Wake Up Call: King & Spalding Names Largest New Partner Class

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

• King & Spalding announced it promoted 37 lawyers to partner, the largest group of new partners in its history. More than a third of the new partners practice in areas of finance, with most based in the financial centers of New York, Dubai, and London. Litigators represented the second largest group, with most based in Washington and Los Angeles. (Law.com)
• President Joe Biden is facing calls from dozens of Democratic lawmakers to pardon Steven Donziger, an environmental lawyer who led a $9.5 billion legal case against Chevron for its responsibility in the dumping of oil waste en masse in Ecuador. Following the case, the oil giant did not pay the judgment, and instead filed and won a racketeering suit against Donziger. (Zeteo)
• Gareth Flanagan, a former New England Law Boston employee, pleaded guilty to three counts of theft after embezzling more than $80,000 from the school. Flanagan was fired as the law school’s IT director in 2022 after admitting to unauthorized purchases and was sentenced to one year of probation and ordered to pay $10,000 in restitution. (Reuters)

Laterals, Moves, In-House

• Tal Hacohen joined Holland & Knight as a partner in its corporate, mergers and acquisitions, and securities practice group. He joins from WilmerHale.
• Peter Fusco, Jae Zhou, and Frank Paz joined Morrison Foerster as partners in its emerging companies and venture capital group in New York.
• Brian Tomkins joined Foley & Lardner as a partner in its mechanical and electromechanical technologies practice group in New York.
• Ari Stern joined Fox Rothschild as a partner in its litigation department in Boston. He joins from Ruberto, Israel & Weiner.
• Brian Park joined Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani as a partner in its employment law practice group in San Diego.
• Michael Long joined Lowenstein Sandler as a partner in its white collar defense and business litigation practice groups. He joins from the New Jersey attorney general’s office.