More Lawyers Leave as Howrey Dissolution Vote Approaches

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As the dissolution vote draws nearer, and is reported to be happening this week, partners are continuing to leave the firm.

Four IP litigation partners from Howrey’s Palo Alo office are now moving to Perkins Coie.  The four who are leaving are James Valentine, Daniel Shvodian, Christopher Kelley, and James Pistorino, all from Howrey’s Palo Alto office.  Margaret Macdonald, another partner of Howrey located in Washington D.C., has also been given an offer by Perkins Coie, according to Perkins Coie’s chief lateral recruitment officer, Karen Andersen.

Since these four jumped ship, Perkins Coie has increased its IP practice to over 75 patent litigators and over 200 attorneys in its Bay area location, according to its Bay area managing partner, Ed Wes.

  

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Krista Carter, also based in Howrey’s Palo Alto office, left Howrey for Dickstein Shapiro.  On March 1^st she joined the firm and now is opening an office in Silicon Valley, along with partners Deborah Fishman and Jeffrey Miller, who were formerly partners at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe.

Henry Petri and Janelle Waack, from Howrey’s Houston firm, left for Novak Druce + Quigg, an intellectual property firm, originally founded in 2004 by partners formerly from Howrey.  Howrey’s Houston office has not seen as many defections as some of its other offices, and Petri was offered a position at Novak in January, but, in his words, he stayed until now “to wrap up things there.”

Waack decided to move much more recently, because of the talks between Howrey and Winston.  In her own words, she said, “When the situation came up with Howrey and the potential integration with Winston & Strawn, it just became apparent there were some conflict issues I’d have to deal with.”

As a result of all of the recent departures, Howrey is now almost the half the size it was last year.  The firm had 297 partners and counsel as of April 2010.  Now, less than a year has passed by, and 141 of those 297 have left the firm.