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Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr

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Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP
Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr
Headquarters Washington, D.C. and Boston, Massachusetts
No. of offices12
No. of attorneys972 (2008)
No. of employeesapproximately 2,500
Major practice areasGeneral Practice
Key peopleWilliam F. Lee, William J. Perlstein
Revenue $944m USD (2008)
Date founded Boston (1918); Washington, D.C. (1962)
Foundermultiple
Company typeLimited liability partnership
Websitewww.wilmerhale.com

Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, which also goes by the shorter market name WilmerHale, is an American law firm with twelve offices across the USA, Europe and Asia. It was created in 2004 through the merger of the Boston-based firm Hale and Dorr and the Washington-based firm Wilmer Cutler & Pickering, and employs more than 1,100 attorneys worldwide. As of 2008, it was the 23rd largest law firm in the world in terms of revenue. In 2007, the National Law Journal ranked the firm as the 22nd largest in the United States by number of attorneys.

History

Hale and Dorr was founded in Boston in 1918 by Richard Hale, Dudley Huntington Dorr, Frank Grinnell, Roger Swaim and John Maguire. Reginald Heber Smith, author of the seminal work Justice and the Poor and a pioneer in the American legal aid movement, joined the firm in 1919 and served as managing partner for thirty years. Hale and Dorr gained national recognition in 1954 when partner Joseph Welch, assisted by associate James St. Clair and John Kimball, Jr., represented the U.S. Army on a pro bono basis during the historic Army-McCarthy hearings. In 1988, partner Paul Brountas chaired the presidential campaign of Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, and in 1990, senior partner William Weld was elected governor. The firm has had a long and mutually profitable relationship with nearby Harvard Law School, alma mater of more than a fifth of WilmerHale's current lawyers, and home of the WilmerHale Legal Services Center. [2]

Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering was founded in Washington in 1962 by former Cravath attorneys Lloyd Cutler and John Pickering, along with a senior lawyer, Richard Wilmer. Cutler, who later served as White House Counsel to Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, founded the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law in 1962, and served on its executive committee until 1987.

In the 1980s, Cutler led the founding of the Southern Africa Legal Services and Legal Education Project, to aid South African lawyers who fought to implement the rule of law during apartheid. From 1981 to 1993, partner C. Boyden Gray left the firm to serve as White House Counsel to Vice President and President George H.W. Bush.

In 1988, the law firm established a subsidiary as a registered investment adviser. Initially known as Haldor Inventment Advisors, L.P., and then Hale Dorr Wealth Advisers. In 2008 Hale Dorr Wealth Advisors became Silver Bridge. [1] In 2003, partner Jamie Gorelick began serving as a member of the 9/11 Commission. The two firms merged to form Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr in 2004. [3]

Reputation

WilmerHale is currently ranked 14th in the popular Vault "prestige" ranking of the top hundred American law firms (including second in Boston and third in Washington, DC), and 8th on the American Lawyer "A-List" of the nation's twenty leading law firms based on revenue per lawyer, pro bono work, associate satisfaction, and diversity. [4] According to the British magazine Legal Week, the firm ranks 14th among American law firms in terms of total revenue. [5]

Clients

Large clients

Among the major companies that have recently been represented by WilmerHale attorneys include Bayer, Bear Stearns, Boeing, Bose, Boston Scientific, Cephalon, Citigroup, Credit Suisse First Boston, DaimlerChrysler, Danaher, Deutsche Bank, Educational Testing Service, Fannie Mae, General Electric, John Hancock, JPMorgan Chase, Lehman Brothers, Lufthansa, Morgan Stanley, Novartis, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble, Prudential, Red Hat, Sepracor, Staples, UBS, Verizon, The Washington Post, and Honda. [6]

A Civil Action

In the late 1980s, Hale and Dorr partner Jerome Facher successfully represented Beatrice Foods in a suit by eight families from Woburn, Massachusetts who claimed that Beatrice, along with W.R. Grace, had polluted the town's water supply, resulting in an elevated number of leukemia cases and immune-system disorders. The case was memorialized in the controversial book A Civil Action, by Jonathan Harr, and in a movie of the same name starring Robert Duvall as Facher and John Travolta as plaintiffs' lawyer Jan Schlichtmann. [7]

Enron and WorldCom reports

In the wake of news articles raising concerns about transactions between Enron and its CFO, Andy Fastow, lawyers from Wilmer Cutler & Pickering represented a special investigative committee of Enron's board of directors in an internal investigation into those transactions. The resulting report, known as the "Powers Report," laid out the facts that have been the predicate for much of the public discussion of Enron since that time. [8]

Similarly, after WorldCom's announcement that it would have to restate financial statements, the firm represented a special investigative committee of WorldCom's board of directors in performing an internal investigation into the accounting irregularities. The investigation resulted in a widely-covered written report that detailed a variety of accounting issues as well as the role of management and the board of directors. [9]

Other notable and controversial clients

In 1986, Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering represented corporate raider Ivan Boesky in high-profile Department of Justice and SEC proceedings, as well as multiple class actions based on his alleged participation in insider trading violations.

Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering represented Swiss banks accused of profiting from the Holocaust in their settlement negotiations with plaintiffs. The firm also represented Siemens AG, Krupp AG, and other German companies accused of exploiting forced laborers during the Nazi era. [10]

Since 2005, WilmerHale has represented Senator William Frist with regards to an SEC insider trading investigation.[11]

Pro bono

Both Hale and Dorr and Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering have a long history of involvement in pro bono work. Not surprisingly, WilmerHale has ranked at or near the top of The American Lawyer's pro bono ranking since the merger. In recent years, the firm has been involved in several high-profile cases. Among other things, it has:

  • Represented Senators John McCain and Russ Feingold and other sponsors of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (known popularly as "McCain-Feingold") in defending the Act's constitutionality. Again, Seth Waxman argued the case in front of the Supreme Court, which upheld all of the core provisions of the Act.

Guantanamo controversy

Main article: Guantanamo Bay attorneys

A team of WilmerHale attorneys currently represents the “Algerian Six”, a group of men who fell under suspicion of planning to attack the US embassy in Bosnia and who are now held in the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp. [12]

In 2006, attorney Melissa Hoffer, then part of the team with WilmerHale, delivered a speech in Caen, France, critical of U.S. detainee policy. Other WilmerHale lawyers participating in the case include Stephen Oleskey[13][14], Rob Kirsch[15][16], Mark C. Fleming[17], Lynne Campbell Soutter[18], Jeffrey Gleason[19] and Lauren Brunswick[20].

In January 2007, Cully Stimson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, criticized WilmerHale and other major law firms for representing "the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001," and questioned whether such work was really being done pro bono or might actually receive funding from shadowy sources. [21] In a Wall Street Journal editorial criticizing Stimson, Harvard Law School professor (and former United States Solicitor General) Charles Fried wrote:

"It is no surprise that firms like Wilmer Hale (which represents both Big Pharma and Tobacco Free Kids), Covington & Burling (which represents both Big Tobacco and Guantanamo detainees), and the other firms on Mr. Stimson's hit list, are among the most sought-after by law school graduates, and retain the loyalty and enthusiasm of their partners. They offer their lawyers the profession at its best, and help assure that the rule of law is not just a slogan but a satisfying way of life." [22]

In December 2007, Seth Waxman made the oral argument to the Supreme Court in Boumediene v. Bush which upheld habeas corpus rights for detainees at Guantanamo Bay.[2]

Offices

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Attorneys

Notable attorneys, past and present:

Template:Multicol Hale and Dorr

Template:Multicol-break Wilmer Cutler & Pickering

Template:Multicol-break WilmerHale

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2009 Layoff Dispute

In June 2009, Legal blog AbovetheLaw.com received tips that attorneys at Wilmer Hale were being being laid off through a process commonly referred to as "stealth layoffs" (laying people off for economic reasons, but claiming merit-based terminations).[3] In response to inquiries from ATL, Wilmer Hale denied that any layoffs had taken place, and further stated that none were planned or expected.

However, an internal memorandum circulated throughout the firm in July 2009 stated that a "very small number" of associates had been terminated due to economic reasons.[4] Further, in October 2009, Wilmer Hale laid off an addition 57 employees. [5] Despite citing economic need for the reduction in workforce, Wilmer Hale posted 7% increase in profits per partner in 2009.

References

  1. ^ The Boston Globe, "Hale and Dorr launches "Silver Bridge Advisors", September 29, 2008
  2. ^ Wilmer Hale press release [1], Retrieved on 13 June 2008
  3. ^ http://abovethelaw.com/2009/06/nationwide_layoff_watch_gettin.php
  4. ^ http://abovethelaw.com/2009/07/wilmerhale_update.php
  5. ^ http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2010/02/05/profits_soar_for_boston_law_partners/

External links

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