Wake Up Call: Jenner & Block Sued for $3.7M Over Late Rent in Chicago

In today’s column, a lot of U.K. law firms fear for their 2020 profits because of Covid-19’s hit to their business; an Australian firm plans to close its London office and have its 200 workers there work permanently from home; the expected boom in bankruptcy cases stemming from the Covid-19 crisis could make eDiscovery lawyers’ work more difficult; Cozen O’Connor got five litigators from Akin Gump, including two new co-chairs for its class-action practice; a new cyber-security report argues the legal sector should be labeled critical to the national infrastructure; Quarles & Brady hired a former NBCUniversal chief privacy officer as a partner.

• Leading off, Jenner & Block is getting sued for $3.7 million in overdue rent plus late fees on its Chicago office, a report says. However, co-managing partner Randy Mehrberg said the firm is invoking a “negotiated” lease provision that gives it an abatement if the space is unusable “in the event of a situation, like the global pandemic.” Mehrberg said the firm, which had about $448 million in revenues last year, is not in any financial trouble. (AbovetheLaw.com)

• Business confidence in the U.K. legal sector has ticked up since the worst of the lockdown, but about one-third of 170 firms responding to a recent survey expect their 2020 profits to shrink more than 25%, while 10% of respondents expect to make no profit at all this year. The survey was done by an accountancy firm and the Institute of Legal Finance & Management, this report says. (GlobalLegalPost.com)

• Australia-based firm Slater and Gordon is set to close its London office, whose 200 workers will begin working from home permanently starting in September. (Law.com International)

• Bloomberg Law reporters from various beats discussed how Big Law attorneys and in-house counsel they deal with every day say they are feeling the effects of the Covid-19 crisis. (BLAW)

• The expected boom in bankruptcy cases stemming from the Covid-19 crisis could make eDiscovery lawyers’ work more difficult, in particular because of bankruptcies’ accelerated pace and unique data collection and privacy challenges, a report says. (Legaltech News)

• Remote jury trials are technically feasible and legally plausible, but risks of procedural flaws and rampant retrials reduce their appeal, two California legal academics argue. (The Recorder)

• Lawyers and staff at Womble Bond Dickinson recorded themselves reading their favorite children’s books for a library of recordings for use by the transatlantic firm’s parents who are working from home. (Daily Report)

• Merck & Co., advised by Covington & Burling, reached a deal to buy Austrian biotech company Themis as part of Merck’s efforts to accelerate development of a Covid-19 vaccine. (FierceBiotech.com) (Bloomberg News)

Lawyers, Law Firms

• Six-month-old Chicago corporate boutique Croke Fairchild Morgan & Beres is staying busy during the Covid-19 pandemic charging rates that are about half those of the Big Law firms at which its founders used to work. (American Lawyer)

• Latham & Watkins got replaced representing Quantico Tactical Inc. after getting disqualified in that company’ pre-award protest of a defense logistics procurement because Latham previously represented another bidder, which is represented by Wiley Rein. (BLAW)

• A lender filed an affidavit in Manhattan Supreme Court that it says shows Pierce Bainbridge Beck Price & Hecht and founder John Pierce owe it almost $4 million. (New York Law Journal)

• Elon Musk’s aerospace company Space Exploration Technologies Corp., better known as SpaceX, has gotten a lot of help from Big Law firms, in particular lobbying work from Squire Patton Boggs. (American Lawyer)

• A court lifted a temporary injunction in a fierce battle of New York fashion agencies over the exit of 55 models from one to the other. Quinn Emanuel is advising one side in the case. (New York Law Journal)

• WilmerHale and Dechert were among firms that won $6.8 million in legal fees in a Texas voter identification lawsuit. (Texas Lawyer)

• Arent Fox said it was named counsel to the unsecured creditors committee in the bankruptcy proceedings of Dean & Deluca New York Inc., the gourmet grocery store chain. (ArentFox.com) (Bloomberg News via BLAW)

• Attorney General William Barr named D.C. deputy associate attorney general Stephen Cox as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Texas starting June 1. He takes over from U.S. Attorney Joseph Brown, who said he’s leaving. This report says Brown is leaving after a clash, with Cox and others at DOJ, over potential prosecution of Walmart over its opioid prescription practices (Houston Chronicle)

• One law firm accounted for 81% of legal work for Texas hospitals suing patients for medical debt, a report says. (MedPage Today)

Laterals, Moves

• Cozen O’Connor hired class action litigators Michael W. McTigue Jr. and Meredith C. Slawe from Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld as shareholders and co-chairs of its national class actions practice group. Slawe will also co-lead the firm’s retail industry group. Philadelphia-founded Cozen also added Akin Gump lawyers Mira Baylson, a white-collar defense attorney and trial lawyer, as a shareholder, and class action litigators Daniel Brewer and Marie Bussey-Garza. (BLAW)

• As firms get ready for Covid-19 bankruptcies, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett has added finance and restructuring lawyer David Zylberbergas counsel in New York. He was previously special counsel at Sullivan & Cromwell in New York. (STBL.com)

• Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan’s Washington office poached Williams & Connolly patent litigation co-chair Kevin Hardy. Hardy, who’d spent his entire 20-year legal career with Williams & Connolly, is the third practice leader to leave the firm in 2020. (National Law Journal)

• Carlton Fields hired business litigator and trial attorney Roger S. Kobert as a shareholder practicing from its New York and Miami offices. Kobert arrives from Weiss Serota Helfman Cole & Bierman, where he was a partner and chair of the international practice group. He’s a former chairman of the Federal Bar Association’s international law section. (Carlton Fields)

• Perkins Coie added privacy litigator Alison Watkins as a partner in Palo Alto. According to her LinkedIn, Watkins advises tech companies on compliance with global privacy laws and arrives from Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, where she’d been nearly 13 years. (PerkinsCoie.com)

• Quarles & Brady also expanded its data privacy and security practice, adding former NBCUniversal chief privacy officer Hilary Laneas a partner in Tampa. Lane most recently was briefly an adviser at Fenwick & West and at WeWork as interim senior director and global head of privacy. Partner Greg Leighton and associate Bari Nathan arrived from Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg in Chicago. (Quarles.com)

In-house

• Telehealth startup 98point6 Inc. added associate general counsel Melanie Curtice, who had been the company’s primary outside employee benefits counsel as a partner at Perkins Coie’s Seattle headquarters. Nursing home operators and hospital systems also recently added in-house talent. (BLAW)

Technology

• The near $1 trillion legal sector should be defined as critical to securing national infrastructure, according to a new cyber-security report that finds 100% of law firms were targeted by attackers in 2020’s first quarter. (Infosecurity Magazine)