January 8, 2007
THE DAILY JOURNAL
By Emma Dewald
SAN DIEGO – Like squirrels stashing acorns, law firms are preparing for colder economic times by amping up their bankruptcy practices.
Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, a relative newcomer to the San Diego scene, added DLA Piper San Diego partner Jeff Davis to its office, marking its first foray into the California bankruptcy field. But DLA Piper made up on the swings what it lost on the roundabouts by adding Paul Hastings bankruptcy partner Karol Denniston to its Los Angeles office.
Mintz Levin opened its San Diego office this summer with a contingent of lawyers from Fish & Richardson. Since then, the office has grown to 15 lawyers, with 25 Mintz Levin lawyers in California overall – a contrast with DLA Piper’s reported 400 lawyers in California.
Davis said he was excited about the smaller presence.
“The conflict web [at DLA Piper] was sometimes difficult,” he said. “While Mintz [Levin] hopes and expects to grow its West Coast presence, it’s going to be a while before I see that conflict web.”
But the size of DLA Piper’s footprint drew bankruptcy lawyer Karol Denniston.
Denniston has practiced law in Texas, California, Georgia and London.
“My move to DLA was basically premised on the opportunity to utilize both my domestic and international skill set,” she said.
Davis and Denniston’s moves were brokered by Watanabe Nason Schwartz & Lippman.
Both Davis and Denniston declined to name specific clients. Davis said clients contemplating restructuring often did not want to be identified.
But, he said, he expected clients to follow him to Mintz Levin.
“It will be up to the clients to make that decision themselves,” he said.
Denniston said she also expects her clients to join her.
“There’s a pretty good following,” she said.
Craig E. Hunsaker, managing partner of Mintz Levin’s San Diego office, said he was pleased by the addition.
“As a new office here in San Diego and with the firm’s new presence in California, we have been focusing aggressively on finding the right lateral candidates,” he said. “Jeff was one of our early targets.”
Michael Meyer, managing partner of DLA Piper’s Los Angeles practice, said he was pleased, too.
“The more we talked to [Denniston], the more we became enamored with her,” he said.
And despite her peripatetic existence, he expects her to stay.
“I can just tell she’ll be here for the rest of her career,” he said.
Everybody expects her to be needed. Most predictions have the economy slowing down in the next couple of years.
“There is likely going to be a downturn,” Denniston said. “The market can’t stay where it is.
“That means more work for bankruptcy lawyers.”
“The odds of the bankruptcy practice heating up are very high,” Hunsaker said. “I think that most of our competitors have the same intelligence and are looking at the same types of people to strengthen their practices.”