Melissa is a Senior Managing Director with over 30 years of experience providing financial advisory, restructuring, and turnaround management services to Fortune 500 and mid-sized companies and their stakeholders. She also has extensive investigative, litigation, and valuation experience, including insolvency-related litigation, avoidance actions, fraud investigations, merger and acquisition disputes, director and officer claims, and other commercial litigation support. Melissa has provided expert testimony in U.S. District Court, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, state court, arbitrations, and other venues. Her industry experience includes automotive, aviation, education, energy, financial services, gaming, healthcare, manufacturing/distribution, media/entertainment, municipalities, natural resources, real estate/construction, retail, restaurant, steel, telecommunications, transportation and other industries.
Melissa recently served as Chief Restructuring Officer in the bankruptcies of Juno USA, previously the third-largest ride-hailing company in New York, and Rubio’s Restaurants, a Mexican coastal grill, and as the Chief Financial Officer of Edmentum Holdings, Inc., a leading provider of online learning solutions.
Melissa has led or played a senior role in teams delivering exceptional solutions in restructuring and/or related litigation matters for clients such as the examiner in Residential Capital; represented debtors/companies or estate fiduciaries in matters such as Sprint, North Pacific Group, Havens Steel, Capital Consultants, and Iridium; advised creditors or official committees in cases such as Boy Scouts of America, Punch Bowl Social, Energy Future Holdings, Savient Pharmaceuticals, Engineered Plastic Products, Kmart, Bethlehem Steel, Warnaco Group and Singer; and provided litigation support or expert testimony in matters such as Horizon Management, Calumet, FirstMed EMS, American Commercial Lines, Keywell, International Offshore Services, Tronox, ASARCO, Chrysler, Quebecor, Neff, Tribune, Amaranth, Sentinel Management Enron, Kmart and Singer. She has also advised parties in numerous confidential and out-of-court matters.
Melissa is a Fellow and currently serves as the Chair of the American College of Bankruptcy and has held leadership positions at numerous industry organizations, including President of the American Bankruptcy Institute, Director of INSOL International, and Chair of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) Bankruptcy Task Force. She has received many industry recognitions, including Global M&A Network’s Inaugural D&I Leadership Award, Global M&A Network’s Women Leadership Award, the Chicago Chapter Turnaround Management Association’s CTP of the Year Award, Consulting Magazine’s Leadership Award for Women Leaders in Consulting, the AICPA’s Women to Watch Award for Experienced Leaders, the International Women’s Insolvency & Restructuring Confederation’s Woman of the Year in Restructuring Award, Crain’s Chicago Business 40 Under 40, and the Association of Insolvency & Restructuring Advisor’s Gold Medal. Highly credentialed, Melissa is a Certified Public Accountant, Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor and Certified Turnaround Professional (CTP), and holds the Certified in Financial Forensics and Certification in Distressed Business Valuation credentials.
Previously, Melissa served as a senior executive for leading consulting practices, most recently as Senior Managing Director and Executive Committee member of Mesirow Financial Consulting, and as Partner and Midwest Region Corporate Recovery practice leader of KPMG. She started her career in financial advisory services at Price Waterhouse.
Melissa earned her B.B.A. in accounting and is a summa cum laude graduate of Texas A&M University. She earned an M.B.A. from Southern Methodist University, where she graduated first in her class.
"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.” - Dr. Seuss
