Law Firms

Weil, Gotshal & Manges, Jenner & Block, and Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn have filed their applications for employment as counsel to General Motors in the troubled automaker’s Chapter 11 case. The filings show that GM has paid more than $80 million in fees to the three firms over the past six months. As lead […]

Most lawyers who take on major bankruptcy cases have the time and leeway to help troubled companies restructure in Chapter 11. Corinne Ball, the lead lawyer in Chrysler’s bankruptcy case, had neither. Learning only weeks before Chrysler sought bankruptcy protection that the company would wind up in court, Ms. Ball led a team of more

A federal court ruled Monday that Exxon Mobil Corp. owes $507.5 million, plus 5.9% annual interest accrued since 1996, in punitive damages to plaintiffs affected by the Exxon Valdez oil spill. In a divided opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit determined that the Irving, Texas-based company and the plaintiffs would have

Plaintiffs law firms are sinking their teeth into product liability lawsuits alleging that denture cream products cause zinc buildup in the body and neurological problems. A dozen cases pending in federal courts in California, Colorado, Florida, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Tennessee are awaiting the result of a May 28 multidistrict litigation panel hearing

The R. Allen Stanford legal defense story keeps getting stranger and stranger. While the securities world waits for the inevitable indictment of the Texas financier, he keeps going through lawyers with the same speed the alleged Ponzi mastermind was said to date women. Last week Stanford replaced his civil litigation defense team with a group

After months of anxious planning, it was time for Hugh Verrier (pictured) to finally press send. In his two years as chairman of White & Case, the venerable Wall Street law firm, Mr. Verrier had already laid off 70 young lawyers and shuttered offices in Bangkok, Dresden and Milan. He had watched top partners flee

Nearly two out of three bankruptcies stem from medical bills, and even people with health insurance face financial disaster if they experience a serious illness, a new study shows. The study data, published online Thursday in The American Journal of Medicine, likely understate the full scope of the problem because the data were collected before

Richard W. Fields says he has come up with a win-win financial strategy for the downturn. He is investing in lawsuits. Not in trip-and-fall cases, mind you, but in disputes that are far larger, more costly and potentially more lucrative, often pitting major corporations against each other. Mr. Fields is chief executive of Juridica Capital

Logic suggests that when the economy tanks, opportunities for in-house lawyers ought to improve. After all, legal disputes rise when the Dow takes a dive, and who better to tackle this growing workload than cost-efficient staff attorneys? Yet the nation’s in-house bar—however vital its role in hard times—is shrinking at a rate that tracks the

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Gerber, who oversaw the biggest asset sale and the largest financing loan in court history, will show an exacting style of inquiry during General Motors Corp.’s reorganization, lawyers said. A U.S. judge in New York’s Southern District since 2000, Gerber’s experience in handling Chapter 11 cases such as Adelphia Communications Corp.