Zachary J. A. Coon is a partner and commercial litigator representing clients in a wide array of business matters including contract claims, construction law, commercial debt collection and business disputes. Zach’s clients include diverse entities across Maryland, including small businesses, banks, hotels, property owners, investors, general contractors, subcontractors and material suppliers.
Zach’s primary focus is in commercial litigation, which includes not only shoe-leather courtroom advocacy but also innovative boardroom negotiations. Zach holds his clients’ business interests as his own and collaborates with his clients to develop a clear legal dispute resolution strategy from the outset. He works cleverly and creatively with his clients to devise out-of-court solutions to legal problems, if possible. In litigation, Zach is comprehensive, methodical and diligent; he is determined to get to the bottom of the facts and present the best case possible for the client. He routinely handles lawsuits of all sizes and intensity on a variety of issues, from garden-variety contract matters to complex, multimillion-dollar business and property disputes.
Zach co-anchors the firm’s construction law practice and represents contractors and owners in a variety of contexts, including mechanics’ liens, equitable adjustment claims and close-out disputes on projects of all shapes and sizes, public and private. He represents general contractors and tradesmen, including electricians, plumbers, blacksmiths and painters. He assists clients in the contract review and negotiation stage and counsels clients as they encounter issues during contract administration. He works tirelessly to assist clients in resolving disputes without litigation, if possible, but he is experienced and prepared to bring and defend construction claims in a multitude of forums, including before courts, arbitration panels, administration agencies and the Maryland Board of Contract Appeals.
Zach has extensive experience on commercial debt collection cases on behalf of both creditors and debtors. He routinely represents community and national banks, as well as private money lenders, in multimillion-dollar and six-figure collections and is accustomed to managing post-judgment enforcement efforts that span multiple years. He understands that collection is oftentimes a matter of persistence and ingenuity, and he is adept at helping creditors develop a sharp collection strategy to aggressively locate and attach available assets while also establishing senior lienholder rights through a variety of methods, including post-judgment discovery, property and wage garnishments, sheriff levies and charging orders against business owners’ economic ownership interests in corporate entities.
On the other side of the proverbial coin, Zach maintains a debtors’ rights practice and regularly defends clients from their creditors, both in the pre-judgment and post-judgment contexts. He has tremendous experience in proceedings to vacate, open or modify confessed judgments, motions to release property from garnishment and charging order litigation, including assisting clients in electing their statutory and common law exemptions. Zach negotiates forbearances, workouts and settlement agreements and, in connection with the firm’s bankruptcy department, assists clients in analyzing whether dissolution, bankruptcy or other debt-relief strategies may be appropriate.
Zach maintains a robust estate and trust practice and regularly assists clients with the preparation of their last wills and testaments, trusts, financial powers of attorney and advance medical directives. Largely informed by his debt collection experience, he helps clients with asset protection planning and wealth preservation matters. He represents fiduciaries, including personal representatives (executors) of probate estates and trustees in the administration of their duties. He also handles fiduciary disputes and estate and trust litigation in cases before both the Orphans’ Courts and the Circuit Courts.
Zach is a member of the Litigation, Construction Law and Estate and Trust Law Sections of the Maryland State Bar Association. He is also a member of the Baltimore County Bar Association and Harford County Bar Association.
A native of the Hereford Zone, Zach and his family now live in Towson and enjoy walking to everything. When he’s not practicing law, Zach plays bass in a local bluegrass band, is a musician at his church and is an avid reader of history.