Law Firms

In 1996, Eugene Stearns and his Miami-based law firm joined a team of lawyers representing thousands of gas station owners around the country who claimed they’d been ripped off by oil giant Exxon. Just before Stearns and his firm signed on as lead trial counsel with the team, which included Pertnoy Solowsky & Allen of […]

The mass murder trial of Saddam Hussein and his seven co-defendants proceeded with its usual chaos Wednesday, with the proceedings were peppered with outbursts from Saddam and his half-brother. Defense attorneys questioned the validity of the memories of the witnesses and accused the witness of being coached, as Barazan Ibrahim al-Tikriti and Saddam Hussein lectured

American International Group Inc., the world’s largest insurer, probably will announce a $1.6 billion settlement of U.S. state and federal regulatory investigations later today, people familiar with the matter said. The agreement would resolve New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer’s allegations that AIG used sham reinsurance contracts to hide losses and understate liabilities, two people

Plans are afoot in Victoria, Australia to ban the title solicitor because it confuses lawyers with prostitutes, beggars and hawkers. The Attorney-General, Rob Hulls, said the word “evokes thoughts of panhandlers, door-to-door salesmen and streetwalkers”. “In fact, in the US there are signs around the place saying, ‘Do not give money to solicitors’.” To clearly

Average profits at the top 50 firms fell for the second year running, depressed by the lack of corporate mergers and acquisitions and the slowdown in capital market activity. That compares with fee growth at the top 50 firms of 8.6 per cent in 2001-02 and 21 per cent in 2000-01. Profits were down 0.9

It has been decades since Tony Blair had his day in court. That expertise could prove invaluable, particularly as there is only one precedent for a serving prime minister appearing in public before a judicial inquiry. John Major, the former Tory prime minister, gave evidence at the Scott Inquiry into the arms-to-Iraq scandal and was

Like most elite US firms, Cravaths’ awards are handed out solely on a seniority basis with no performance criteria. Cravaths’ announcement, which was made to associates on 8 December, ends weeks of intense speculation over whether New York firms would this year sanction significant increases to the awards handed out in 2002, given the post-summer

Simpson Thacher & Bartlett and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati have emerged as the main lawyers on the long-awaited flotation of US search engine Google. Wilson Sonsini’s chairman and chief executive Larry Sonsini and corporate partner David Segre are acting for established client Google on the $2.7bn IPO. While Palo Alto-based corporate partner William Hinman

Its name evokes a world of beauty and glamour. But lately, Elite Model Management, the largest modeling network in the world, has developed a bad case of the uglies. Not long ago it was a hot agency, representing such models as Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista, and Naomi Campbell. It still has Lauren Bush, President George

A committee of MP reported the legal aid cost blow-out yesterday when they warned ministers that unless the Government took action against these high-cost cases, the legal aid budget, now standing at £1bn, would spiral out of control. No cases were identified by the Commons Constitutional Affairs Committee but they are believed to involve complex