Co-Chairs

The Co-Chairs Welcome You to the 2009 Fall Meeting Website! For a detailed biography of each Co-Chair please click on his or her photo.

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  Marcelo Eduardo Bombau

Marcelo Bombau leads the Mergers and Acquisitions, Media and Entertainment and Customs and Foreign Trade departments of the firm.

Ever since joining the firm in 1981 he has worked on a number of important transactions, participating actively in some of the most important reorganizations and company purchase deals carried out in Argentina during the last decade, especially related to the media and entertainment areas.

The Mergers and Acquisitions field has been at the core of his activities, giving advice on difficult negotiations and actively participating in due diligence processes, negotiations and structuring of complex businesses.

Mr. Bombau is member of the board of directors of several local companies. He has received distinctions in several publications that distinguished him within his area of practice. He has written many articles in the area of his expertise and has lectured both in the Argentine Republic and abroad.

Mr. Bombau graduated from Universidad Nacional de La Plata in 1981. He is a member of Colegio de Abogados de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, the American Bar Association and the International Bar Association.

• 
  M. Cristina Cárdenas

Cristina Cárdenas focuses her practice on international litigation and arbitration. Her experience includes the representation of U.S. and Latin American corporate clients in a variety of business related disputes, including disputes involving distributorship, manufacturing and other commercial agreements. Cárdenas' most recent notable experience includes successfully serving as co-counsel to a Latin American licensee that was awarded $52.6 Million as well as attorneys' fees in an international arbitration, the litigation of which involved parallel litigation in five different fora in the U.S., Brazil and Argentina.

Cárdenas has lived, studied, and traveled extensively throughout Europe and Latin America. She is fully bilingual in Spanish, which enables her to coordinate with and oversee the work of local counsel in different jurisdictions. Cárdenas is also conversant in French.

She received her B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a double major in Political Science and Latin American Studies. Cárdenas obtained her J.D. from the University of Florida, where she was a Legal Research and Writing and Appellate Advocacy Teaching Fellow. Also during her law school career, Cárdenas served as Executive Research Editor and Assistant Editor in Chief of the Florida Journal of International Law, which published her article, The Colombian Peace Process: The Continuous Search for Peace, 15 Fla. J. Int'l L. 273 (2002). While in law school, Cárdenas also pursued a concentration in international commercial transactions from the University Of Montpellier College Of Law in Montpellier, France.

Following her graduation from law school, Cárdenas obtained an LL.M. in International Law from the University of Miami, where she concentrated her studies in international litigation and arbitration.

Cárdenas' recent speaking engagements include the Juris Conference on Managing Business Disputes and Legal Risk in Latin America, Current State of International Commercial Arbitration in the Region (October 2008); ICDR's 6th Annual Miami International Arbitration Conference, The Latest Developments in the Region on the Law of Arbitration (April 2008); Inter-American Bar Association's Conference on Establishing and Protecting Your Investment in the United States, The Legal System at Work (March 2008); ICDR's International ADR New York and Washington, D.C. Reporting Programs, Latin American Report (October and November 2007); and the New York State Bar Association's International Law and Practice Section Annual Meeting in Lima, Peru, Judicial Interference with International Arbitration (September 2007).

Admitted to practice before the U.S. District Courts for the Southern and Middle Districts of Florida and all Florida state courts, Cárdenas is also a member of the International Law Section of the Florida Bar and of the International Law Section of the American Bar Association. Cárdenas also currently serves as one of the Co-Chairs for the Section of International Law of the American Bar Association 2009 Fall Meeting.

• 
  Russell Dombrow

Russell’s practice interests are in International Commercial Dispute Resolution & Litigation, Bankruptcy/Insolvency, and “Green” Technology.  He graduated from the Nova Southeastern University Shepard Broad Law Center with a Certificate in International Legal Practice, and a Certificate in Arbitration Law from the Pennsylvania State University Dickinson School of Law and the McGill University Faculty of Law.  Russell also holds a Master of Science degree in Management Information Systems from Nova’s Graduate School of Computer & Information Sciences, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Political Science from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Since joining the Section, Russell has also served as Co-Chair and Vice-Chair of the Law Student, LLM, & New Lawyer Outreach Committee, Vice-Chair of the Young Lawyers’ Interest Network, and as a member of seasonal meeting planning committees, the Diversity Committee, the Membership Committee, and the Technology Committee.  He is an alumnus of the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court and the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot, on which he has served as a judge and as a pre-moot arbitrator, respectively.  He is also active in U.S. politics, where he has served on the Florida Democratic Lawyers’ Council for the past three election cycles, and was a former Regional Aide to the late U.S. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.  

• 
  Tony Santos

TONY SANTOS serves as Vice President and General Counsel of JMsolutions, part of JM Family Enterprises, Inc., a $12.2 billion diversified automotive services company based in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Prior to joining JM Family Enteprises, Mr. Santos was in private practice in Miami, Florida handling corporate and commercial transactions for multinational technology concerns and representing banks throughout the Americas in cross-border matters. He is a frequent lecturer on issues involving international law, technology and arbitration.

In the past he has and has served Co-Chairman of the Steering Committee of the 1997 and the 2006 Fall Meetings of the Section of International Law of the American Bar Association, as Chairman of the International Law Section of The Florida Bar and as Co-Chair of the Inter-American Law Committee of the American Bar Association's Section of International Law. He also presently serves as a member of the Council of the Inter-American Bar Association based in Washington, DC.

Mr. Santos has been recognized as one of the "101 Most Influential People in the International South Florida Business Community" and Is listed in Who's Who in International Business in Miami and South Florida. He has held numerous positions in community organizations in South Florida over the years. Mr. Santos is a 1984 graduate of the University of Miami School of Law, a 1981 graduate of the University of Miami's School of Business Administration (with honors) and is admitted in Florida. Mr. Santos holds the highest peer review rating of AV assigned by Martindale-Hubbell.

Mr. Santos is fluent in Spanish and conversant in Brazilian Portuguese.