Milberg Weiss

Milberg Weiss Death Watch: More About Steve Schulman’s Departure

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Steven G Schulman Steven Schulman Steve Schulman Shulman Milberg Weiss Above the Law.jpgAfter we mentioned the departure of indicted partner Steven Schulman from the indicted law firm Milberg Weiss, some of you had funny things to say. See, e.g., this comment.
As it turns out, there were reasons unrelated to federal criminal charges for Steve Schulman to leave Milberg. From Legal Pad:

Schulman’s deal with the firm required that upon his departure, he receive a sum based on Milberg’s income during his last year at the firm. With 2005 a considerably better (as in, indictment-free) year for the firm than 2006, the partner had a real incentive to leave. Indeed, we’re told that by departing before the end of 2006, he’s in line to get about $5 million more than if he had waited.

It’s all about the benjamins, baby. You can take the lawyer out of the plaintiffs’ firm; but you can’t take the plaintiffs’ firm out of the lawyer.

And that $5 million could come in handy if Schulman does strike a plea deal — something that, according to lawyers familiar with the case, has not happened yet, but very well could. We hear that Schulman is open to the idea, and his switch of attorneys earlier this year — from the NY brawler Ed Hayes to former federal Judge Herb Stern — would seem to lend itself to negotiations. The hitch is that if he were to flip, Schulman would probably have to offer up a superior or two, namely Melvyn Weiss or William Lerach.

Very interesting. We know many lawyers who have worked with Judge Stern, and some say that at times he can be difficult, controlling, and arrogant (although you’d be too if you were an ex-Article III judge). But it’s certainly true that he’s not as much of a street-fighter as Ed Hayes, one of the deans of the Mafia defense bar (along with Bruce Cutler and Gerald Shargel).
The prospect of Schulman flipping on Mel Weiss or Bill Lerach is dizzying. The glee among Fortune 500 general counsels and Biglaw securities lawyers — and the Schadenfreude among less successful plaintiffs’ lawyers — would be boundless. Happy Kwanzaa!
5 Million Reasons to Quit Milberg [Legal Pad / Cal Law]
Partner at Law Firm Resigns to Focus on Criminal Charges Against Him [New York Times]
Steven G. Schulman bio [Milberg Weiss]
Earlier: Musical Chairs: 12.13.06

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Musical Chairs: 12.13.06

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musical chairs 2 Above the Law legal blog above the law legal tabloid above the law legal gossip site.GIFIt has been a while since our last round-up of notable moves within the legal profession. So there’s a lot to report today:
Law Firm to… Prison?
* Former Milberg Weiss name partner Steven Schulman resigned from the firm to pursue “new ventures.” The most important of these “ventures” will surely be fighting federal charges of making illegal payments to plaintiffs in past cases.
Law Firms to In-House:
* Securities lawyer Stephen Cutler is leaving his partnership at WilmerHale to become general counsel of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., the banking giant. From a tipster who works in securities law: “This is a big deal.”
Colleagues of Cutler described the JP Morgan gig to the WSJ Law Blog as a “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity. Translation: Who wouldn’t want to make mid- instead of low-seven-figures?
* Another WilmerHale departure: J. Kevin McCarthy is taking over as top lawyer of the Cowen Group, an investment bank.
Government to Private Sector:
* Former New Jersey Chief Justice Deborah Poritz joins the Princeton office of Drinker Biddle & Reath, as of counsel. She stepped down from the New Jersey Supreme Court in October, after reaching the mandatory retirement age.
Government Promotion:
* David Nocenti, current counsel to New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, will become counsel to the governor effective January 1.
Academia-Biglaw Alliance:
* Harvard Law School Professor Laurence Tribe, the renowned constitutional scholar and SCOTUS litigator, is entering into a consulting arrangement with Akin Gump.
Akin Gump is developing a Supreme Court practice. Earlier this year, they added young SCOTUS superstar Tom Goldstein to their line-up.
Lateral Moves:
* Securities-enforcement lawyer Chuck Davidow, to Paul Weiss (DC), from WilmerHale.
Another loss for WilmerHale — on top of the previously reported departure of Paul Eckert for the White House Counsel’s Office.
Why are so many partners leaving WilmerHale? A Hillary Clinton administration is still two years away.
* IP lawyer Joseph Gioconda, to DLA Piper (New York), from Kirkland & Ellis.
* Corporate lawyer Eric Lerner, to Kramer Levin, from Katten Muchin Rosenman.
* Tax lawyer Thomas Giegerich, to McDermott Will & Emery (NY), from Dewey Ballantine (about to merge with Orrick to form Dewy Orifice).
New Partners:
* Bryan Cave: Eleven new partners. Names here.
Due to the sheer number of links today, we’ve placed them after the jump.

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Morning Docket: 11.28.06

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* Happy Anniversary, Justice Stevens. [Associated Press via How Appealing]
* Our low low prices on handmade office furniture are cruel and unusual! [MSNBC]
* The Court lights one up for Big Tobacco. [Law.com]
* Milberg Weiss’s judgment day: January 2008. [New York Times]

Musical Chairs: Parachuting Onto a Sinking Ship?

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sinking ship milberg weiss.jpgWe’re vaguely troubled by the title of this WSJ Law Blog post (’cause it makes us think of this). But it does report on a notable move within the legal profession, so we will plow ahead.
From the aforementioned post:

Matthew Gluck is joining Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman as a senior partner, marking a significant hire for the plaintiffs’ law firm. Gluck had been a litigation partner at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson since 1973….

Milberg Weiss was indicted in May on fraud charges based on allegations that it paid plaintiffs to file cases. It pleaded not guilty and has vowed to fight the charges. Since the indictment, the firm has lost a significant number of partners and associates.

Gluck’s move continues the trend of breaking down the barrier between plaintiffs’ firms and Biglaw. Sometimes Biglaw associates might, after a few years of practice, move over to the plaintiffs’ side; but such moves at the partner level were much less common. Biglaw was Biglaw, plaintiffs’ firms were plaintiffs’ firms, and never the twain shall meet.
This may be changing. Gluck’s move, from Fried Frank to Milberg Weiss, comes not long after former Milberg Weiss name partner Patricia Hynes moved in the opposite direction — from Milberg Weiss to the New York office of Allen & Overy, the defense-oriented British firm.*
So why did Gluck make the move?

Gluck, 64 years old, is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Cornell University. He told the WSJ’s Nathan Koppel he was soon facing retirement age at Fried Frank and wanted a new challenge.

Attempting to turn around a class-action-complaint mill under federal indictment would indeed qualify as a “challenge.” But the undaunted Gluck is surprisingly sanguine about Milberg’s future:

“I don’t know why people have left [the firm] except for panic,” he says. “It doesn’t strike me as rational.”

Not “rational”? Clients defecting en masse, partners fleeing in droves, courts taking the firm off cases, or refusing to appoint them in new ones… Call us Debbie Downer, but this doesn’t sound too promising.
Even if you question the original decisions of clients, partners, and courts to abandon Milberg in the first instance, here’s the problem: the prophecy of doom has turned self-fulfilling. Does the name “Arthur Andersen” ring a bell? Even though the accounting firm was ultimately vindicated in the Supreme Court, that vindication came too late.
But hey, Matt Gluck’s arrival is undoubtedly a good thing for Milberg. In addition to being an experienced litigator, Gluck has — as noted by Milberg Weiss managing partner Sanford Dumain — “superb credentials in the area of bankruptcy law.”
* Yes, Allen & Overy is one of the “Magic Circle” firms. There, we said it. Now wasn’t that fun?
Fried Frank Partner Comes In Through Milberg’s Out Door [WSJ Law Blog]
Milberg Gets Fried Frank Veteran [Wall Street Journal]
Against Tide, Lawyer Joins Milberg Weiss [New York Times]
Matthew Gluck bio [Martindale-Hubbell]

Musical Chairs: 10.05.06

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musical chairs above the law legal blog above the law legal tabloid above the law legal gossip site.GIFOodles of juicy moves today, especially out of and into the federal government. As the leaves change, so do the lawyers.
Government to Private Sector:
* Federal prosecutor John Hueston, a leader of the team that prosecuted Enron execs Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, is heading for the greener pastures of Irell & Manella.
All around the country, AUSAs with white-collar criminal experience are leaving U.S. Attorney’s Offices — including our former workplace — for the more lucrative precincts of private practice. The trend is especially pronounced in the legendary Southern District of New York, as noted by Anna Schneider-Mayerson.
Private Sector to Government:
* Corporate and securities lawyer Michael Halloran, a partner at Pillsbury Winthrop, has been appointed to serve as deputy chief of staff and counselor to Christopher Cox, chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Lateral Moves:
* Broker-dealer compliance specialist Steven Lofchie, to Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, from Davis Polk & Wardwell. (In this day and age, compliance is a hot area. We’re guessing Lofchie got offered a nice deal.)
* Tax lawyer John Narducci, to Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, from White & Case.
* IP lawyer Robert Wasnofski Jr., to Dorsey & Whitney, from Baker Botts.
* M&A lawyer Sandy Feldman, to Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Nicholson Graham, from Torys.
Retirements:
* Plaintiffs’ lawyer Alan Schulman, of Bernstein, Litowitz — and formerly of the indicted Milberg Weiss — is retiring at the end of the year.
Not Going Anywhere — Yet:
* Apple CEO Steve Jobs and HP CEO Mark Hurd are sticking around — despite the problems that their companies face.
NY Practice Leader Leaves One Elite NY Firm for Another [NYLawyer.com]
More NY Partners Switching Firms [NYLawyer.com]
Milberg Weiss: Merger Talks Break Down; An Alum Retires [WSJ Law Blog]
Enron Prosecutor John Hueston to Join Irell & Manella [WSJ Law Blog]
The Gang That Shot Straight Is Disbanding, For a Profit [New York Observer]

Morning Docket: 09.15.06

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anna nicole smith.jpg* Anna Nicole Smith, the buxom ex-Playmate and victorious Supreme Court litigant, supports a formal inquest into the mysterious death of her 20-year-old son, Daniel Wayne Smith. [Associated Press]
* SCOTUS groupies, rejoice: Same-day transcripts of Supreme Court oral arguments will be made available, for free, on the Court’s website. [Washington Post; SCOTUSblog]
* The Pennsylvania Supreme Court strikes down the legislature’s attempted repeal of judicial pay raises as unconstitutional. As a result, Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices’ salaries will increase to about $171,000, and Common Please judges’ salaries will increase to almost $150,000. Not bad for being an icky state court judge. [How Appealing (linkwrap)]
* Boy that was fast: notorious plaintiffs’ lawyer William Lerach, a former partner at the indicted law firm Milberg Weiss, has filed a derivative lawsuit against the HP board. [The Recorder via WSJ Law Blog]
* Michael “Under God” Newdow, the Energizer Bunny of questionable litigation, is at it again. [Law.com]
* More wrangling between the White House and Congressional Republicans over military tribunals and permissible interrogation methods for terror suspects. We hope this gets resolved soon, ’cause our attention span just isn’t that long. [New York Times]

Milberg Weiss Death Watch: Now It’s Getting Really Bad

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pat hynes lawyer.jpgSince it went and got itself indicted, things have been less than peachy-keen over at Milberg Weiss, everyone’s favorite class-action complaint factory. Milberg has lost oodles of prominent partners to other plaintiffs’ firms. And now things are turning downright ugly:

Patricia Hynes, a former name partner of Milberg Weiss, is crossing over to the other side. Starting today, she will be a senior counsel in the New York office of Allen & Overy, an elite, London-based firm that defends companies against securities-fraud litigation, according to a release issued by A&O. “We are desperately trying to build the U.S component of a great firm,” says A&O partner Pamela Rogers Chepiga,* who notes that she used to work with Hynes in the U.S Attorney’s Office in Manhattan.

Yes, that’s right. Pat Hynes — who was a name partner at Milberg, back when it was called Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach — is going to be a defense lawyer in securities class actions.

Congratulations to Hynes for seeing the light — or, at the very least, the fat paycheck that A&O probably dangled before her.

Milberg Weiss Heavyweight Bolts to the Other Side [WSJ Law Blog]

Earlier: Prior AboveTheLaw coverage of Milberg Weiss

* The legal world is a small one: Pamela Rogers Chepiga is the wife of Simpson Thacher powerhouse partner Michael Chepiga (who also finds time to be a Broadway playwright).

(Disclosure: Back when we were in private practice, Michael Chepiga got mad at us on the telephone — and was entirely in the right. After changing into dry underwear, we called him and left a voice-mail of one thousand apologies.)

Milberg Weiss Death Watch: Finally Flatlining?

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It’s been a few weeks since our last report on the much-maligned Milberg Weiss. So here’s the latest news about the plaintiff’s class-action firm that everyone loves to hate:

The bleeding continues at Milberg Weiss Bershad & Shulman. [Last] week, four partners — Bruce Bernstein, Brian Kerr, Dan Scotti and Lee Weiss — announced they were leaving. The lawyers are heading to New York’s Dreier LLP, which represents defendants and plaintiffs in securities litigation. The news was confirmed by Mark Dreier, the firm’s managing partner, who says the Milberg transplants will create a class-action group for their new firm. “Primarily, they will look for opportunities to do plaintiffs work,” he says. The four attorneys did not return calls for comment.

We’re not that familiar with the Dreier firm — don’t they make ice cream or something? But it does strike us as odd that the firm represents plaintiffs and defendants in securities cases. Sounds like a recipe for client conflicts.
Milberg Weiss Watch: The Bleeding Continues [WSJ Law Blog]

Milberg Weiss Death Watch: Partying on a Sinking Ship

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melvyn weiss mel weiss.jpgOne of our favorite legal reporters, Anna Schneider-Mayerson of the New York Observer — a paper that is, by the way, now under new ownership — chimes in on the slow death of securities class-action behemoth Milberg Weiss (headed by Melvyn Weiss, pictured).
Most of her piece summarizes recent developments that have been reported previously elsewhere. But the article does contain some nice color, including details about the indicted firm’s summer party on board an enormous yacht.
Some of our favorite anecdotes, after the jump.

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Milberg Weiss Death Watch: The Last Throes

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Sometimes a dying person twitches and convulses violently before finally biting the big one. Such is the case with Milberg Weiss, which is showing a few final signs of life. The New York Law Journal passes along this good news for our favorite class-action complaint assembly line:

A New York judge has given a boost to Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman by appointing the embattled law firm co-lead counsel in a consolidated suit over stock-option backdating….

Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Richard Lowe said in a decision dated July 13 that the firm’s indictment had no bearing on its ability to handle a batch of derivative suits on behalf of individual investors in voicemail software company Comverse Technology, Inc., whose top executives allegedly enriched themselves by almost $400 million by repricing stock option grants.

In addition, in a catty footnote, the judge took a swipe at Bernstein Litowitz, one of the firms that tried to replace Milberg Weiss as lead counsel:

Justice Lowe also said in his footnote it was “disingenuous” for Bernstein Litowitz to raise the issue of Milberg Weiss’ indictment and its impact on the Comverse matter “since the attorney representing LSERS [Bernstein's client] was himself a partner at Milberg Weiss, a member of its Management Committee, and was at Milberg Weiss when this action was commenced.”

The judge was referring to Salvatore Graziano, who announced plans to leave Milberg Weiss in March.

There are few things more fun to watch than scrappy plaintiffs’ lawyers going at each other’s throats. Milberg Weiss and Bernstein Litowitz deserve each other.
NY Judge Backs Indicted Firm for Spot in Backdating Case [New York Law Journal]

Milberg Weiss Death Watch: Another One Bites the Dust

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Milberg Weiss, the plaintiffs’ side class-action factory under federal indictment, continues to fall apart before our very eyes. The former legal powerhouse, which just lost partner Christopher Jones, suffers another defection. CalLaw’s Legal Pad reports:

The most recent [departure] is William Fredericks, a New York-based partner who’s joining rival Bernstein, Litowitz, Berger & Grossman.

“We’re thankful to have a partner of Bill’s background and experience on the Bernstein Litowitz team,” Bernstein partner John “Sean” Coffey said Monday.

Plaintiffs’ lawyers are so predictable. What’s that saying about rats and a sinking ship?
Milberg’s Partner Flight Continues [Legal Pad - CalLaw.com]
Earlier: Milberg Weiss: The Harder They Fall

Milberg Weiss Death Watch: The Harder They Fall

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Milberg Weiss, the plaintiffs’ class-action mill currently under federal indictment, continues its swift disintegration. Here’s the latest news:

Indicted law firm Milberg Weiss has lost another partner. Christopher Jones announced Friday he’s leaving the firm’s Boca Raton office to join Saxena White.

Right now you’re scratching your head: “Saxena White, Saxena White… Didn’t I see one of her films when I took that due diligence trip to South Dakota, and stayed in the motel with the vibrating bed?”

But no, Saxena White isn’t a porn star — it’s a law firm:

[The] firm was founded last month by former Milberg partner Maya Saxena and associate Joseph White, who left a few weeks after the firm’s May 18 indictment.

Perhaps they split off from Milberg and started their own shop to avoid criminal liability. Or maybe they wanted a shot at winning Above the Law’s first annual contest for “Law Firm That Sounds Most Like a Porn Name.”

Milberg Weiss Watch: From Four Offices to Two [WSJ Law Blog]