Large Firm

DLA Piper Program Will Assign Two New Associates to Pro Bono Work Only

DLA Piper will select two new associates each year to work exclusively on pro bono matters in a new fellowship program announced on Monday. The associates will receive the usual pay—ranging from $145,000 to $160,000, depending on the region—to do pro bono work for their first year at the law…

Aug 30, 2011 2:06 PM CDT

Empire Builder: Frank Burch, DLA Piper

Twelve years ago, a two-page memo drafted at a breakfast meeting at Chicago’s Ritz-Carlton hotel outlined the visions of two leaders of midsize law firms to build the world’s leading global business-law firm. That memo listed three attributes thought to define the top firms of the future, and it remains…

Aug 29, 2011 7:49 PM CDT

DC Law Offices Report Stable or Increasing Summer Progams, Albeit Down from Pre-Recession Highs

Summer associate hiring still hasn’t returned to pre-recession highs at a number of Washington, D.C., law offices. But it’s stable or on the rise, well-known law firms in the nation’s capital tell the the Washington Post. Among them, WilmerHale, which had a high of 78 summer associates in 2005 and…

Aug 29, 2011 5:31 PM CDT

Will the Financial Services Industry Ring the Bell for Law’s New Normal?

In 1995, when Microsoft rolled out the Windows operating system to great fanfare, Microsoft’s graphical user interface and other features appeared to many Apple aficionados to be so derivative of their preferred product that they made a bumper sticker: Windows 95 = Mac 88 I was a newly minted general…

Aug 24, 2011 1:30 PM CDT

Panel Seeks Disbarment of Harvard Law Grad and Ex-BigLaw Partner Who Lied on Child’s School Aid App

Things went from bad to worse for a Harvard Law School graduate who lost his job at a BigLaw firm in 1991 and subsequently lied about family income on a Chicago private school application so that his daughter would get financial aid there. Somehow, Illinois attorney discipline authorities got wind…

Aug 24, 2011 12:11 AM CDT

All Shook Up By Quake, Courts and Law Firms Evacuate; Cozen Partner Welcomes Break in Park

An earthquake in Virginia this afternoon closed some courts and law firms there and in Washington, D.C., and was felt in New York, Boston, Maine and Canada as far north as Toronto, as well as North Carolina. However, there were no reports of serious injuries. The 5.8 magnitude temblor closed…

Aug 23, 2011 10:31 PM CDT

Debevoise and Skadden 1st-Years to Spend First Month Learning B-School Skills Under New Program

Reading a balance sheet and learning to create databases and computer spreadsheets aren’t the focus of a law-school education. But such useful skills, routinely taught to business school students, will be the focus of an innovative monthlong training program for incoming first-year associates at least two major law firms, according…

Aug 23, 2011 12:20 AM CDT

Business Management Strategies Can Be Applied in Law Practice—Document Review, for Instance

Whenever I have written about project management, process management or Lean and Six Sigma, I received considerable criticism from a number of people who feel that such concepts should not be applied to knowledge workers such as lawyers. At the risk of drumming up more consternation, I am putting my…

Aug 22, 2011 2:12 PM CDT

Are BigLaw Firms Inflating Partner Profits? Citigroup Unit Reportedly Finds Fudging

Are law firm rankings suspect because of fudging on figures? More than half of the nation’s top 50 law firms could be overstating profits per partner to the American Lawyer magazine, the Wall Street Journal (sub. req.) reports. An analysis by Citi Private Bank Law Firm Group reportedly found that…

Aug 22, 2011 11:47 AM CDT

Lawyer Paid $32K for M&A Tips Gets 3 Years for Conduit Role in High-Profile Insider-Trading Scheme

A New York personal injury lawyer was sentenced today to a three-year federal prison term for serving as a conduit for at least two attorney tipsters then working at Ropes & Gray in a high-profile insider-trading scheme. Jason Goldfarb was paid $32,500 for his work in the illegal stock-trading scheme,…

Aug 19, 2011 6:23 PM CDT

Judge Nixes Bingham’s Bid for a Court Finding Precluding Malpractice Suit by LA Dodgers Owner

In an unusual pre-emptive strike, Bingham McCutchen filed suit in Massachusetts earlier this year, seeking a declaratory judgment that apparently could have precluded a former client, Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt, from suing for malpractice over a botched marital property agreement. But a state-court judge in Boston nixed the…

Aug 19, 2011 12:10 AM CDT

BigLaw Firms Report Big Jumps in Summer Associate Hiring for 2012

With this year’s summer associates barely out the door, major law firms are already starting to interview candidates for 2012 summer associate positions. And some BigLaw firms are planning to bring in a lot more law students for summer jobs next year than they did this year, reports the Am…

Aug 16, 2011 9:56 PM CDT

Edwards Angell to Merge with Wildman Harrold; New Firm Will Have 650 Lawyers

Boston-based Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge is merging with Chicago law firm Wildman, Harrold, Allen & Dixon. The new firm will be called Edwards Wildman Palmer, according to a press release. It will have 13 offices and 650 lawyers. The merger takes place on Oct. 1. Wildman Harrold had 224…

Aug 15, 2011 4:26 PM CDT

Irell Says Hollywood Dreams, Rather than Bias, Spurred Former Partner to Leave

Irell & Manella is contradicting the claims of a former partner who claims in a lawsuit that the law firm cut her pay because of lost hours during maternity leave. Irell asserts that Juliette Youngblood left the firm in 2009 to pursue dreams of becoming a Hollywood producer, the Am…

Aug 15, 2011 1:53 PM CDT

Several Law Firms Plan to Increase Hiring; Law Schools Jockey for Placements

The hiring outlook may be slightly better for law students this year. Several large law firms are planning to increase hiring over the previous year, the Wall Street Journal (sub. req.) reports. They include Bingham McCutchen, planning to increase summer associate hires by almost 29 percent, and Skadden, Arps, Slate,…

Aug 12, 2011 11:43 AM CDT