Two weeks after snagging M&A partners David Fox and Daniel Wolf from Skadden, Kirkland & Ellis is suffering a little turnabout. The Chicago firm took a massive hit when its West-Coast bankruptcy team decamped for the LA office of Cleveland’s Jones Day.
After the jump, more on the lawyers changing teams.
Rick Wynne, the former head of the Kirkland practice, was the instigator. Going with him are Bennett Spiegel, who will also join as a partner, and Lori Sinanyan and Erin N. Brady who will be of counsel in the Los Angeles Office. AmLaw Daily identifies three associates as well: Christopher Healey, Stacie Torres, and Lance Miller (who will sit in NY, where Wynne spends half his time). The partners’ and counsels’ bios are available in the Jones Day press release.
PPP couldn’t have been the reason for the move: Jones Day’s were $810,000, a far cry from Kirkland’s $2.47 million.
It must be that California Love.
“We’ve been doing a lot of bondholder and creditors’ committee-type work for the past several years and Jones Day is very interested in developing that practice on a national front,” Wynne says. “We thought that would help us gel a little bit better.”
Although many of the latest bankruptcy cases have been coming out of Delaware and New York, Wynne says he’s been encouraged by Jones Day’s commitment to developing its presence in the California market–the firm has five offices in the state.
Considering Chrysler (and probably GM) didn’t even file in Detroit, the city with which they’re practically synonymous, it’s pretty clear where the locus of power is for bankruptcy these days.
The sounding-out process seems to have gone relatively well:
Wynne says he traded phone calls with current Kirkland restructuring cohead Richard “Rick” Cieri, a former Jones Day bankruptcy lawyer, about the move and that Cieri only had “good things to say” about his former firm. Wynne also spoke with Kirkland’s other bankruptcy honcho, James “Jamie” Sprayregen, before leaving.
We wrote about Sprayregen a while back. He was one of the lawyers-turned-investment-bankers who came back to the dark side last year. We also speculated that his return from Goldman Sachs was part of the reason General Growth dumped Sidley & Austin for Weil Gotshal and Kirkland. And, of course, now the trustee is objecting to Kirkland’s engagement.
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Somewhere Dre is pouring some out for these California loving lawyers.
Who wouldn't love California? It's sunny and warm all year, and real estate prices are dropping a little everyday….
I wouldn't really call this a massive hit for Kirkland. This was basically the entire restructuring group in the LA office, and the firm has been looking to phase out the LA restructuring group. The firm wishes them well and is happy they found a better fit and place.