Partner Andrew Troop and associate Chris Mirick have left Weil, Gotshal & Manges’ Boston office for Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft in New York. Three other bankruptcy lawyers in New York also left for Cadwalader. With Troop’s departure, Weil now has no bankruptcy partners in Boston. Troop and Mirick’s move to NY partly stems from the fact that they conduct much of their business there. Weil plans to add about 12 bankruptcy lawyers over the next year.
Source: www.phoenix.bizjournals.com
Goodwin Proctor has recruited biotechnology lawyer Stephen Ferruolo from Heller Ehrman to launch an office in San Diego. Ferruolo is also vice president and general counsel for Biocom, the region’s biotechnology industry organization. Partner Ryan Murr, several associates and a paralegal are also leaving Heller Ehrman’s life sciences practice for Goodwin Proctor. The firm’s new San Diego office is a part of its “California initiative”; Goodwin now has two offices in LA, one in San Francisco, and one in San Diego.
Source: www.signonsandiego.com
Dallas firm Jenkens & Gilchrist has finally reached the end of its rope, as it announced that it would close its last office and cease practicing law by the end of the month. The firm has entered into a nonprosecution agreement with federal prosecutors over its past involvement in illegal tax shelters. Between 1998 and 2003 the firm’s tax shelter practice wrote hundreds of legal opinion letters supporting illegal tax shelters; in return, Jenkens will pay a $76 million civil penalty to the IRS and the firm has agreed to continued cooperation with the investigation. Though at one time the firm had about 600 lawyers in offices nationwide, it has since then lost about two-thirds of the lawyers and has closed a number of offices.
Source: www.law.com
Dewey Ballantine has lost four more partners in the past two weeks. The firm has seen almost 20 partners leave over the past few months, during which it announced, and then cancelled its plans to merge with Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. Former litigation partners David J. Grais and Kathryn C. Ellsworth have started Grais & Ellsworth. The two partners, who specialize in insurance and reinsurance litigation, aim to boost efficiency and productivity for clients; they currently have one associate from Dewey, but hope to recruit more from elsewhere. Tax specialist Robert H. Frastai, also departed last week to Weil, Gotshal & Manges. Dewey’s D.C. intellectual property litigation co-chair, Cono A. Carrano, has left for Howrey.
Source: www.law.com
Peter Mostow, the head of the renewable energy practice at Stoel Rives, has left for Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, along with John Pierce, another partner in the practice. Mostow will work in Wilson Sonsini’s San Francisco office, while Pierce will be based in Seattle. The partners’ departure was a sound choice considering that Wilson Sonsini has close ties to the venture capital community and a tendency to jump into up-and-coming practice areas; moreover, San Francisco is ideal for Mostow since California boasts a booming renewable energy field. Last month five other partners left Stoel Rives’ San Francisco office; the firm now has 14 lawyers there.
Source: www.law.com
Taylor Wessing has recruited real estate finance lawyer, Antonia Raccat, from Jones Day for its Paris office. Becoming the firm’s nineteenth partner in Paris, Raccat will head the French finance practice. The firm hopes the French practice group will follow the example of its UK equivalent.
Source: www.thelawyer.com
Shearman & Sterling has enacted a new policy which will allow partners to stay on after the traditional retirement age of 65. In order to take advantage of the new policy, partners will have to apply to the policy committee; so far only heavyweight German managing partner Georg Thoma has signed up. The plan is not for all partners to stay on; rather it is for those exceptional cases who have a strong drive to continue working. Moreover, the firm’s generous pension plan that kicks in at 60 will most likely be enough for most so that they don’t need to work past 65.
Source: www.legalweek.com
New York firm Weil Gotshal & Manges plans to close its Brussels office in a move to focus its attention on an Asian expansion. The business out of the two-lawyer office will then be handled by the other European offices. Weil Gotshal has already applied for a licence to practice in Beijing, and hopes to open by summer with a combination of local and transferred attorneys. The firm also hopes to open in Hong Kong sometime in the near future. Currently only with an office in Shanghai, the firm’s ultimate goal is to have a quarter of its lawyers in Asia, as it does already in Europe.
Source: www.legalweek.com
Baker Botts announced the opening of its new office in Beijing today. With an office in Hong Kong, this is the firm’s second location in China. John Kuzmik, the head of the firm’s China practice, commented that “For infrastructure and energy projects, as well as for cross-border debt and equity transactions, a strong Beijing presence can be critical.” Baker Botts is largely focused on the energy industry in China, having represented many of the world’s leading energy companies on major projects in Asia. Baker Botts now has 11 offices worldwide and approximately 750 lawyers.
Source: www.prnewswire.com
Javerbaum Wurgaft Hicks & Zarin of Springfield, NJ, will acquire Sinins and Bross of Newark, NJ, and be renamed as Javerbaum Wurgaft Hicks Kahn Wikstrom & Sinins. These two personal injury, medical-malpractice firms are joining forces to form a more competitive 15-lawyer firm. The merger gives Javerbaum the ideal Newark location, as some of their clients didn’t like traveling to Springfield; for Sinins, the merger provides some much needed man-power to the shrinking firm. Javerbaum has been growing over the past year, and is looking to expand further. Last summer, they took over the Freehold, NJ, practice of personal injury practitioner Paul Newell, and around the same time, they acquired a satellite office in Harrison: the workers’ compensation practice of former associate John Pinho.
Source: www.nylawyer.com
