Mr. Eric L. Johnson

Eric L. Johnson is a partner at Spencer Fane LLP in Kansas City, Mo., and the co-practice group leader for its Banking and Financial Services Group and practice group leader for its Bankruptcy, Restructuring and Creditors’ Rights Group. Over the course of his 20-plus year career, he has represented almost every constituency in insolvency proceedings, including trustees, receivers, secured lenders, debtors in possession, buyers of distressed assets, creditors’ committees, trade creditors, landlords, and defendants in insolvency-related litigation. Mr. Johnson has focused his practice on the representation of bankruptcy trustees, judicial receivers and assignees for the benefit of creditors in complex litigation and liquidations. He also has served as a federal equity receiver, state court appointed receiver and chapter 11 trustee, and he is currently a member of the panel of chapter 7 trustees for the Western District of Missouri. In addition to his fiduciary-related work, Mr. Johnson has focused his practice on the representation of secured lenders along the distressed loan continuum, including out-of-court workouts, state law remedies such as receiverships, and ultimately bankruptcy proceedings. In this respect, he has been involved in numerous cash-collateral and debtor-in-possession financing disputes and transactions. Mr. Johnson has a particular focus on agricultural-related matters; he hails from a small rural community in central Iowa where his family has been involved in soybean and corn production for multiple generations, along with farm implement sales and repair. Mr. Johnson is a frequent speaker and writer on insolvency-related topics and has served in multiple leadership positions at the local, state and national level. He serves on ABI’s Board of Directors and is a Fellow of The American College of Bankruptcy, and he received the Missouri Bar’s Michael R. Roser Excellence in Bankruptcy Award. Mr. Johnson currently serves on the American College of Bankruptcy Foundation’s board of directors and is serving as the College’s Eighth Circuit Education Chair. He is Board Certified in Business Bankruptcy Law by the American Board of Certification. Mr. Johnson received his B.A. in 1988 from the University of Northern Iowa and his J.D. in 2001 from the University of Iowa College of Law.