Eversheds Sutherland Continues to Strengthen Premier Tax Practice Group with Prominent Federal Tax Controversy Trio

WASHINGTON—Eversheds Sutherland is pleased to announce the continued expansion of the firm’s premier Tax Practice Group with the arrival of David Blair, David Fischer and Dwight Mersereau as partners. Seated in Washington, the nationally recognized trio brings sophisticated federal tax controversy and tax planning experience, with extensive combined federal tax litigation and trial experience. They regularly represent both US and international clients before courts and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and across a broad range of industries, including energy, financial services and insurance. 

“The Tax Practice Group has long been an important part of the firm and we are thrilled to further strengthen our capabilities with the addition of these exceptional lawyers,” said Mark D. Wasserman, Co-CEO of Eversheds Sutherland. “Their experience and knowledge navigating complex transactional and accounting issues will be of great benefit to clients in high-stakes tax controversy matters throughout the United States and around the globe.”

“David, Dwight and David’s arrival underscores our team’s commitment to growth through the addition of talented and highly skilled individuals who share our commitment to client service,” said Robert S. Chase, US Tax Practice Group leader. “Their experience across a range of tax controversy and planning matters complements our deep bench of tax professionals, which, will be highly beneficial to our collective clients. With this group of laterals, our tax team will continue to be unmatched in its ability to provide unparalleled support in all manner of tax planning and controversy.”

In a statement from the group, David, Dwight and David shared: 

“We are excited to join Eversheds Sutherland and merge our practice with the firm’s historically renowned Tax Practice Group. Eversheds Sutherland offers our existing and future clients an extensive global platform to provide outstanding service across multiple jurisdictions for their most complex cases. Like our new Eversheds Sutherland colleagues, we are committed to delivering the best client service. We look forward to working with this internationally recognized group.” 

About the lawyers 

Mr. Blair has over 30 years of tax litigation and trial experience. He has handled large tax litigations in the areas of transfer pricing, foreign tax credits, partnerships, tax-exempt bonds, consolidated returns, excise taxes, employment taxes and tax accounting matters. He also has extensive experience in handling tax controversies before the IRS Exam, Appeals, National Office, and Advance Pricing and Mutual Agreement program (APMA). He is also active in pro bono litigation. 

Mr. Mersereau represents large, multinational corporate clients in high stakes policy, planning and controversy matters. These projects typically involve complex, highly technical tax accounting issues involving billions of dollars. He is involved in shaping tax policy through legislation, US Department of the Treasury regulation projects, revenue rulings and private letter rulings. He has represented individual clients, industry associations and client coalitions before Congress, the Treasury and the IRS. Mr. Mersereau also represents clients involved in controversy with the IRS at all levels of the proceedings.

Mr. Fischer represents clients in complex, high-stakes tax controversies. For nearly 40 years, Mr. Fischer has worked with IRS Appeals, the Advance Pricing Agreement (APA) program and US Competent Authority, and fast-track and other IRS alternative dispute resolution programs to resolve complex tax matters. He also has litigated against the IRS in US Tax Court, the Court of Federal Claims, and district courts. His current emphasis is on international issues, transfer pricing, repatriation, the domestic manufacturing production deduction, and complex financial transactions in the software, health care, financial, oil and gas, and hospitality industries. 

In addition to Mr. Blair, Mr. Fischer, Mr. Mersereau, the group has welcomed Partners Todd G. Betor, Jason D. Dexter and Xenia J.L. Garofalo, and Senior Counsel E. Miller Williams in the past 12 months. 

About Eversheds Sutherland’s Tax Practice Group

Eversheds Sutherland serves as tax counsel to many of the world’s most prominent corporations—including more than a third of the Fortune 100—in every area of federal, international, state and local tax law. Our prominence in legal tax services dates back to the firm’s founding nearly a century ago. Our practice has more than 150 tax attorneys in 20 countries, representing taxpayers in the US, Europe, Africa, south-east Asia and additional jurisdictions across the globe. By virtue of the size of our tax practice and our varied client base, we are active in every area of taxation—from planning the most complex corporate tax transactions to representing taxpayers in administrative and judicial tax controversies. 

About Eversheds Sutherland 
As a global top 10 law practice, Eversheds Sutherland provides legal services to a global client base ranging from small and mid-sized businesses to the largest multinationals, acting for 79 of the Fortune 100, 65 of the FTSE 100 and 134 of the Fortune 200.

With more than 3,000 lawyers, Eversheds Sutherland operates in over 70 offices in more than 30 countries across Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and the United States. In addition, a network of more than 200 related law firms, including formalized alliances in Latin America, Asia Pacific and Africa, provide support around the globe.

Eversheds Sutherland provides the full range of legal services, including corporate and M&A; dispute resolution and litigation; energy and infrastructure; finance; human capital and labor law; intellectual property; real estate and construction; and tax. 

Eversheds Sutherland is a global legal practice and comprises two separate legal entities: Eversheds Sutherland (International) LLP (headquartered in the UK) and Eversheds Sutherland (US) LLP (headquartered in the US), and their respective controlled, managed, affiliated and member firms. The use of the name Eversheds Sutherland is for description purposes only and does not imply that the member firms or their controlled, managed or affiliated entities are in a partnership or are part of a global LLP. For more information, visit eversheds-sutherland.com.