Filter This View

  • May 27, 2009 |

    Thomson vocal

    A year on from the merger between the Thomson Corporation and Reuters - which created the world's largest information multimedia news agency - and there has still been no review of the new company's fused panel of UK legal advisers. And according to Daragh Fagan, Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) general counsel (GC) for Thomson Reuters Markets division, there are no plans for one.

    1 minute read

  • May 27, 2009 |

    Weil partner testifies in $2.4bn Refco fraud case

    Weil Gotshal & Manges corporate partner Jay Tabor has pointed an accusing finger at Mayer Brown partner Joseph Collins and his firm for their role in the billion-dollar Refco scandal, reports the Am Law Daily. Collins has been charged by federal prosecutors with concealing a $2.4bn (£1.5bn) corporate fraud that led to the collapse of commodities dealer Refco in 2005.Prosecutors have claimed that Collins helped orchestrate hundreds of millions of dollars in sham loans that eventually bankrupted Refco and forced the company to liquidate. Collins allegedly was motivated to maintain the deception because Refco was his largest client, bringing Mayer Brown more than $40m (£25m) in fees between 1997 and 2005.On Tuesday (26 May), Tabor took the stand to testify about his work advising a private equity group that acquired a 57% interest in Refco in 2004.

    1 minute read

  • May 19, 2009 |

    Maher quits Mayer Brown as firm elects two to board

    Mayer Brown's former co-vice chair Paul Maher has formally resigned from the firm. The UK-based corporate partner handed in his resignation on Friday (15 May) after taking a three-week sabbatical to decide his future.Maher had sent an internal announcement to the firm's global partnership on 28 April explaining that he was considering leaving the firm.

    1 minute read

  • May 14, 2009 |

    Mayer Brown partner claims Refco innocence

    The lawyer representing Mayer Brown partner Joseph Collins in the Refco fraud case has claimed his client was kept out of the loop on hidden debt and sham transactions, reports The New York Law Journal. Collins is accused of helping to conceal a $2.4bn (£1.6bn) corporate fraud, but William Schwartz of Cooley Godward Kronish said the three top Refco officials who defrauded banks and investors made a victim out of "an honest lawyer who believed he was representing an honest, trustworthy company."The issue at the trial, said Schwartz, was "whether Collins was on the inside or the outside - whether they kept him out of the loop, whether they kept him at arm's length, whether they lied to him so he could represent Refco" as an honest company.

    1 minute read

  • May 14, 2009 |

    Eleven firms reappointed to AXA roster as insurer reviews panel

    French insurer AXA has finalised its global roster of external legal advisers, with at least 11 firms securing re-appointments to the panel. Clifford Chance, Clyde & Co, Debevoise & Plimpton, Eversheds, Gide Loyrette Nouel, Holman Fenwick Willan, Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge, Dewey & LeBoeuf, Mayer Brown, Norton Rose and Simmons & Simmons have all been re-appointed to the insurance giant's panel for two years.

    1 minute read

  • May 13, 2009 |

    The Am Law 100: Lessons of the Am Law 100

    Nothing grows forever. For the first time since 1991, both average profits per partner and revenue per lawyer dipped last year among the Am Law 100 firms, the top-grossing firms in the nation. And, given the weakness in the market thus far in 2009, another decline seems likely this year.Those are the headlines from The American Lawyer's 23rd annual Am Law 100 report. These results are for 2008. They capture the start of the economic distress that set the stage for record law firm layoffs and anxiety but, because of the cutoff date, they mask the distress many firms are now dealing with. Last year, overall gross revenue grew by 4.1%, to $67bn (£44.4bn), a new record. But head count grew faster, increasing by 5.4%, to 81,992 lawyers. As a result of that growth, plus a serious drop in demand during the second half of 2008 for high-end work - especially in the corporate and finance sectors - profits per equity partner (PEP) fell by 4.3%, to an average of $1.26m (£836,000), and revenue per lawyer (RPL) dropped 1.2%, to $818,000 (£542,000).

    1 minute read

  • May 8, 2009 |

    Jackson to review complex commercial disputes

    Large-scale commercial disputes will come under the remit of Lord Justice Rupert Jackson's review into the high cost of civil litigation, Jackson said today. Jackson's 650-page preliminary report issued earlier today warns that the commercial courts are not a 'sacred territory' and that his findings will still apply to complex commercial cases.The news comes despite earlier concerns about whether potential procedural changes to litigation should apply to complex, multi-party disputes in the higher courts as well as to commoditised cases in the lower courts.

    1 minute read

  • May 8, 2009 |

    Mayer Brown names new City insurance chief

    Mayer Brown has appointed a new head of insurance and reinsurance in London, with Karen Abbott taking over the post. Abbott, who joined the firm in 1985 and made partner in 1994, succeeds former head Sean Connolly, who is now senior partner of the firm's London office. Connolly was elected to the senior partner role in 2007, replacing former chief Paul Maher.

    1 minute read

  • May 7, 2009 |

    US law firms face worst year for PEP since 1991

    America's legal elite has emerged from its worst financial year since 1991 as partner profits and lawyer productivity at the US's top 100 law firms fell for the first time in 17 years.Eagerly-awaited 2008 results from Legal Week's sister title The American Lawyer confirms the dramatic impact of a fourth quarter dominated by financial turmoil, leading to an immediate global slump in demand for legal services.

    1 minute read

  • May 1, 2009 |

    Former IP client goes after Heller for $50m

    A well-known patent-holding company, and one of Heller Ehrman's most lucrative former clients, is claiming $50m (£33.5m) from the firm's estate for extra costs incurred for having to find other lawyers to cover its cases. Ronald A Katz Technology Licensing, which could owe Heller an undisclosed amount of contingency fees on pending cases against 48 companies, played an indirect role in the US firm's demise. Its outside lawyers were among the 14 partners in the intellectual property (IP) group that moved to Covington & Burling when the firm was days away from a merger with Mayer Brown last summer. The move cost the dying firm a significant revenue stream from Katz's prolific patent fights. The loss of the partners also triggered a contract clause with Heller's banks, Bank of America and Citibank, that allowed them to seize control of Heller's cash.

    1 minute read