Geoffrey K. Willis and Deborah M. Rosenthal havejoined the Orange County office of Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP aspartners in the firm's Real Estate, Land Use and Environmental practice group.  Willis and Rosenthal will be joined bya team of six attorneys: special counsel Marguerite P. Battersby and David R.Hunt, and associates David P. Collins II, Jessica A. Johnson, Douglas E. Wanceand Gregory E. Woodard.  The group most recentlypracticed together with Bingham McCutchen in Orange County. 

"With Geoff, Deborah and the groupjoining us, we continue to grow signature practice groups like Real Estate andexpand capabilities to better serve client needs.  With Geoff leading the team, the group's knowledgeand expertise will significantly enhance our real estate practice, which isalready one of the best in California," said Guy Halgren, chairman of thefirm. 

"I look forward to growing the firm's California landuse practice, specifically in Orange County,” Willis said. “Sheppard Mullin isa top-notch firm with an impressive real estate group.  I am thrilled to be practicing on such astrong platform with the firm's great lawyers throughout the state."

"Geoff's group is an excellent addition to the firm'sReal Estate practice group, which now includes more than 80 attorneys firmwide," commented Domenic Drago, chair of the firm's Real Estate, Land Useand Environmental practice group. "They bring an incredible collective background with more than seventy-fiveyears of combined experience, which includes ground-breaking land use mattersand cutting-edge real estate-related litigation." 

As a land use and developmentspecialist, Willis concentrates his practice on matters involving theCalifornia Environmental Quality Act (CEQA); the National Environmental PolicyAct; water rights and quality; the Endangered Species Act; wetlands regulation;the Clean Air Act; CERCLA investigation, remediation and litigation; theCalifornia Subdivision Map Act; local zoning and land use requirements,environmental due diligence and audits. He has specific expertise in the development of shopping centers, largeconjunctive use projects, houses, golf courses, industrial parks andmanufacturing complexes, regulatory compliance of ongoing businesses involvingair, endangered species, water and wetlands permitting. 

Rosenthal devotes her practice to land use andenvironmental law and litigation, working with issues that include wetlands,endangered species, takings, historic preservation, mitigation banking,hazardous materials industrial development, including self-storage, and golfcourses.  She has been involved in avariety of complex federal- and state-coordinated environmental permitting programsfor large private developments, including the negotiation of developmentagreements and preparation of development plans.  A major portion of Rosenthal's practice isdevoted to CEQA, inverse condemnation and general plan litigation in connectionwith land use entitlements for large residential real estate developers. 

Willis and Rosenthal have represented their clients’ interests beforeall of the counties in Southern California, many of the cities in California,the State Water Resources Control Board, the Regional Water Quality ControlBoards, the Army Corps of Engineers, the United States Fish and WildlifeService, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the High Desert AirPollution Control District, the California Department of Fish and Game, theCalifornia Coastal Commission, the California EPA, and EPA Region IX and anumber of additional state and local governing bodies.

Willisreceived a B.A. from Pomona College in 1983 and a J.D. from University ofCalifornia, Hastings College of Law in 1986. Rosenthal received a B.A. from University of Michigan in 1972, a master'sdegree in regional planning from the University of Oklahoma in 1978 and a J.D. fromYale Law School in 1981.

Last year, a six attorneyteam joined Sheppard Mullin's Real Estate, Land Use and Environmental practicegroup in the firm's San Francisco office. The former Steefel, Levitt & Weiss land use group includes partnersJudy Davidoff and Art Friedman, as well as associates William Fleishhacker,Miriam Montesinos, Alexis Pelosi and Elizabeth Sibbett. 

TheCalifornia Real Estate Journalconsistently ranks Sheppard Mullin among the largest real estate practices in thestate. The firm's Real Estate, Land Useand Environmental practice group is one of the most diverse in California, representinginvestors, developers, builders, major landowners, lenders and local agencieson every aspect of commercial and residential real estate.

About Sheppard Mullin Richter &Hampton LLP

Sheppard Mullin is a full service AmLaw 100 firm with more than 520attorneys in 10 offices located throughout California and in New York,Washington, D.C. and Shanghai.  Thefirm's California offices are located in Los Angeles, San Francisco, SantaBarbara, Century City, Orange County, Del Mar Heights and San Diego.  Founded in 1927 onthe principle that the firm would succeed only if its attorneys deliveredprompt, high quality and cost-effective legal services, Sheppard Mullinprovides legal counsel to U.S. and international clients.  Companies turn toSheppard Mullin to handle a full range of corporate and technology matters,high stakes litigation and complex real estate, land use and finance transactions.  In theU.S., the firm's clients include more than half of the Fortune 100 companies.  For more information, please visit www.sheppardmullin.com.

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 28, 2008 — Craig Gatarz and Arturo Sida have joined Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP as partof the firm's Corporate practice group.  Gatarz,most recently chief operating officer and general counsel with JAMDAT MobileInc. in Los Angeles, will be based in the firm's Century City office.  Sida, most recently assistant general counselwith Internap Network Services Corporation in Costa Mesa, will be based in thefirm's Orange County office.  

"We're very pleased to welcome Craig and Art tothe firm and to the Corporate practice group," said Randy Short, head ofthe firm's Corporate practice group. "As in-house counsel of two clients, we have worked closely with Craigand Art for years.  They are excellent businesslawyers who will be valuable additions to the Corporate practice, combiningtheir respective in-house emerging growth technology industry expertise andprior private practice experience."

At JAMDAT Mobile Inc., Gatarz built out and directlymanaged the team responsible for all non-studio operations, including legal,human resources, facilities, infrastructure, inter-company matters andinternational operations. He directlyoversaw and managed the international expansion of business operations.

Gatarz' JAMDAT transactional experience includes fourrounds of private financing aggregating $33 million in capital raised, oneinternational and two domestic acquisitions (with an aggregate value ofapproximately $150 million) in which JAMDAT acquired intellectual property andstudio assets to enhance its operations (including the wireless rights toTetris, one of the world’s most popular interactive games), and completion of a$101 million initial public offering and consummation of a $680 million mergerwith Electronic Arts Inc., the world’s leading publisher of interactiveentertainment. 

AtVitalStream Holdings, Inc., a Nasdaq-listed company that was recently acquiredby Atlanta-based Internap Network Services Corporation, Sida served as thechief legal officer and secretary responsible for developing and managing thelegal, corporate secretary and human resources functions.  He implemented Sarbanes-Oxley Act complianceand was responsible for securities law compliance, including the preparation ofSEC '33 and '34 Act filings.  Sida'sexperience includes various financing deals aggregating approximately $35million in available capital, as well as two strategic acquisitions and themerger transaction with Internap.  Additionally,he was responsible for all aspects of IP protection, including the evaluationof technology and management of patent applications.

Previously,Sida was VP, legal affairs and assistant secretary for AmerisourceBergenCorporation, a NYSE-listed leading pharmaceutical services company.  There he was responsible for a broad range ofcorporate transactions, including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures and jointventures, defense or prosecution of lawsuits, investigations and claims, andcorporate governance, stock exchange and regulatory matters, including FDA,DOT, DEA and OIG issues.

Gatarz earneda J.D. from University of Virginia School of Law in 1987 and M.A and A.B., summacum laude, from Boston College in 1984. Sida earned a J.D. from University of California, Berkeley (Boalt Hall)in 1980 and B.A. from Stanford University in 1977. 

About Sheppard Mullin Richter &Hampton LLP

Sheppard Mullin is a full service AmLaw 100 firm with more than 520attorneys in 10 offices located throughout California and in New York,Washington, D.C. and Shanghai.  Thefirm's California offices are located in Los Angeles, San Francisco, SantaBarbara, Century City, Orange County, Del Mar Heights and San Diego.  Founded in 1927 onthe principle that the firm would succeed only if its attorneys deliveredprompt, high quality and cost-effective legal services, Sheppard Mullinprovides legal counsel to U.S. and international clients.  Companies turn toSheppard Mullin to handle a full range of corporate and technology matters,high stakes litigation and complex financial transactions.  In the U.S., the firm's clients include morethan half of the Fortune 100 companies.  Formore information, please visit www.sheppardmullin.com.

Yogurt company The Dannon Company has refuted the class-action lawsuit filed against it in Los Angeles, California.

The company has said the complaint does not have any support for the generalizations made in the lawsuit and the publication cited in the lawsuit does not disprove the company's scientific substantiation for its product benefits. The report cited in the lawsuit, published by the American Academy of Microbiology, does not refer to any Dannon products, the company added.

The company also said it makes all scientific studies about its products available to the public and follows the method of peer-review and publication and regularly consults independent experts in the field of probiotics about the science behind all its probiotic claims.

The company has claimed that the scientific journals which have reviewed and published the findings on its products and the consumers who use the products have confirmed the benefits.

In the last two decades, as working schedules became flexible, and even accounting firms, of all places, embraced the mantra of work-life balance (at least on paper), there was one unbending, tradition-bound profession: The law.

That is why it is so remarkable to watch the legal world racing - metaphorical black robes flapping - to catch up.

Over the last few years and, most strikingly, the last few months, law firms have been forced to rethink long-standing ways of doing business, if they are to remain fully competitive.

As chronicled by my colleague Alex Williams in the Sunday Styles section earlier this month, lawyers are overworked, depressed and leaving.

Less obvious, but potentially more dramatic, are the signs that their firms are finally becoming serious about slowing the stampede for the door. So far the change - which includes taking fresh looks at the billable hour, schedules and partnership tracks - is mostly at the smaller firms. But even some of the larger, more hidebound employers are taking notice.

"There are things happening everywhere, enough to call it a movement," said Deborah Epstein Henry, who founded Flex-Time Lawyers, a consulting firm that creates initiatives encouraging work-life balance for law firms, with an emphasis on the retention and promotion of women. "The firms don't think of it as a movement, because it is happening in isolation, one firm at a time. But if you step back and see the whole puzzle, there is definitely real change."

Last month, Henry's ambitious proposal was published in the magazine Diversity and the Bar. Her plan, called FACTS, takes on law-firm bedrock - billable hours, which are how lawyers have calculated their fees for more than 50 years.

At nearly every large American firm, lawyers must meet a quota of hours. During the 1960s and 1970s, the requirement was between 1,600 and 1,800 hours a year or about 34 hours a week, not counting time for the restroom or lunch or water cooler breaks. Today that has risen to 2,000 to 2,200 hours, or roughly 42 hours a week. (Billing 40 hours a week means putting in upward of 60 at the office.)

FACTS is an acronym. Under Henry's proposal, work time can be: Fixed (allowing lawyers to choose less high-profile work for more predictable schedules), or Annualized (intense bursts of high-adrenaline work followed by relative lulls); Core (with blocks mapped out for work and for commitments like meeting children at the bus); Targeted (an agreed-upon goal of hours, set annually, customized for each worker, with compensation adjusted accordingly); and Shared (exactly as it sounds).

Henry's proposal came at the end of last year, when firms had already started backing away from the billable hour.

Some firms have gone so far as to eliminate the billable hour. The Rosen law firm in Raleigh, N.C., one of the largest divorce firms on the East Coast, did so this year, instead charging clients a flat fee.

Similarly, Dreier, a firm with offices in New York and Los Angeles, pays its lawyers salaries and bonuses based on revenue generated, not hours billed.

At Quarles & Brady, a firm with headquarters in Chicago, not only have billable hour requirements been eliminated, but parental leave has been expanded. Women can take 12 weeks with pay, men six weeks. And that time can be divided, meaning a father can take a few weeks off when his baby is born and a few more after his wife returns to work. Other firms are making smaller changes.

REDUCED PAY, REDUCED SCHEDULE

Howrey, a global firm in Washington, is tinkering not only with how much associates bill, but also with their pay.

That is the message behind changes at Chapman & Cutler, a midsize firm in Chicago, which rolled out a two-tier pay scale in September.

Associates can choose to bill 2,000 hours a year and be paid accordingly. Those who would like to see their families a little more can opt for 1,850 billable hours. Both groups will have a chance to become partner, albeit at different paces. Given the choice, more than half took the reduced schedule.

"What is happening now is not just about the needs and demands of women," said Lauren Stiller Rikleen, who directs the Bowditch Institute for Women's Success.

Law is responding to a confluence of factors, said Rikleen, the author of "Ending the Gauntlet: Removing Barriers to Women's Success in the Law" (Thomson Legalworks, 2006).

First, clients, reacting to spiraling legal costs, have begun insisting on flat-fee deals.

In addition, "you can't ignore the generational piece," Rikleen said. On one end of the spectrum are baby boomers, nearing retirement and mindful of the flexible schedules that did not exist at the start of their careers. At the other end are Gen Y workers, some nearing 30 and in want of a life.

FIGHTING FOR A LIFE

A group of students at Stanford Law School, for instance, shook up the legal world in 2006 when they formed Law Students Building a Better Legal Profession. The Stanford group has more than 130 members, and other elite schools like Yale and New York University have formed chapters. The Stanford organization has published a ranking of firms based on how they treat employees; members vow not to work for those who don't rate well.

Andrew Bruck, a president of the Stanford group, told the Legal Times: "Just because something always has been doesn't mean that it always must be."

A harbinger of changing times might well be the brief filed by the hard-driving white-shoe firm of Weil Gotshal & Manges of New York, asking a judge to reschedule hearings set for Dec. 18, 19, 20 and 27 of last year.

"Those dates are smack in the middle of our children's winter breaks, which are sometimes the only times to be with our children," the lawyers wrote. The judge moved the hearings.

The father, James Boldt, converted to Judaism in 2004 and wants the boy to be circumcised as part of the faith. The mother, Lia Boldt, appealed to the high court, saying the operation could harm her son physically and psychologically.

The state Supreme Court ruled that earlier court decisions failed to determine whether the boy wanted the circumcision, as his father contended, or opposed it, as his mother alleged.

The Supreme Court sent the case back to the trial court to answer that question.

If the trial court finds the child agrees to be circumcised, the Supreme Court said, it should deny the mother's requests. But if the trial court finds the child opposes the circumcision, the court has to determine if it will affect the father's ability to care for the child.

The custody dispute began when the child was 4 and the circumcision issue began three years ago when he was 9.

James Boldt, a lawyer, is representing himself, had no comment, his office said. The attorney for both sides also declined to comment.

The case has drawn attention from Jewish groups concerned that the Oregon court might restrict the practice. A group called Doctors Opposing Circumcision backs the mother.

The courts have steered clear of religious or medical issues, focusing on the questions of custody and care of the child.

One constitutional law professor who has been following the case called it "a reasonable ruling."

"I think what may be delicate and tricky is ... how much we can trust what the 12-year-old says, given the circumstances," said Carl Tobias of the University of Richmond. "He likely feels some pressure from (his parents)."

More than a million U.S. infants are circumcised each year, but circumcising adults or teens remains relatively rare. A urologist who met with the boy submitted an affidavit that said the procedure would cause him minor discomfort for about three days but not interfere with his normal activities, the Supreme Court's decision said.