Recent reports of nearly 50 partners, counsel and associates jumping ship from DLA Piper to McDermott Will & Emery in the US, are greatly exaggerated, a DLA Piper memo claims. Reported departures include four Chicago lawyers in employment and litigation and a former DLA Americas co-managing partner who arrived earlier in March. McDermott Chairman Ira Coleman had written in a memo that the influx of new lawyers would add more than $100 million to the firm. According to a report in Crain’s Chicago Business, DLA Piper’s global co-chair Roger Meltzer, Americas co-chair Cameron Rains and Americas managing partner Stasia Kelly issued an internal email stating the number of exiting lawyers is far fewer than 50 and the that the loss in business is 'dramatically' less than the reports of $100 million.

Battle of the memos

The DLA Piper memo claims the reports contained 'materially inaccurate and misleading pieces of information,' explaining the firm has more than 4200 lawyers worldwide, with 87 joining this year, and any departures are 'not any cause for concern from a pure headcount perspective.' The memo goes on: 'The gross revenue attributable to the departing lawyers is dramatically lower than what has been reported. If those numbers were true, that would be $2 million per lawyer, easily more than double what the departed group produced while at DLA Piper.' The memo said last year saw a 6.6 per cent increase in revenue to $2.6 billion. Source: Crains