Legal News

Recession robs 800 of their jobs, with more cuts on the horizon

By Richard Binder

Almost 800 associates and legal staff nationwide returned home jobless Thursday after eight firms conducted mass layoffs, citing an unprecedented downturn in demand. California was not left unscathed by Thursday's cuts, although it's unclear how many people in the state were hit. The cuts targeted finance and real estate practices, demand for which has almost completely dried up since the financial crises hit last fall.

"It is now apparent that this downturn will be deeper and broader than past recessions, and all business sectors will be adversely affected in some way," Goodwin Procter Chairwoman Regina Pisa wrote in a memo announcing that the firm would lay off 38 associates and 36 staff, about a 4 percent reduction. In California, four associates and three staff were let go.

Other firms did not say how many people in California were let go, but acknowledged there were cuts in the state.

DLA Piper cut 80 associates, or 5 percent of its U.S.-based lawyers. Aside from 28 associates in New York and Chicago, the reductions are primarily on the West Coast, Chairman Francis Burch Jr. told Recorder affiliate The National Law Journal. DLA's spokesman declined to say how many attorneys were laid off in California.

Read the full story at The Recorder.

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on February 13, 2009 (boomark / email).