Antitrust Section Honors Sawchak

The Antitrust & Complex Business Disputes Law Section of the North Carolina Bar Association presented its Distinguished Service Award to Matt Sawchak of Ellis & Winters in Raleigh. The award was presented at the section’s annual meeting and CLE on Feb. 17 at the N.C. Bar Center.

The award was presented by law partner Paul Sun.

Sawchak served as chair of the Antitrust & Complex Business Disputes Law Section in 2000-01 and is also a past chair of the Appellate Rules Committee. He serves as a senior editor of the ABA Antitrust Section’s Antitrust Law Journal.

He is also a member of the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers, the North Carolina Business Court’s Rules Advisory Committee and Civil Rules Committee of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina.

“Our Bar Association, and the Antitrust and Complex Disputes Law Section, have played a huge role in my development as a lawyer,” Sawchak said. “I developed a lot of my speaking and writing skills through programs for this section.

“I encourage everyone who wants to advance as a lawyer to go ‘all in’ with the NCBA.”

Sawchak is a graduate of Harvard and the Duke University School of Law. He clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas when Thomas was serving on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, and also clerked in the Office of the Solicitor General of the United States.

The Distinguished Service Award was established to recognize members of the North Carolina Bar Association Antitrust & Complex Business Disputes Law Section (or others under extraordinary situations) who:

(1) have demonstrated the highest ethical standards;
(2) have shown a high level of professional competence; and
(3) have made significant contributions (a) to the Section, (b) to scholarship in the fields of antitrust or complex business disputes law, and/or (c) to advocacy on behalf of clients, consumers, or the public in the fields of antitrust or complex business disputes law.

The Distinguished Service Award is given by the section every other year. It was presented to John F. Graybeal in 2009, Everett J. Bowman in 2011, Noel L. Allen in 2013 and Judge John R. Jolly Jr. in 2015.