She has several published decisions and has been a frequent speaker at state and national bankruptcy seminars.

At Jennings Strouss, CJ chairs the Associate Committee which supervises associate attorneys practicing with the firm. She organizes an extensive mentoring program and seminars for new lawyers. She previously chaired the Recruiting Committee responsible for interviewing and hiring new lawyers and conducting the summer associate program.

CJ currently co-chairs the committee for Arizona Women Lawyers Honoring Sandra Day O'Connor in conjunction with the law school at Arizona State University. She is a member of the Executive Committee for the Council of 100 to support to law school newly-named for Justice O'Connor.

CJ currently chairs the committee for Credit Abuse Resistance Education which teaches classes on financial responsibility to high school students. She has served as one of fifteen Arizona lawyer representatives to the Ninth Circuit Judicial conference. She was appointed by Arizona bankruptcy judges to serve on the Pro Se Debtors Outreach Committee and the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel Rules Committee.

In 2006, CJ was selected one of 10 Leading Lawyers by the Phoenix Business Journal and was also voted as "Best of the Bar" in 2003,2004 and 2005. She is a founding Director of Valley Commerce Bank, the former Financial Director of the Phoenix Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners, and she has served as the Co-Chair of the Arizona Women's Council and as Chair of the Arthritis Foundation Wine Classic. She received the Pioneer of the Y ear Award, 1999, from the National Association of Women Business Owners and was named as one of the Top Ten Women in Arizona Business, 1997-1998. She earned her J.D. from Texas Tech School of Law in 1980.

 

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