More Law Firm Implosions to Come

The prospect of more law firms imploding is a scary one for both partners and law job seekers, but according to the law firm consultant Bruce MacEwen, who also blogs at AdamSmithEsq.com, there will be more implosions among the Big Law category firms: and some of the names will be brand name firms.

MacEwen’s prediction refers to the collapse of Dewey & LeBeouf, which MacEwen said was doing nothing more or less than what other firms are doing – they just did them to an extreme, he said.

Dewey & LeBeouf, which dissolved in 2012, saw its bankruptcy plan approved by a Manhattan U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge recently and it is the largest U.S. law firm ever to go out of business, with more than 1,400 lawyers on its staff at its peak.

Meanwhile with layoffs and other downsizing continuing among many of the major firms, the law fraternity is becoming increasingly uneasy.  While many large firms have expanded internationally, to Asia, the Mid-East, Europe and Eastern Europe, the competitive nature of the legal world, rising cost structures, fee limitations and competition from new forms of legal service delivery are all contributing to tightening margins.


Man Sentenced for Hiding Millions Hidden in Swiss Banks from IRS

LawFuel.com – US Attorney Announcements and News – Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that JACQUES WAJSFELNER was sentenced today to six months of probation, including three months of home confinement, for willfully failing to file Reports of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (“FBARs”) with the IRS, regarding Swiss bank accounts that he maintained and controlled.  WAJSFELNER used the services of Beda Singenberger, a Swiss financial adviser who was charged in July 2011 with conspiring with various U.S. taxpayers and others to hide more than $184 million offshore at various Swiss banks. 

WAJSFELNER also had undeclared accounts at Wegelin & Co., a Swiss bank sentenced yesterday for conspiring to evade taxes, file false tax returns, and defraud the IRS in the Southern District of New York, and Credit Suisse.  As part of his resolution of the criminal charges against him, WAJSFELNER agreed to pay a civil penalty of over $2.8 million, representing 50% of the high value of the accounts that he maintained.  Today’s sentence was imposed by U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald.

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