Frank Morse is a California businessman and attorney. His clientele previously included aviator and industrialist Howard Hughes, Saudi billionaire Adnan Khashoggi and CIA spymaster Larry J. Kolb.
Morse graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University, in Palo Alto, California. He received his law degree from Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Morse went on to teach at University of Southern California and at University of California, Irvine. He is married to Rio Morse and has three children.
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History with Howard Hughes
In his early thirties, Morse became general counsel to Howard R. Hughes and Summa Corporation. According to the book Overworld, Hughes learned about Morse in a Los Angeles Times article --- one in which Morse was described as an indomitable young attorney who had just won fifty-two cases in a row. “Get me that lawyer!” Hughes is reported to have shouted to his chief of staff. In addition to being Chief Legal Officer for the umbrella corporation for the holdings of Howard Hughes, Morse served as legal counsel to the President of Summa Corporation which had businesses ranging from airlines, to helicopter manufacturing, to resort hotels.[1]
History with Adnan Khashoggi
In the 1980’s and 1990’s, as a partner in the law firm Sandler, Rolnick & Morse, Morse served as Chief Legal Advisor for Adnan Khashoggi in the United States and Europe. Morse was responsible for defenses of litigation and insolvency proceedings for Khashoggi, specifically for Triad Corporation.
History with Larry J. Kolb
Morse was the attorney for Larry Kolb during the CIA agent’s legal troubles which stemmed from Kolb’s involvement in the St. Kitt’s Affair, a scandal involving cabinet members of the government of India.
Finance and Acquisitions
In the early 1980's, Morse was President of Group Resources Management, a Southern California consulting business with emphasis on venture capital financing and acquisitions. He also maintained his private practice of law with emphasis on general corporate matters and litigation. From 1996-2003, Morse was Chairman of the Board of BLI Holdings Corp., a Bain Capital owned company. The company was a contract manufacturer for hair care products and cosmetics in the United States. The company had factories in California and New Jersey totaling over 750,000 square feet. The company had approximately 1,000 employees and gross revenues of over one hundred and thirty million dollars when it was sold in 2003.
Presently, Morse is Chairman of the Board of Cielo Unlimited, a California Holding Company. He is actively involved in seeking private investment opportunities, primarily in leveraged buyouts of existing companies.
Trivia
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In 1962, while an undergraduate at Stanford University, Morse was one of the civil rights workers kidnapped in Mississippi while helping to register black voters during the African-American Civil Rights Movement. While severely beaten he returned to Stanford to resume and complete his undergraduate studies.
References
- ^ Kolb, Larry J., Overworld, The Life and Times of a Reluctant Spy, Riverhead Books, 2004.
- Boyles, Denis, “Lawyers, Guns & Money,” Vanity Fair, December, 1989
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