Legal News

N.Y. Firm Regains 1 of 3 Lawyers it Lost to Dechert in June

By Brian Harris

By Zack Needles
Of the Legal Staff

Less than four months after losing three of its partners to Dechert?s Moscow office, New York-based Chadbourne & Parke has seen one of them return.

Transactional attorney Konstantin Konstantinov has rejoined the firm.

?We are very pleased to welcome back Konstantin as the sixth resident partner in our Moscow office,? said Chadbourne managing partner Charles K. O'Neill in a press release issued Sept. 14. "Our lawyers and our clients know him as an outstanding transactional lawyer and an extremely valued colleague and advisor."

Konstantinov?s homecoming is just the latest twist in a saga that was born out of a somewhat premature announcement from Dechert this past spring.

On May 8, Dechert announced it was opening an office in Moscow with the additions of partner Laura Brank, managing partner of Chadbourne & Parke's Moscow and St. Petersburg offices and the head of its Commonwealth of Independent States practice, as well partners Shane DeBeer, Jennifer Handz, Konstantin Konstantinov and Mikhail Rozenberg.

But word came out the same day that Chadbourne & Parke was trying to convince the partners to stay.

Soon after Dechert?s announcement, Brank intimated to Legal affiliate ?The Am Law Daily? blog that most of Chadbourne & Parke's nearly 30 Moscow attorneys might follow.

"But, I mean, if all five partners are leaving, that's pretty much the business," she said then. "So I would anticipate most of the attorneys would follow."

Brank also said that she and the four other partners had officially resigned from the firm.

But on May 14, Chadbourne & Parke said only three attorneys? Brank, DeBeer and Konstantinov? would be leaving to join Dechert.

Because of a 30-day notice provision in Chadbourne & Parke's partnership agreement, they officially started at Dechert in early June.

Now, only Brank and DeBeer remain at the firm.

Dechert had no comment at press time.

Full post as published by The Legal Intelligencer Blog on September 14, 2009 (boomark / email).