Posts on ‘December 18th, 2008’

Smith Gambrell & Russell has opened a seven-lawyer New York office at a time when many firms in Manhattan offices are finding the legal market there a treacherous place. Chairman Stephen M. Forte said the fallout in the New York market from the Wall Street financial crisis presents opportunities to a midsize firm from Atlanta. Forte acknowledged that expanding into New York may seem rash in the current economic climate, but he added, “We feel it is a very good investment for the future.”

A federal judge on Wednesday dismissed an antitrust lawsuit Louisiana’s former attorney general filed against some of the nation’s largest insurance companies after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The suit accused Allstate Insurance Co., State Farm Fire and Casualty Co. and other insurers of conspiring to shortchange policyholders after the hurricanes struck the Gulf Coast in 2005. U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey said the suit failed to present evidence of a conspiracy among the competing companies.

Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy has rejected two more efforts to get the Court to consider whether President-elect Barack Obama is eligible to take office. Kennedy on Wednesday denied without comment two appeals that claim Obama is either a citizen of Kenya or Indonesia and is ineligible to be president because he is not a “natural-born citizen” of the U.S. Individual justices and the entire Court have turned down similar emergency appeals at least seven times in the past six weeks.

Larry Sonsini and his firm, Wilson Sonsini, paid $9.5 million to client Brocade to forget about that little backdating thing. It’s possible they’ll have to pay more if Gregory Reyes, Brocade’s former CEO and current pokey-bound backdating whipping boy, has his way. Reyes has hired L.A. white-collar criminal specialist Terry Bird to figure out whether he’s got some contribution claims against the likes of Sonsini, a former Brocade board member, and his firm, say people familiar with Bird’s role.

Two teenage boys share similar tragic situations — both have the terminal genetic disease Duchenne muscular dystrophy and both were not allowed to participate in a drug company’s trial of an experimental drug that holds some promise as a possible cure. But their families were on different sides of a landmark case in the 3rd Circuit that helps set the standard that families should not be able to use litigation to force drug companies into providing experimental drugs before trials prove their safety.

A group of five U.S. Army veterans discharged as unfit to serve due to post-traumatic stress disorder filed a class action against the federal government Wednesday, alleging they were illegally denied disability benefits despite being qualified for them because of the illness. The complaint alleges that starting in 2002, the Army “systematically” ignored related rules. Lawyers for the veterans are hoping that the suit’s discovery process will reveal how many other soldiers with PTSD were denied benefits.

In a letter to N.Y. Gov. David A. Paterson made public Wednesday, the state’s Commission on Judicial Nomination — criticized by the governor and Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo for nominating seven men, six of them white, for the state’s chief judgeship — defended its search as diligent and far-reaching. The letter contained an unprecedented release of additional information on the commission’s candidate list.

Dorsey & Whitney partner Tom Vilsack — previously a two-term governor of Iowa and a Democratic presidential candidate — was named secretary of agriculture on Wednesday by President-elect Barack Obama. Obama also named his incoming secretary of the interior — Colorado Sen. Ken Salazar, a former state attorney general and chief legal counsel to former Colorado Gov. Roy Romer. Vinson & Elkins partner Ronald Kirk is reportedly a contender for secretary of transportation or U.S. trade representative.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich withstood a fellow Democrat’s attempt to have him quickly ousted from office when the state Supreme Court refused Wednesday to hear a challenge to his fitness to serve. The court rejected Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s argument that the Blagojevich corruption scandal prevents him from properly doing his job. Blagojevich’s lawyer, meanwhile, filed a motion with the House committee asking the state to appoint and pay for Blagojevich’s legal defense in the impeachment process.

The Constellation Energy saga is over, and it ended in a victory for the French energy giant EDF, which acquired the struggling Baltimore energy company’s nuclear power business for $4.5 billion. That’s nearly the same amount Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy offered for all of Constellation two months ago, a deal Constellation accepted only to be met with a half-dozen civil suits from shareholders claiming Buffett’s offer was low.