Final name partner leaves Nelson Brown; is firm 'effectively dead'?
The Pennsylvania law firm Nelson Brown Hamilton & Krekstein has lost its last remaining name partner, spurring questions about its future.
Name partner Michael Nelson has left the firm with four other Nelson Brown lawyers to join Sutherland Asbill & Brennan, report the Legal Intelligencer (sub. req.) and the Philadelphia Business Journal. Nelson Brown, which had 75 lawyers at the start of 2014, listed only six lawyers on its website when the publications checked it.
Neither publication was able to obtain any on-the-record comments about the future of the law firm. A Nelson Brown spokesperson who spoke with the Legal Intelligencer deferred comments to Nelson, who didn’t comment to either publication.
One unidentified lawyer who recently left the firm told the Legal Intelligencer it appeared that Nelson Brown was “effectively dead.”
Nelson’s departure comes after Nelson Brown settled two suits involving lawyers who left to join Lewis, Brisbois, Bisgaard & Smith. One suit claimed the 14 departing lawyers took law firm laptops with them, while a second claimed Nelson Brown failed to pay promised bonuses to seven of the departing lawyers.
However a suit claiming a fired Nelson Brown associate was subjected to a “frat house atmosphere” at the law firm is apparently still pending, the Legal Intelligencer says.
