Moving on

private practicePartnershipLots of heads of department moving around this week, with west country firm Bevan Ashford leading the way.

Bethan Evans, formerly Cardiff-based executive director of Syniad, the improvement and development agency for local government in Wales, is joining as a partner and head of public sector work.

Ms Evans is a former chairwoman of the Law Society's Local Government Group.Meanwhile, the firm's Exeter office has hired David Pomeroy from Clarke Willmott & Clarke as head of corporate recovery and insolvency.In the City, Travers Smith Braithwaite has hired DLA's London-based head of private equity Andrew Roberts to be a partner in its corporate department.Nigel Brown - a partner with Manches - will later this year join Richards Butler to head its development projects unit.James John has been taken on as a partner in the commercial property department by Rooks Rider.

He arrives from Harbottle & Lewis, where he was a senior associate.

Rooks Rider now has 14 partners.Among US firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton's five new partners worldwide is securities lawyer Pierre-Marie Boury, promoted in the London office.

The firm now has 151 partners.Media litigation specialist Mark Thomson has left the partnership at London-based Schilling & Lom with assistant Hanna Basha to take up identical roles at Peter Carter-Ruck & Partners, taking the partnership to eight.The fallout from the dissolution of Nottingham firm Warren & Allen continues (see [2002] Gazette, 21 February, 8).

Anne Robinson and John Pears, formerly the firm's heads of property and private client, join fellow Nottingham firm Berryman Shacklock as partners.

Berryman Shacklock now has 12 partners.Stoke-on-Trent firm Grindeys has promoted personal injury lawyer John McGettigan and family lawyer Dan Rushton to the partnership.In Manchester, Perkins Mainman has a new civil litigation partner in the shape of David Dutton from Berrymans Lace Mawer.DWF's Manchester office has hired DLA associate Simon Prendergast as a banking partner.

Personal injury partner Roger Brooks has left Keoghs in Bolton for James Chapman & Co in Manchester.In Liverpool, Jackson & Canter has promoted Dipankar Choudhury (immigration) and Nicola Cho (mental health) to partner.

The firm now has nine partners.

private practiceAssociates/assistantsMichael Reynolds has left City firm Eversheds, where he was an assistant in the construction department and a chartered arbitrator, for Chelmsford firm Merricks, where he becomes an associate.

Also joining Merricks as an associate is commercial property lawyer Colin Bolsher, who arrives from Southampton firm Moore & Blatch.Also leaving London is Olswang commercial property lawyer Tessa Naylor, who has joined Home Counties firm IBB as a senior solicitor.Leaving the City for Bevan Ashford's banking department in Exeter is associate Andrew Smith, formerly an assistant with Theodore Goddard.Staying in the City though is Michael Connor, who has swapped the in-house department of Lloyd's investigations department to join Reynolds Porter Chamberlain as an assistant in the insurance department.Mike Jeremiah arrives as an assistant in the employment group of Richards Butler from Linklaters, where he was an associate.Birmingham practice Carvers - which is part of the Wilkes Partnership - has hired Lesley Mottram, formerly a partner and head of the criminal department in the Quinton branch of Cartwright & Lewis, to be a senior associate.

Her team is moving with her, including assistant Shaun Newey.Assistant Ruth Knight leaves Nottingham firm Roythorne & Co to continue working in corporate insolvency with the Leicester office of Gateley Wareing.

Commercial litigation associate Clare Brady moves across Nottingham from Warren & Allen to Berryman Shacklock.In addition to new partners, Stoke firm Grindeys has promoted personal injury lawyer Tim Johnston-Jones to associate.In Plymouth, Gill Akaster has hired commercial partner Paul Johnson from Wolferstans to be a senior solicitor in the company department.

OTHERLeading mobile phone company Hutchison 3G has appointed Paul Vickers as its general counsel.

He joins from global investment company Antfactory, where he was director of commercial and legal affairs.

He was previously group legal director and company secretary of Pearson.The latest barrister to switch to a law firm is employment specialist Dan Peyton, who has joined City firm Richards Butler.City firm Reynolds Porter Chamberlain has hired media law consultant Jane Anderson, who was formerly working for Crockers Oswald Hickson.The UK College of Family Mediators has appointed Karin Walker, a partner at Guildford-based TWM Solicitors, to be its vice-chairwoman.