The administrator of the estate of J.L. Chestnut Jr. has filed a petition in Dallas County Circuit Court, asking for dissolution of all the partnerships in which he was involved for a full accounting and expeditious and just distribution of all the assets and liabilities.

The documents, which reflect only one side of a legal issue, name as defendants: Chestnut Sanders, Sanders and Pettaway LLC; Chestnut Sanders, Sanders, Pettaway, Campbell & Albright LLC; Chestnut, Sanders, Sanders, Pettaway, Campbell & Albright PC and Ola-Ora LLC.

Ronald O. Gaiser Jr., a Birminham attorney, filed the documents Friday, representing Gregory Kenneth Chestnut of Selma, the administrator of J.L. Chestnut’s estate.

Gaiser declined to discuss the filing, saying because he represents Chestnut, comments would be inappropriate.

The petition points out the entities named still exist and J.L. Chestnut contributed to each of the business entities listed in the document.

J.L. Chestnut, a Selma native, was the first African-American attorney to set up a law practice in Dallas County. He died in 2008.

In the 1960s, Chestnut brought Hank Sanders and his wife, Faya Rose Touré, both Harvard-educated, to Selma and his law practice.

State Sen. Hank Sanders said Monday he had yet to be served with legal documents about the lawsuit. He said he was unaware of the filing.

Chestnut handled many court cases. His legal work included defending blacks in major voter fraud prosecutions brought by the Justice Department in west Alabama during the 1980s.

He joined other black leaders in a meeting with then-Attorney Gen. Edwin Meese in 1985 to complain about the department’s handling of civil rights issues.

Later he was lead attorney in a class-action lawsuit that thousands of black farmers filed against the U.S. Department of Agriculture for regularly denying subsidies and other assistance to them because of their race.

A federal judge approved a settlement of the case in 2000 and Chestnut led the appeals for thousands of farmers who were denied compensation in the federal statement.

That was opened again, but the farmers have not received any money as a result.