Royal Dutch Shell said its general counsel of global litigation, Richard Hill, is taking over as general counsel of its downstream sector and will be based in London. Hill replaces Martin Bambridge, who left the group for health reasons. Houston-based in-house lawyer Kimberly Phillips will take over as general counsel of global litigation. She was previously associate general counsel of global litigation for the Americas.

Wells Fargo general counsel and former interim ceo C Allen Parker is to leave the bank. Mr Parker took on the interim chief role in March, but then returned to general counsel post in October. He will leave the bank at the end of March. This is the first departure from the executive management team since Charles Scharf took over as permanent ceo of the troubled bank in late October. Mr Parker, had been tasked with cleaning up existing issues and preventing them from spreading, reportedly had no plans to leave and reiterated his desire to stay on when Scharf became CEO in late October. He joined Wells as general counsel in March 2017, having joined from Cravath, Swaine & Moore, where he was partner in charge of managing the firms operations.

Elizabeth Casey is now serving as senior member of litigation and intellectual property groups at the Fox Corporation. This has expanded her role of executive vice president and associate general counsel. She now reports to executive vice president and chief litigation counsel Jeff Taylor and also continues to lead the standards and practices department for Fox’s national networks and the legal team that supports Fox’s advertising sales function. Ms Casey joined Fox in 1999 as vice president of litigation. She had previously been a partner with law firm Troop Meisinger Steuber & Pasich, representing financial institutions and entertainment studios in complex civil litigation. Fox Corporation earlier this year hired Jeff Taylor as executive vice president and chief litigation counsel, reporting to chief legal and policy officer Viet Dinh.

Nancy Avedissian, who has been general counsel and corporate secretary since October 2016 at NYSE American-listed Volt Information Sciences, has been promoted to the position of senior vice president, chief legal officer (CLO) and corporate secretary. Ms Avedissian’s new role as CLO is a newly created position at the company, where she has oversight of the company’s legal function in Europe and Asia, in addition to managing its legal and contracts department in the US. Before moving to the staffing services provider, she was general counsel and vice president for legal affairs at contract research organization Worldwide Clinical Trials.

Guy Carpenter has a next general counsel and cco. Michael Sevi, who joined Marsh & McLennan in 2014 as senior compliance officer, has been appointed general counsel and chief compliance officer (CCO) of Guy Carpenter & Company, Marsh & McLennan’s global risk and reinsurance unit. In his new role, Mr Sevi reports to Peter Hearn, president and ceo of Guy Carpenter, and Peter Beshar, executive vice president and general counsel of Marsh & McLennan. He now sits on both Guy Carpenter’s executive committee and the senior leadership team of the legal, compliance and public affairs department. Mr Sevi takes over the role from Michael Borik, general counsel of Guy Carpenter for the past four years , who is moving into a joint business and legal role as managing director and chief counsel of Guy Carpenter’s global capital solutions group.

LBI Media has named its new general counsel following its emergence from bankruptcy. The Spanish-language television and radio company recently emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Arya Towfighi is taking charge at the LBI legal department after having served for over a decade as an executive and in-house leader for rival media company Univision. He will serve as svp, general counsel for the company and its subsidiaries, and will be responsible for all aspects of LBI Media’s legal affairs around the country. Mr Towfighi has 25 years of experience as outside counsel at large international law firms and in-house counsel at large public and private corporations, and spent over 13 years at Univision.

Andrew Lehmann has been named general counsel of MGH Hotels, taking on the new role this month. MGH Hotels is one of the largest privately owned companies and includes Marriott International, Hilton Worldwide, InterContinental Hotel Group, Choice Hotels International, La Quinta, and Wyndham in its portfolio. Mr Lehmann began his legal career at Schuckitt & Associates, where he most recently served as a supervising attorney.

Arcutis Biotherapeutics, a privately held clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, has announced the appointment of Keith Klein as general counsel. Mr Klein will be responsible for all legal aspects of the company, as well as serving as secretary of the board of directors. He most recently served as general counsel for Unity Biotechnology from January 2016 to May 2017.