10 February 2003
The Lawyer
A&G arbitration ace quits for Essex Court tenancy
International arbitration heavyweight Michael Hwang SC has quit as head of litigation at Allen & Gledhill (A&G), Linklaters' joint venture partner, to set up his own practice in Singapore and become a door tenant at Essex Court Chambers
A&O adds litigation in New York expansion drive
Allen & Overy is launching a US litigation practice in New York. The firm has hired a partner and senior litigation counsel as the first step in building the new practice.Trial lawyer Michael Feldberg has joined from New York firm Schulte Roth & Zabel, where he was a partner and chair of the litigation department. Former Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft partner Pamela Rogers Chepiga will also join the magic circle firm. Most recently she has been teaching at Fordham University ...
A&O Germany trims assistant pay bands
Allen & Overy Germany has changed its assistant salary bands, in some instances reducing them by E10,000 (£6,600)
A&O puts Camerons lateral in top job
Allen & Overy has appointed lateral hire David Kidd to head its Asian business restructuring and insolvency group. Kidd joined eighteen months ago from CMS Cameron McKenna. He will replace group head Mark Sterling, who will return to London.The group comprises lawyers in Singapore, Bangkok, Tokyo and Hong Kong. Kidd is based in Hong Kong, where his former firm has now scaled back its office to an ...
A&O relocates Paris derivatives partner to London
Allen & Overy (A&O) derivatives partner Edward Murray has returned to London after nearly four years in Paris. Murray's responsibilities in Paris will be absorbed by Pierre Gissinger, who heads the Paris derivatives practice, and international capital markets partner Dan Lauder. The scaling back of English law is a response to currrent market conditions. First revealed on www.thelawyer.com/lawyernews 5 February
A&O, Cadwalader in conflict storm over collapse of TXU
Row builds as City law firms play controversial dual role for TXU administrators and creditors
Addleshaws takes on Johnson & Johnson in landmark patent case
Addleshaw Booth & Co has launched a landmark action against a UK subsidiary of healthcare product manufacturer Johnson & Johnson
Al Fayed loses right to appeal in House of Lords
Neil Hamilton's backers are saved from paying Al Fayed's legal costs
All for one…
In the spirit of the EU, member states must work together as equals. Ross Fraser and Emma Nendick discuss changes in tax law that are bringing European countries into line
Ashursts scoops GIB work
Ashurst Morris Crisp has won its first mandate from Gulf International Bank UK (GIB UK), on a collateralised debt obligation (CDO) transaction
B&M beats CC and White & Case to Saudi privatisation
Baker & McKenzie has fought off rival bids from Clifford Chance and White & Case to advise all parties on the $4bn (£2.43bn) privatisation of Saudi Telecom - Saudi Arabia's largest ever privatisation.The firm was transaction counsel on the deal, advising underwriters Gulf International Bank, issuer Saudi Telecom Company and selling shareholder the Saudi government.
Barking mad
Lawyers can be an eccentric bunch and one particular partner at Clifford Chance in Paris is no exception: said partner keeps a pretty Parisian poodle in the office.While working late one night, one fresh-faced associate was surprised to hear the pitter-patter of little feet and when turning a corner saw the pooch scamper into the partner's office. The associate shrugged, giggled ...
Barlows makes six corporate redundancies
Barlow Lyde & Gilbert has become the first insurance law firm to bow to the recession and publicly announce assistant job cuts
Beachcrofts bolsters IT with Freeserve hire
Chair of the Internet Service Providers' Association joins IT and interactive commerce practice
Bingham makes West Coast IP push
Bingham McCutchen has bumped up its IP coverage on the West Coast by appointing a partner from specialist firm Christie Parker & Hale.Robert Schroeder is set to join Bingham’s LA-based intellectual property and technology litigation group on 18 February. Schroeder, who has practised in this area for over 30 years, specialises in trademarks, copyright law and unfair competition.
Bird & Bird takes on four from E&Y for Milan plan
Bird & Bird has hired four lawyers, led by intellectual property/IT head Massimiliano Mostardini, from Ernst & Young's Italian arm to set up a Milan office in April. Mostardini will be the managing partner of the operation.
Box clever
Tulkinghorn is a big fan of TV legal dramas. However, he was having a few problems getting to grips with the BBC's latest offering, Trust. Then one of its budding lawyer stars committed the heinous crime of calling her own firm a company. By now, Tulkinghorn was on the point of ditching his Thursday evening spot on the sofa when the programme more than redeemed itself. Proving that Trust is truly on the pulse of what goes on in the legal profession one of the lawyers was caught ...
Brobeck Hale and Dorr chief in shock departure
Brobeck Hale and Dorr’s managing partner Tom Kellerman has suddenly stepped down in mysterious circumstances. Just last week, Kellerman told The Lawyer: "You've got to have a long-term vision. It's going to take 10 years. It can't happen overnight."Kellerman visited Brobeck Phleger & Harrison, the collapsed West Coast firm, at the end of last week to discuss his future. It is also understood that he met with Hale and Dorr representatives early this ...
Carey Langlois and Olsens join forces
Carey Langlois and Olsens have merged to create the largest firm in the Channel Islands. The new firm will be called Carey Olsen and will comprise 120 lawyers, including 25 partners based in Jersey, Guernsey and London. First revealed on www.thelawyer.com/lawyernews 4 February
Carnelutti reshuffle aims to mimic the Anglo-Saxons
Italian firm Carnelutti has bolted on a litigation practice in Rome and is continuing to overhaul its management in an effort to create a more Anglo-Saxon-structured firm
Chilling billing
As if lawyers weren't already strange enough, Tulkinghorn has come across the weird goings on of a West Coast-based female partner.California's very own Queen of the Damned regularly holds seances at her house, where she and her mates can regularly be found chanting, quivering and spewing up ectoplasm. Apparently the loon thinks all this is very normal. But then to be fair, half her time is spent dealing with the undead at her own firm.
Cisco open to offers after Brobeck collapse
After the collapse of its principal outside counsel Brobeck Phleger & Harrison, Cisco Systems is watching a series of West Coast law firms traipse through its San Jose headquarters in an attempt to woo the technology giant
Clarke Willmott's Equitable claimants win group status
Clarke Willmott & Clarke, acting for 10 claimants with cases against Equitable Life, has won a key action for its clients to go to trial as a group rather than individually, providing savings in court time and costs
CMS Lexcelis launches Brussels IP department
A&O assistant recruited to head up new group
Corporate deals round-up
Lovells (Richard Lewis) advised Unum, the UK subsidiary of UnumProvident, on the acquisition of the UK group insurance business of Sun Life of Canada. Clifford Chance advised Sun Life of Canada.Barlow Lyde & Gilbert (Keith Snedden) acted for Teather & Greenwood Holdings on the sale of part of Teather & Greenwood Investment Management to Prudential-Bache for £3.65m. ...
Criminal team walks out on Dechert to go it alone
Dechert's high-profile criminal, investigations and civil fraud unit is breaking away from the firm to launch an independent boutique
DEAL OF THE WEEK - DEUTSCHE TELEKOM
Freshfields back on Deutsche Telekom selloff with Apax bid
Deutsche Börse gets new legal head
Roger Müller, director and deputy head of capital markets at HypoVereinsbank, will succeed Heiko Beck as general counsel of Deutsche Börse, operator of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, in April
Dewey lands largest Chinese IPO of the year despite HK exit
Despite its withdrawal from Hong Kong last month, US firm Dewey Ballantine has won instructions on the biggest initial public offering (IPO) of 2003 in China
DLA insolvency head joins Eversheds
DLA has lost its national head of business support and restructuring Peter Cranston to Eversheds
Dorsey & Whitney lures Landwell tax team
Landwell's City-based tax litigation team has moved to Dorsey & Whitney. Six lawyers, including Simon Whitehead, transferred to the US firm's London office, but three litigators were retained. The move is a response to new rules that came into force under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which introduced restrictions on the services that accountancy-tied firms can offer to their US-registered audit clients.
Equitable action struck out
Stricken insurer to pursue alternative claim againt former auditor, Ernst & Young
Eversheds targets Middle East with Qatar link
National firm signs co-operation agreement with Qatar firm
Ex-Radcliffes head sues firm
The former finance director at RadcliffesLeBrasseur is suing the Westminster firm for more than £100,000 in damages over a dispute relating to his employment contract
Fare's fair
God help City lawyers trying to get a cab anywhere near London Wall. Apparently one can't be found for love nor money because they're all lined up outside Clifford Chance.Not to be foiled by this little problem, a rather smart Camerons assistant came up with a clever solution. He decided to saunter down to the doors of Clifford Chance and, taking careful note of the surname ...
Farmer wages High Court war on Cripps
Cripps adversary continues 10-year saga; other Kent firms brought into the fray
Field Fisher lands Osborne Clarke partner
Field Fisher Waterhouse has poached Osborne Clarke employment partner David Fisher. Fisher, who was based at Osborne Clarke's London office, specialises in both contentious and non-contentious employment. First revealed on www.thelawyer.com/lawyernews 4 February
Forsters
Having the strength to go it alone has paid off for Forsters
Freshfields appoints contentious insurance boss
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has appointed Raj Parker as head of its contentious insurance group. Parker has a wide practice area covering insurance, public administrative and sports law. One of his biggest clients is the Football Association. First revealed on www.thelawyer.com/lawyernews 4 February
Gide forges alliance to drive international expansion
Firm joins forces with former French foreign minister to target government's worldwide
Gouldens partner vote seals Jones Day merger
Gouldens has confirmed its future after partners voted through the merger with US firm Jones Day
Hengeler develops Euro competition capability
Hengeler Mueller is moving partner Christoph Stadler from Düsseldorf to Brussels in a bid to boost its European competition practice. Stadler will continue to work on German transactions, but said the growing number of large cross-border deals made the Brussels antitrust practice a priority for the firm. First revealed on www.thelawyer.com/lawyernews 5 February
Herbert Smith outwits Linklaters in oil project court battle
Firm sees BHP Billiton Petroleum to victory in dispute over Liverpool Bay development
HIH inquiry takes new twist
In the last of the submissions before the HIH Royal Commission, former Blake Dawson Waldron partner and HIH director Charles Abbott has had his submission turned on its head due to evidence presented by KPMG liquidator Tony McGrath
Infer play
Spotted having a cosy lunch in Smithfields: two magic circle PR heads. Tulkinghorn is sure Clifford Chance's Jeff Wagland and Linklaters' Gita Bartlett were only swopping notes on how to deal with pesky hacks. But he rather prefers the other theory - the mega-merger to end all mega-mergers. Sightings ...
Jacko jumps the gun with Theodores
Michael Jackson brought in Theodore Goddard to advise him on Granada Television's controversial documentary days before the piece was broadcast
Jensen: 'Pillsbury does not have insurance to cover $45m lawsuit'
Pillsbury Winthrop is facing a fresh wave of claims from former partner Frode Jensen, who is now alleging that the firm does not have insurance to cover his $45m (£27.4m) lawsuit
Judge Jacob slammed for expert witness flak
One of the UK's most senior judges has been rebuked for wrongly condemning an expert witness
Judge sends Rolls-Royce litigation to Indian limbo
Is it within a UK judge's remit to evaluate the competence of foreign courts? asks Brendan Malkin
Judiciary pressed to welcome in-housers
The Lord Chancellor's Department (LCD) is set to bring in-house lawyers into the judiciary following intensive lobbying from their professional body, the Commerce & Industry (C&I) Group
Keoghs insurance partner joins Silverbeck Rymer
Highly-rated insurance partner Iain Tenquist (left) has switched from defendant to claimant and joined Silverbeck Rymer after just a year at defendant firm Keoghs. Prior to that, Tenquist endured a stormy departure from Morgan Cole, where he was head of insurance. Tenquist has been appointed claimant operations director ...
KMZ man joins Barclays Capital
Barclays Capital has hired banking and securities partner Jonathan Hughes of US-based firm KMZ Rosen-man as its new UK head of legal
Law Soc budget suffers £7m shortfall
The Law Society has a £7.1m hole in its budget as a result of expanding its regulatory department after setting last year's practising certificate (PC) fee, which is its main source of income
Law Soc hits out at Mugabe regime
The Law Society has added its voice to those condemning the regime of Robert Mugabe, after further attacks and the alleged torture on a member of the Zimbabwe legal profession
Laytons recruits Pannones insolvency partner
Pannone partner hired to head up Manchester group
Leeds litigators: 'Woolf is not working'
Four years after the overhaul of the civil procedure rules (CPR), significant areas of the reforms are as flawed as they were pre-Woolf, according to litigators at several Leeds-based firms
Lester Aldridge partner quits for tribunal post
Lester Aldridge commercial litigation partner Richard Byrne has left the South Coast firm to work full time as a chair of the Reading Employment Tribunal. He has been at the firm for 20 years and became a partner in 1983. First revealed on www.thelawyer.com/lawyernews 5 February
Letter
I refer to the recent article regarding the suggested defection of a team of lawyers from Crills (20 January). I welcome this opportunity to clarify the position.It is true that two salaried partners have left our financial services business team, but all the other lawyers and support staff remain in that team and it is business as usual at Crills. Recruitment and the level of work, in both non-contentious and contentious commercial fields, remain strong and I would not ...
Lord Chancellor's judicial role under attack
Pressure group Justice calls for Lord Irvine to step down as a judge
Mayer Brown continues Paris expansion
M&A team hired from former Andersen Legal firm SG Archibald
Milbank makes state prosecutor NY partner
Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy has hired George Canellos as a partner in the firm's New York office. Canellos joins the firm after nine years as a prosecutor in the Criminal Division of the United States Attorney's Office.
Morgan Cole sets sights on London
Crisis-torn Morgan Cole is launching a London campaign in a bid to raise its profile and drum up business in the City
Morgan Lewis rescues a third of Brobeck partners
One-time suitor takes 50 partners as deadline for closure takes unromantic twist
Motor head
With a £45bn turnover per year, no one could argue the might behind the motor industry, and SMMT is at the forefront of the action
MP mounts legal attack against ICC
The International Cricket Council (ICC) may face a legal challenge to the planned English cricket match in Zimbabwe, by MP Derek Wyatt and his legal team
Opinion
The Sun's oft-quoted headline 'Crisis? What Crisis?' seized on the remarks of Prime Minister James Callaghan as he returned from a summit in the Caribbean to the dark, cold days of the UK's Winter of Discontent
Paradise is half as nice
Tulkinghorn hears that Nabarro Nathanson lawyers are up in arms… over the quality of the firm's snacks. Managing partner Nicole Paradise seems to have inadvertently imposed her health kick on the entire firm.The story goes that Paradise had a quiet word with kitchen staff to ask for a few more healthy options from the canteen. The trouble is, they were rather overenthusiastic about ...
Pilsbury keeps Dentons on tenterhooks over UK merger
Pillsbury Winthrop is continuing to play the field on its hunt for a UK merger partner, while potential suitor Denton Wilde Sapte has seemingly put all its eggs in one basket in the hope of a tie-up with its US friend
Samuelssons merges with Kromanns
Niche Danish insurance practice Samuelsson Neugebauer has merged with Danish giant Kromann Reumert
Secrets and lies
Brobeck Hale and Dorr: London, Munich, Oxford… or so you might think, until Tulkinghorn uncovered the firm's darkest secret. (No, not what it did with Tower Snow's hard drive.) The firm for the new technological age has its hubs in tech centres, right? That's London and Munich covered. But Oxford? Tulkinghorn can reveal that Brobeck's office is not actually in Oxford, but Oxfordshire. In a business park in Abingdon, to be precise. Busted.
Simmons wins Barclays job ahead of panel review
Simmons & Simmons has been instructed by Barclays Bank on its £35m acquisition of broker Charles Schwab Europe.The appointment comes as Barclays reviews its entire panel for external legal advisers, a process that will be completed over the next few months. The bank is also combing the market for a new general counsel to replace Howard Trust, who announced his retirement last September.Execution-only broker Charles Schwab will be merged with Barclays ...
Skjerven collapse sees Pillsbury partners return
Pillsbury Winthrop is taking back a score of ex-lawyers who had quit the firm for San Jose's Skjerven Morrill, which last week was plunged into dissolution
Smarmed response
Tulkinghorn would like to congratulate Lex Mundi for topping a recent survey… wait for it… that it commissioned itself.The Altman Weil survey revealed that Lex Mundi was nearly three times better known than the next highest scoring law firm network and five times better known than other global or US-based networks. But as Charles Maddock of Altman Weil, who developed the survey, rightly points out: the fact that the survey was commissioned by Lex Mundi obviously ...
Tax break
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act will have a wider effect than just on US-listed business. John Taylor finds that tax lawyers could soon be competing on a level playing field with accountancy firms
The Leader Column
The law doesn't work. Well, it didn't for Sally Clark, but now the dust has settled on her successful second appeal, it's time to ask whether such cases should reach our courts again.Clark has endured a terrible miscarriage of justice; spending three and a half years in prison, separated from her husband and surviving child and unable to grieve the loss of her two sons. The trial itself is estimated to have cost £2m, and the Government now faces the potential ...
The price is right
Are legal aid firms being made scapegoats by the National Audit Office? Jon Robins reports on how access to justice is being compromised for easy headlines
The quiet American
BHD managing partner Tom Kellerman may have escaped the collapse of Brobeck, but its aftershocks are his main concern. Catrin Griffiths reports
Theodore Goddard and Addleshaws enter merger talks
Theodore Goddard and Addleshaw Booth & Co have agreed to enter exclusive merger negotiations. A joint statement issued on behalf of both firms said: "We’ve agreed to enter exclusive discussions to explore the benefits of a merger."See The Lawyer on Monday for more details
Theodores forever
If the firm pulls off that merger it's been struggling to secure for over a year, then the name Theodore Goddard may be no more.At least anti-merger Theodores partners can take some small comfort from the fact that the firm's name and the fearsome reputation of its libel lawyers have been immortalised in the bestselling novel How To Lose Friends and Alienate People - UK journalist Toby Young's fabulous account of his failure to take Manhattan.Young ...
UK opposes EU takeover directive
The EU's revised take-over directive is facing new obstacles following an unexpected decision by the UK to side with Germany in opposing a number of key aspects of the proposal
Weil Gotshal moves in on Brobeck team
High profile partners Rod Howard and Curtis Mo are latest to find new home
Weil Gotshal rues the day it took on Indigo instruction
What should a law firm do if faced with an out-of-control client? Helen Power investigates
Wragges strengthens its links with Atlanta's King & Spalding
Wragge & Co has scored its first instruction from US law firm King & Spalding. The Atlanta-based firm, which launched an office in London last summer, has instructed Wragges' real estate group to advise on the lease of its new City headquarters.Wragges partner David Birch is a close contact of John Cogan, who joined King & Spalding as a partner more than three years ago. Once ...
