DLA and Reed Smith gain partners from Dewey departures

Corporate partner Prakash Paran has quit the firm’s London office for DLA Piper, taking two of his colleagues, associates Roger Loo and Melanie James, with him.

The co-head of Dewey’s environmental litigation practice, Nicholas Rock, has also left the London office for US rival Reed Smith. Rock has over two decades of litigation experience and specialises in environment and climate change law.

The departures come on the back of reports that Dewey is rolling out an initiative scheme to stem this year’s partner exodus (5th April) after the firm lost a further two partners to DLA Piper last week (4th April).

DLA Piper’s EMEA head of corporate, Juan Picon, said in a statement: “A strong focus on key sectors is of paramount importance to implementing our strategic plan. With the arrival of Basel III and other solvency regulations, the insurance sector is one which will continue to have very significant levels of activity and we intend to be a key player in it.”

Six partners quit Dewey for Sutherland Asbill & Brennan in New York last month (26 March 2012), following the departure of a 12-partner transactional and regulatory team to Willkie Farr & Gallagher (19 March 2012).

Last week The Lawyer revealed that Dewey had slashed the profit share received by the five members of the firm’s new senior management team after they agreed to cap their earnings at £1.6m per year (2 April 2012).

The firm also hired a top crisis communications manager last month to deal with bad publicity surrounding its financial health (23 March 2012).