Legal Pad

Distinguished Reed Smith Partner Edward Sanders Dies at 87

Southern California lost a significant part of its legal history yesterday with the death of retired Reed Smith partner Edward Sanders. Sanders, 87, counted serving as a senior advisor to President Jimmy Carter on Mideast policy among the highlights of a distinguished career.

The Los Angeles Times looks at his career in the obituary that ran today. A representative for Reed Smith tells us services will be held 2 p.m. Thursday at Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. Legal Pad offers its condolences to Sanders’ family and colleagues.

— Brian McDonough

Are Folger Levin and Crowell & Moring Talking Merger?

The streets are buzzing with word that San Francisco’s Folger Levin & Kahn is in advanced merger talks with Crowell & Moring, a Washington, D.C.-based firm with more than 450 lawyers.

We have yet to get confirmation from the firms that they are talking, but knowledgeable sources outside the firms have been hearing about it. Crowell & Moring partners we reached said our questions would best be answered by the press department or the firm’s chairman, Kent Gardiner, who hasn’t gotten back to us. A Crowell D.C. spokeswoman neither confirmed nor denied talks. Folger lawyers, including the name partners and managing partner, have been mum.

One lawyer familiar with Folger, who believed it was a done deal, said word had first leaked out about a month ago. Now, that lawyer said, there appears to be turmoil inside Folger. Lawyers there are split between those who see the possibilities of joining a bigger firm with offices as far as Brussels and London and those who feel their best opportunities lie in striking out on their own.

Another lawyer on the outside said the mood seems to have shifted inside the firm. “I think people are sad.” Some are looking for other opportunities, the lawyer said.

If the deal does go through, observers say it would signal a change of heart on the part of Folger Levin, which has remained independent as suitors looked for S.F. merger partners.

We go over the practice area overlaps, after the jump ... 

Bingham Lawyer Discusses His Erin Andrews Strategy

Extinguishing an exploding nude-video scandal for a celebrity client is not something many lawyers get hired for very often.

Los Angeles attorney Marshall Grossman made headlines this week as the lawyer representing Erin Andrews, the ESPN reporter who was secretly videotaped through the peepholes in her hotel rooms. An insurance salesman was arrested last week in the case and charged with interstate stalking.

Grossman, who came to Bingham McCutchen in 2007 through the Alschuler Grossman merger, has had a few more stabs at representing celebrities than most, but even he said nothing prepares a lawyer for the tightrope maneuvers required to keep a client’s reputation in place. We chatted with him earlier this week to find out how you handle a case like this.

Stress and strategy, after the jump.

Would-Be A.G. Joins Goodwin Procter

Former Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo has joined Goodwin Procter as counsel in its litigation department. 

“This is an outstanding place to practice law,” Delgadillo said. “They are a group of innovative thinkers that do not look to the past, look to the future for solutions.”

In addition to litigation, Delgadillo will be part of the real estate and public finance group, helping do public-private partnership work. But he said he’ll also continue his run for state attorney general, for which he has $900,000 cash on hand.

Fiscal highs and ethical lows, water under bridges … after the jump.

Pillsbury Loses One Partner, Promotes Another

Akin Gump has recruited longtime Pillsbury partner Patrick Marshall to join its San Francisco office as a partner in its American Indian law and policy practice.

Chambers and Partners ranks Akin Gump as one of four top firms in the country in American Indian law, a practice area Marshall says is growing in this state.

“With the explosion of Indian gaming in California and elsewhere, tribes are also moving toward a diversification of their business beyond gaming,” Marshall said. “And there’s been a great need of the tribes for top legal help.”

Gambling: It’s big … plus an upbeat new office MP for Pillsbury, after the jump …

More Reish Luftman Lawyers Joining Venable

We couldn’t be sure mid-May how many lawyers L.A.'s Reish Luftman Reicher & Cohen was losing to the much larger Venable.

Exiting Reish Luftman partners Brad Cohen and Mike Foster weren’t very chatty then.

But this afternoon, Leland Reicher, who is staying, confirmed to Legal Pad that seven people are leaving, including Cohen, Foster and three other partners in the firm’s 11-lawyer tax and estate planning group.

Reish Luftman is a full-service, 30-lawyer firm focused on business litigation, employee benefits and real estate law, among other practices. The 600-lawyer Venable has been poaching lawyers from across Southern California.

Partners David Schwartz and Robin Gilden leave at the end of this week. Name partner Michael Luftman is also slated to go, but not for several months, Reicher said. Luftman has a different arrangement with the Reish firm, Reicher said.

The others start at Venable June 8.

Reicher, who said he preferred not to share details, said his firm plans to continue in the same practice areas.

—  Petra Pasternak

A Midsize California Firm With Hiring on the Brain

It’s another midsize firm in California with growth ambitions. And it’s not just one with a plan — Michelman & Robinson opened a new, small office in New York this month.

BETWEEN JOBS An occasional look at how job hunting legal professionals cope with a crisis economy.

Dana Kravetz lateraled into Michelman & Robinson in 2004 as a partner to help with employment matters for the firm’s existing clients. The business litigation firm had 30 lawyers at the time. Now, Kravetz says, he has a book of business of his own, and as managing partner of the L.A.-area office, he is involved in recruiting. And he’s looking to replicate his experience with new hires.

This month, the 60-lawyer firm opened in New York with three partners who focus on corporate and securities work, and the firm is bullish on California, too. Kravetz said that the three-year plan calls for the San Francisco and Orange County offices to become full-service, like the L.A. office. In that time, he’d like San Francisco and Orange County to reach between 20 and 25 lawyers each, and Los Angeles 50.

He expects a good number of those hires will be at the associate level.

In fact, they're trying to fill one of those openings now. What they're looking for, after the jump.

Manatt: 25 'Transitions' as Layoffs Continue

Manatt Phelps & Phillips said Monday that it had laid off 17 lawyers and 8 staff because of the economic slowdown. The L.A.-based firm listed 405 attorneys on its Web site on Monday, with about 75 percent working out of its five California offices.

The news first appeared on Above the Law. A firm statement said it provided those who were laid off with “financial and other assistance to help with their transitions.”

“The broad economic slowdown continues to present challenges to businesses in every industry. The quality and breadth our national practice, as well as initiatives to improve resource utilization and reduce expenses, have positioned us to meet these challenges. Responsible stewardship, however, requires ongoing evaluation and appropriate alignment of staffing levels with client needs,” the statement continued.

A storm of layoffs that swept the industry in February and early March seems to have subsided, but layoff news keeps occasionally trickling in. Manatt confirmed earlier this month that it had laid off nearly fifty people since October, ahead of Monday’s latest batch. Since it appears Manatt’s layoffs have not come in discreet waves, it’s arguable whether Monday’s announcement represents a second wave or just the continuation of a long tide.

— Amanda Royal

Mayer Brown's L.A. Chief Quits Management

After a rough-and-tumble few years, the head of Mayer Brown’s Los Angeles office is stepping down and leaving town.

Jim Tancula resigned from the partner-in-charge role in L.A. last week. An announcement went to the whole firm this past Tuesday, he told Legal Pad this morning.

“It’s been a difficult three years,” he said. “It’s taken a lot of time and diverted me from the practice of law.”

Jim gets back to where he once belonged, after the jump ...

Sheppard in '08: Middle Road Has Fewer Bumps

Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton didn’t ditch slow practice areas when the economy was booming and now they are reaping the benefits.

Revenue rose 6 percent to $352 million in 2008. Profits per partner dipped 1 percent to $1.2 million, while revenue per lawyer dipped 4 percent to $767,000.

Chairman Guy Halgren said the firm did not shed lawyers from practices that became “out of fashion” when the economy was booming, like bankruptcy or labor.

“That strategy has worked out well for us, because we have some very strong countercyclical practices right now,” Halgren said.

We chat with the chairman about his flock, after the jump …