Chicago firm Seyfarth Shaw has raised starting salaries in Sacramento from $121,000 to $135,000, retroactive to April 1. Seyfarth has 18 lawyers in this office. In an attempt to stay competitive in the market, Sacramento firm Weintraub Genshlea Chediak also raised first-year salaries in March from $90,000 to $100,000. Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman is paying $145,000, and Morrison & Foerster is at $160,000 in the California city.
Source: www.sacramento.bizjournals.com
Greater Cincinnati’s second-largest firm, Frost Brown Todd, has opened a new office in Florence, Kentucky. This office will be the firm’s eighth. William Robinson III will be the member in charge of the office, and he will be joined by three other lawyers. Robinson was formerly a managing member of Greenebaum, Doll & McDonald, from where he left in March to join Frost Brown. The firm is working to recruit more attorneys to join the team in Florence.
Source: www.news.moneycentral.msn.com
One of New Jersey’s largest firms, McElroy, Deutsch, Mulvaney & Carpenter has created a minority-owned law firm subsidiary. Last month the 230-lawyer Morristown firm acquired a 49 percent hold in Espinosa & Espinosa, a six-lawyer minority firm in Weehawken, NJ. Associating with McElroy Deutsch allows Espinosa to gain corporation work by marketing itself as a minority firm able to take advantage of the support and expertise of its parent firm. While the arrangement seems promising, the president of the National Minority Supplier Development Council cautions against assuming that a minority firm actually hires a significant number of minorities. She would like to see firms like Adorno & Yoss, with 20 percent Hispanic and 17 percent African American lawyers, get more corporate work.
Source: www.law.com
David Melton has joined Foley & Lardner’s Chicago office as a member of the IP Litigation Practice. Melton specializes in the areas of patent, trade secret, copyright and trade dress cases. He has represented Fortune 500 companies, start-ups and mid-sized companies across the country, including high-tech and telecommunications companies, consulting firms, manufacturing companies and futures exchanges. Melton is also a board member for the Chicago Council of Lawyers, where he served as president from 2001 to 2003.
Source: www.lawfuel.com
International law firm, Haynes & Boone, welcomed a new attorney to its Houston office. Jill Groff, who specializes in complex business litigation, has joined as an of counsel. She mostly handles antitrust, securities, and white collar criminal defense matters. Haynes & Boone employs over 450 lawyers in its offices in Texas, New York, Washington, D.C., Mexico City and Moscow.
Source: www.lawfuel.com
Since February, five shareholders have left the Florida offfices of Squire, Sanders & Dempsey. These partners have raised issues about the firm’s centralized control and what they see as lack of support for their practices. The Cleveland-based firm merged with South Florida’s Steel Hector & Davis in 2005, despite that firm’s financial troubles and partner defections. The attorneys who left the firm claimed that they had wanted to continue work with the newly merged firm, but after a year and a half dealing with unresolved cultural and integration issues, they decided to part ways. Former Steel Hector managing partner Joseph P. Klock, corporate attorney Barry A. Weiss, and lobbyist Jorge Luis Lopez are among those who left. Squire Sanders is recognized for its bond work on behalf of government entities; it was ranked 54 on the AmLaw 100 listing of the nation’s top-grossing firms.
Source: www.law.com
Three Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman partners are leaving to join Jones Day’s Irvine, California office. Former co-leader of the litigation practice, Richard Ruben, along with office-managing partner, Darren Cottriel, and Ralph Blakeney will be making the move. Offers have also been made to at least five associates. Ruben said that his decision to leave primarily had to do with Jones Day’s reputation in litigation and committment to growth in California.
Source: www.law.com
WilmerHale announced that they have raised first-year associates’ salaries to $160,000. The increase will be effective in all U.S. offices on June 1. This decision comes two weeks after Hogan & Hartson and Akin Gump increased starting salaries in D.C. from $145,000 to $160,000.
Source: www.legaltimes.typepad.com
Kansas City-based Stinson Morrison Hecker has acquired St. Louis firm Blumenfeld Kaplan & Sandweiss. The 40-lawyer addition puts Stinson’s St. Louis office at 60 attorneys. Blumenfeld Kaplan was founded in 1950, and today has a general corporate practice. Stinson Morrison has close to 360 attorneys in eight offices.
Source: www.kansascity.com
Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo welcomes Len Nannarone to the corporate practice in its Boston office. Nannarone is a private equity attorney, and was previously a partner at Greenberg Traurig and an in-house counsel to Intel Capital. Joining Nannarone at Mintz Levin is Matthew McMurdo, also formerly of Greenberg Traurig; McMurdo joins as Of Counsel in the New York office. McMurdo works primarily on general corporate and securities law. Mintz Levin’s Corporate Practice closed more than 200 transactions valuing more than $13.5 billion in 2006.
Source: www.home.businesswire.com
