Herbert Smith Freehills has picked up a leading work health and safety lawyer from Clyde & Co to join the Big Six law firm in Sydney as special counsel.
Last year brought economic growth and success for law firms, but 2021 was not only marked with good news. A slew of law firms were dragged into litigation by disgruntled ex-clients, with some paying out millions of dollars to resolve lawsuits accusing them of giving bad advice.
A Sydney-based barrister has been reprimanded for relying on his “gut feeling” in making baseless accusations of misconduct against the principal of a law firm.
The New South Wales Bar Association has lost an appeal seeking a financial penalty and a professional reprimand against a Sydney barrister for his “poorly judged, vulgar and inappropriate” behaviour, with an appeals court finding damage to his reputation and a hike in his insurance premium dwarfed any punishment it could dole out.
An appeals court has dismissed an appeal in a professional negligence lawsuit by a New South Wales developer against HWL Ebsworth over a due diligence report that led to the purchase of a $25.5 million parcel of government land at risk of flooding.
A Western Australian lawyer will face penalties and disciplinary action in the State Administrative Tribunal after nine professional misconduct findings were made against him, including a finding that he knowingly sought to mislead the Supreme Court.
Hall & Wilcox is strengthening its presence in Western Australia with the appointment of three lawyers nabbed from the now-closed commercial law firm Kott Gunning.
A Melbourne solicitor has been banned from legal practice until 2035 after a tribunal found him guilty of eight charges of professional misconduct and unsatisfactory professional conduct for allegedly misleading a court about his entitlement to practice.
In the crucial early years of practice junior barristers have been deprived of vital learning opportunities as a result of COVID-19 lockdowns necessitating the move to online court hearings. The promised return to in-person proceedings is critical for the professional development of counsel just starting out, and equally critical for the Bar as a whole, says noted silk Rachel Doyle.
Law firm Norton Rose Fulbright has won its appeal of a $160,000 judgment in favour of former partner Thomas Martin, with the Full Federal Court finding Martin’s allegations of deceit arose from “an excess of suspicion” and “causal connections of the most tenuous kind”.