FRANK R. LIGGETT III

Frank R. Liggett III, Founder, Ragsdale-Liggett and Partner, Business

Frank R. Liggett III is a founding member and managing partner at Ragsdale Liggett PLLC. A seasoned corporate lawyer who focuses his practice on corporate and insurance regulatory law, Frank is admitted to practice in the United States Supreme Court, United States District Court for Eastern, Middle and Western Districts of North Carolina, United States Tax Court, and all North Carolina State Courts. Frank is a member of the American, North Carolina and Wake County Bar Associations, the North Carolina State Bar, and the 10th Judicial District Bar, where he was a member of the Executive Committee. Frank also has served on the American Bar Association subcommittee on Limited Liability Companies.

During his prominent career, Frank has represented both insurance and non-insurance entities with respect to merger and acquisition transactions, general corporate governance and regulatory issues. He has assisted associations, third-party administrators and insurers on a variety of litigation, regulatory and compliance issues as well as holding company, acquisition, tender offer and merger transactions. He has also assisted directors and owners of privately held entities in preparation for going public and in corporate governance issues.

Frank is a member and director of the exclusive Federation of Regulatory Counsel (FORC, pronounced “force”), a multi-national association of lawyers with significant experience in the practice of insurance regulatory and corporate law. FORC elected Frank to its board of directors for a second term during a meeting held at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners in Chicago in 2005 and he is currently serving as its chairman. FORC is widely considered the authoritative source for regulatory insurance information and expertise.  Liggett has authored articles and notes on insurance topics for the Federation of Regulatory Counsel Quarterly Journal of Insurance Law and Regulation, as well as the ABA Tort and Insurance Practice Committee News of the Public Regulation of Insurance Law Committee.

Frank authored and presented "Legal Survival in the New Surplus Lines Market "at the annual meeting of the North Carolina Surplus Lines Association. He was named the recipient of their Outstanding Service Award and has served as the Association’s Legal Counsel since 1989. A frequent lecturer in continuing education classes regarding surplus and excess lines matters, Frank has written and lectured for continuing legal education seminars on "Considerations in Buying or Selling a Business in North Carolina: Structure of the Acquisition and on Negotiating a Purchase and Sale Agreement". He was adjunct professor of the North Carolina State University School of Design from 1977 to 1979, where he taught Legal Aspects of Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Design. He has been recognized as one of North Carolina's Super Lawyers, and is listed in The Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers and has held the Martindale Hubbell “AV” designation for over thirty years.

Frank has served on the boards of directors of numerous publicly-traded and private business organizations. He is a former member of the board of directors and Executive Committee of McM Corporation, an insurance holding company; a former member of the board of directors of Peninsular Life Insurance Company and Peninsular Title Insurance Company; and a former member of the board of directors of Pan American Van Lines, Inc. He has also filled leadership positions in the fields of the natural sciences and wildlife conservation, including serving as chairman of the board of trustees of the North Carolina Natural History Society (now Friends of the North Carolina State Museum of Natural Sciences), the board of directors of the North Carolina Wildlife Federation and as chairman of the Raleigh area committee of Ducks Unlimited, Inc., which he founded in 1967.  Following a decade of service on the board of directors of the Delta Waterfowl Foundation, North America's leader in waterfowl ecology and waterfowling, Frank has been named an honorary director of the Foundation.

Donating time to civic and charitable organizations is important to Frank. He has served on the board of trustees and chaired the Triangle North Carolina Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. He has served on the board of directors of the Beta Chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon, Inc.; the Woodberry Forest School Advisory Council; the board of directors of Westport III, Inc.; the board of visitors of Trinity Center of the Episcopal Diocese of East Carolina; and the board of directors of Jones Island Club, Inc. Frank participates in several area clubs, including the Terpsichorean Club, Carolina Country Club, Coral Bay Club, English-Speaking Union Old School Society and Sphinx Club. He was a charter member of both the Capital City Club and the Cardinal Club.
 
Born in St. Petersburg, Florida, Frank attended Woodberry Forest School in Orange, Virginia. He completed an English-Speaking Union International Fellowship at Denstone College, Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, England in 1959, the first student from the Southern United States to be awarded that particular Fellowship. That same summer, Frank studied at the University of Paris (Sorbonne).

Frank married Mildred (Mimi) LeBlond in 1961 and two years later graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He received his Juris Doctor from the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1966 and was admitted to practice in the State of North Carolina, where he has built a distinguished reputation, coming a long way since the day in 1972 when he and George R. Ragsdale founded the Ragsdale & Liggett law firm and borrowed their first piece of equipment—an orange IBM Selectric typewriter.

Frank and Mimi attend Christ Episcopal Church and have three grown children: Frank R. Liggett IV; David K. Liggett, who is also a partner at Ragsdale Liggett PLLC; and Louise L. Sprunt.