Brian McMillan

Brian’s business and practical background gives him a deep understanding of clients’ goals, operations and legal challenges. His business and corporate practice includes negotiating and drafting distribution agreements, franchise agreements, lease agreements (on behalf of both lessors and lessees), employment agreements, and purchase/sales contracts. He also has extensive experience negotiating and drafting all manner of business contracts and agreements.

"My real-world experience in business impacts my understanding of and my perspective on the legal problems that the Firm's clients face and helps me identify sustainable, practical, cost-effective solutions for our clients."

Brian advocates for clients in a variety of business disputes, both before litigation commences and during litigation, including breach of contract, breach of warranty, and property tax disputes. He also has experience litigating will caveats and disputes among owners of closely-held entities.

With more than ten years of experience in business management and operations, Brian understands the Firm's clients and their industries and regularly provides advice on day-to-day business matters and their legal implications, in effect serving as general counsel to those clients. 

Brian represents land owners whose land has been taken or is threatened with taking by the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) and/or local municipalities through the exercise of their power of eminent domain (condemnation). The focus of Brian’s condemnation practice is securing fair and adequate compensation for clients for the land that the government wants to take or has taken. In that regard, in the last 18 years he has negotiated numerous settlements, including six- and seven-figure dollar amounts, and has taken several condemnation cases to trial. Recently, he and his Brooks Pierce partners won a jury award of $6.3 million for a client from whom the NCDOT had taken a portion of the client’s property for a highway. The NCDOT’s evidence at trial in that case had been that the property owner was entitled to damages of less than $1.5 million. Brian also negotiates with condemning authorities prior to condemnation regarding the impact of public projects on land owned by clients. In some cases, those negotiations include advocating on the client’s behalf for road designs or routes that bypass their land.