Wake Up Call: Gibson Dunn ‘Playing Both Sides’ in Big Oil Cases

Welcome to Bloomberg Law’s Wake Up Call, a daily rundown of the top news for lawyers, law firms, and in-house counsel.

• Gibson Dunn is arguing free speech grounds both to defend fossil fuel companies regarding climate denial allegations, and to “silence the industry’s critics” in a North Dakota pipeline case, a new report finds. The firm argues that statements from client Chevron and other oil giants about climate change constitute First Amendment protected “political speech.” (DeSmog)
• An unnamed Charlotte, North Carolina law firm was defrauded out of more than $250,000 after receiving a “bogus” email about the closing of a piece of Charlotte real estate. Florida resident Pierre Almonor planned to have hundreds of thousands of dollars in real estate closing proceeds wired into foreign bank accounts, according to a Justice Department announcement. (CBS17.com)
• Marketing expert Helen Johnson was appointed partner at the UK firm Aaron & Partners, making her the firm’s second non-lawyer partner. “Becoming a partner really gives me the mandate to continue the work my team has been delivering,” she said. (Bdaily)

Laterals, Moves, In-house

• Maureen Ohlhausen and Taylor Owings have joined Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati as partners in the antitrust and competition practice.
• David Selden has joined Cooley LLP’s fund formation practice group as a partner in New York. He led the alternative investment funds legal practice in the UK for PricewaterhouseCoopers.
• Justin Cohen has been promoted to counsel at Hughes Hubbard & Reed in the tax and employee benefits practice group.
• Jun Wang has been promoted into the partnership at Miller Kaplan.
• SAX LLP has promoted Nina Bahazhevska, Matthew Giordano, and Gina Perrone to partners.