Armstrong Teasdale announces the addition of Associates Samra Cordic, Charlie Jonas, Chelsea (Bray) Torres, Ph.D., and Zachary S. Wiersma, Ph.D. They are among more than 180 lawyers and staff professionals who have joined Armstrong Teasdale in 2022 alone.

Cordic, a member of the Litigation practice group in St. Louis, is a former auditor for the world’s largest food and beverage company. She has seven years of experience in risk management and audit planning, as well as fraud and financial misstatement investigations. She holds a Certified Fraud Examiner certification and has investigated financial, travel and expense, vendor and competitive bidding frauds.

Jonas is a patent holder and a member of the Intellectual Property practice group in St. Louis. He is well versed in drafting patent applications for inventors and in-house counsel in various subject areas, including artificial intelligence, semiconductors, electrical systems and mechanical components. Jonas was previously a law clerk at the U.S. International Trade Commission’s Office of Unfair Import Investigations. Before that, he worked as a patent engineer at IBM, and externed for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Torres joins the Boston office as a member of the Litigation practice group. With an extensive background in writing and editing, she is skilled at conducting in-depth scholarly and legal research, as well as drafting and revising manuscripts and legal opinions. Torres’ experience includes serving as a research assistant for the dean of Berkeley Law, where she researched Supreme Court cases, provided feedback on briefs and petitions, and revised and updated portions of Federal Jurisdiction. Chelsea was one of eight members from the class of 2022 selected for Berkeley Law’s Ninth Circuit Practicum, to brief and argue Shaykh Muhammad Al Saud v. Pannan Days, et al., 21-15089, before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Wiersma, an Intellectual Property associate in St. Louis, has extensive experience conducting patentability and marketability research and takes a comprehensive approach to analyzing patent protection. He manages applications throughout the process, working closely with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Wiersma was a patent agent at the firm prior to becoming an associate and has drafted and prosecuted patent applications for a wide variety of technologies and industries, including pharmaceuticals, medical devices, diagnostic devices, agrochemicals, materials chemistry, polymers, semiconductors, catalysis, batteries, combustion and electrochemistry.