MOVING ON

PRIVATE PRACTICE

Partners

The biggest name on the move this week is top defamation specialist Barton Taylor, who has left City firm Gouldens for renowned niche firm Peter Carter-Ruck & Partners.

The City office of Halliwell Landau has recruited Freshfields senior associate Robert Campbell to become a litigation partner.

US firm Morgan Lewis & Bockius has made 12 lawyers to partner, with London-based litigator Jamie Harrison the only one outside the US.

It now has nine partners in London.

Shipping and marine insurance firm Sachs Solicitors has swooped on south-coast firm Lester Aldridge for partner Laurence McFadyen, who was a shipping associate at Lesters, and assistant Alastair Broster.

CMS Cameron McKenna has made five partner promotions taking the firm to 149 partners.

Three are in London: financial services lawyer Paul Edmondson, and energy, projects and construction lawyers Amanda Seaton and Victoria Peckett.

DLA has recruited employee benefits partner David Reuben from Ashurst Morris Crisp, while Michael Collins - who was head of DLA's City banking group - has moved north to become managing partner of the firm's Edinburgh office.

He is replaced in London by Michael Burton.

Also leaving London, this time to take up partnership in Salisbury firm Wilsons' trust and tax department is Julia Brown, who arrives from London firm Farrer & Co, where she was an associate.

A new senior partner for Dorking firm Downs: corporate partner Chris Shipley replaces David Rea, who is retiring.

In Kent, Orpington firm Clarkson Wright & Jakes now has 11 partners and a new head of private client in the shape of Jeremy Groeger-Wilson.

He leaves Canterbury firm Gardner & Croft.

In the midlands, Jill Benbow has left her position as head of litigation at Stafford-based Pickering & Butters for Nottingham firm Fraser Brown.

Another former head of litigation switching firms - this time in the north-east - is Graeme Ritzema, who joins Blackett Hart & Pratt from Eversheds.

In the black country, Simon Hanns, a criminal lawyer in the Dudley office of Waldrons, is promoted as the firm's fifth partner.

PRIVATE PRACTICE

Associates/

Assistants

City firm Ince & Co has recruited senior associate Zoran Tasic from Stephenson Harwood.

Mr Tasic blends shipping with litigation, with an emphasis on Croatian work.

Nicholas Terras has joined Withers as an associate from Allen & Overy specialising in commercial trusts and partnerships.

The London office of Scottish firm Maclay Murray & Spens has promoted banking lawyer Anoushka Dosanjh and social housing specialist Wendy Wilks to associates.

Central London firm Kerman & Co has made corporate lawyer Michael Bennett an associate.

Dorking firm Downs has recruited Mark Waterfield as a commercial property assistant from Davis Brown in south London.

In Wiltshire, Vanessa Gist, formerly a senior assistant with Pewsey-based Merriman Waine & Co, joins Wood Awdry & Ford in Marlborough, where she will continue her private client and conveyancing work as an associate.

Lancashire-based personal injury firm Scott Rees & Co has added associate Damian Rigby to its management team.

In Manchester, commercial litigation assistant Michael Grantham is leaving the St Helen's office of Stephensons, for Betesh Fox & Co.

OTHER

The London Borough of Sutton has appointed senior solicitor Fiona Ledden to be the excecutive head of legal services; she will replace Janet Worth, who has become the council's assistant chief executive.

Financial services specialist Barney Reynolds has left Freshfields, where he was an associate, to become counsel at the City office of US firm Shearman & Sterling.

Eversheds has recruited former Ernst & Young partner Gary Telford to work as a fee-earning tax director in its London office.

Former Eversheds marketing director Ray Chalmers is moving to west country firm Bond Pearce as director of business development.

Exeter firm Michelmores has recruited Barclays Bank's former regional corporate director for the south west, Andrew Lovell, to be its chief operating officer.

Moving from the south-west, and specifically Thring Townsend, is management professional Claire Richardson, who has been recruited to Halliwell Landau's London office and the newly created general manager post.

Meanwhile the firm's Manchester office has appointed solicitor Joanne Whalley to be the firm's director of client care; she arrives from Addleshaw Booth & Co, where she carried out the same role.

Also in Manchester Tim Purrier, a solicitor and former claims handler with the Solicitors Indemnity Fund, has been appointed as the first practice manager at James Chapman & Co.