Wake Up Call: Greenberg Partner Resigns After Abuse Allegations

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

• Greenberg Traurig announced on Facebook that partner Allan Kassenoff, a patent litigator who had been on leave of absence pending the firm’s investigation into his divorce and custody dispute with his wife has resigned, effective immediately. (Facebook) Kassenoff’s lawyer wife, Catherine Kassenoff, a former federal prosecutor and corporate in-house attorney, reportedly had terminal cancer and recently died by assisted suicide in Switzerland. (New York Post) (News 12 Westchester) (Above The Law)
• Two construction and federal government contract law firms, Atlanta-based Smith Currie & Hancock and Seattle-based Oles Morrison Rinker & Baker announced they’re combining. The new firm Smith Currie Oles will have 76 attorneys in seven offices across the US, including in Florida, California, and Washington DC, according to a statement. (SmithCurrie.com)
• Southeastern law firms are taking longer than the national average to collect their bills as clients delay payments, according to a report. (Daily Report Online)

Lawyers, Law Firms

• Chicago-headquartered plaintiffs boutique Edelson PC is expanding into Ann Arbor, Michigan with the hire of partner Natasha Fernández-Silber from Radice Law Firm to lead the office and co-lead its antitrust practice. The firm also recently opened an office in Idaho and has added 26 new legal and technical staff overall since the launch of its Washington office. (National Law Journal)
• Conservative legal scholar John Eastman, who helped plan Donald Trump’s effort to hold onto power after his 2020 election loss, is fighting disbarment by the California State Bar. (Politico)
• New York courts are backing a proposed state bill that would gradually end the use of nonattorney judges in town and village justice courts. (New York Law Journal)
• Fox Rothschild partner John Herin Jr., a land use, zoning, and environmental law attorney, has served as legal counsel to the town of Fort Myers Beach for the past seven years. He’s now facing competition for the job from central Florida-based Vose Law Firm, which was one of two firms that responded to the town’s recent request for proposals for the role, according to a report. (Fort Myers Beach Talk)
• Police in a Mississippi town Saturday arrested a civil rights lawyer who’s suing their department in federal court on allegations of brutality. The lawyer was filming a traffic stop conducted by the officers when she was arrested, her attorney said. (Associated Press)

Laterals, Moves, In-house

• Vinson & Elkins appointed labor & employment partner and deputy general counsel Vanessa Griffith to general counsel. She taking over from litigation and enforcement partner John Wander, who has been the firm’s top lawyer since 2022 and is joining Talen Energy this month as GC. (VELaw.com)
• Squire Patton Boggs hired former Tesla in-house counsel Andrea Dinamarco as partner in New York and Atlanta in its financial services practice. She arrives recently from Reed Smith, where she was counsel. (SquirePattonBoggs.com)
• K&L Gates hired finance lawyer Dominic Gregory as partner in Tokyo. He arrives from Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner’s London office, where he was partner. He focuses his practice on project financings and project development work, including for renewable energy, mining and resource transactions, restructurings, and “event-driven” deals. (KLGates.com)
• The University of Maryland hired University of Texas at San Antonio chief legal officer Juan “Jay” Rosselló as its new general counsel and vice president of legal affairs, effective Aug. 1. Rosselló has earlier been general counsel & secretary at InfiLaw System, a consortium of independent ABA-approved law schools, and was at the NCAA as director of legal affairs and enterprise risks, ethics, and compliance. (UTSA.edu)