International firms’ partners vote for merger
The partners of international law firms Eversheds and Sutherland have voted to combine with what is described as “exceptionally strong approval” from both sides.
The merger will complete on 1 February 2017 and the new entity will be known globally as
Eversheds Sutherland. It will be managed by a team of six including joint CEOs, and overseen by a board of ten with equal representation from both firms.
The combination will have 2,300 lawyers across 61 offices in 29 countries including Hong Kong, Mainland China and Singapore.
For Eversheds, the merger will achieve its long-held ambition to expand its footprint to the US and chief executive Bryan Hughes says the challenge has been finding the right firm to join with. For Sutherland, it expands a mainly US-based firm to a global entity.
However, the enlarged firm is expected to seek additional acquisitions to further expand its US and global reach.
Women take the lead in law schools for first time
Female students in US law schools have become the majority for the first time, the American Bar Association says.
The latest data shows 55,766 women studying law in America compared to 55,059 men with women also making up 51 per cent of first year law students.
However, the figures also show that the overall numbers of students choosing to study law remains subdued with only a small increase – since 2010 numbers are down 30 per cent.
Women taking the lead is “is a milestone, but one to view with caution,” said Deborah J. Merritt, a law professor at the Moritz
College of Law at Ohio State University told the New York Times.
Merritt was one of the authors of a report that suggests that some female law students are admitted to lower-ranking law schools and it can be hard for women to get accepted to the elite schools.
Indian lawyers not paid for more than a year
Some lawyers working for the Delhi government have not been paid since for a year, according to the Times of India.
Thirty-two lawyers are affected by non-payment of their fees for work as government prosecutors and the Delhi high court has ordered an investigation.
The court said that it was the state that ultimately loses out and that it could not understand "how the state would expect the requisite assistance to be rendered by the counsel to courts” if they had not been paid.
