Private Practice
Partners


Barry Delaney: joins Smith PartnershipStarting in the City, ship finance specialist David Baker leaves Norton Rose to join Ince & Co.

Geoffrey Mead leaves the London office of US/UK firm Reed Smith to become head of employment and a partner at Collyer-Bristow.


Product liability specialist Anne Ware, who was previously at Davies Arnold Cooper, has joined the London office of US firm Covington & Burling.


Two new partners at Bristol-based TLT: licensing lawyer Matthew Phipps and commercial property specialist Julian Mant move from Osborne Clarke.


Graham Small: managing partner at Rowe CohenBlack Country firm Manby & Steward has hired corporate recovery specialist Brian Aikman from Birmingham firm Martineau Johnson, where he was a partner.

In Manchester, Ayub Patel has been promoted to partner in the personal injury department at Pabla & Pabla.


Graham Small, commercial litigation head at Manchester firm Rowe Cohen, takes on the role of managing partner. He replaces Simon Cohen, who has stepped up to the new role of senior partner.


Private Practice
Associates/Assistants


Brian Aikman: moves to Manby & StewardLondon firm Howard Kennedy has hired Maria O’Brien, previously at Dublin-based Whitney Moore & Keller, as an assistant in its commercial property team.

Winckworth Sherwood has recruited Thekla Fellas as head of its property dispute resolution team from City firm Masons.


Two new assistants at Uxbridge-based IBB: senior solicitor Jeff Elphee joins the commercial property department from City firm SJ Berwin, while barrister Afolabi Euba bolsters the commercial property litigation team from Network Rail Infrastructure.


Moving west, the Swindon office of Charles Lucas & Marshall has promoted employment specialist Elaine Gale to associate.


Sophie Tremblay: bank financing team at TLTIn Bristol, assistant Sophie Tremblay joins the bank financing team at TLT from City firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer.

Insolvency specialist Barry Delaney, previously at Birmingham’s Wilkes Partnership, joins Derby-based Smith Partnership as an assistant in the commercial litigation department.


Further north, employment assistant Laura Price has joined Chester firm Birch Cullimore from Thompsons in Liverpool. James Gregson also joins as an assistant in the agricultural and estates department from the Lancashire Constabulary police headquarters.


Bolton-based Keoghs has appointed Grahame Love, formerly of Geoffrey Leaver Solicitors in Milton Keynes, as an assistant in its dispute resolution team.


John Hardman & Co strenghtens its personal injury team (l-r): Stephen Evans, Paul Williams, and Peter KelletThree trainees qualify at Manchester firm James Chapman & Co: Ann Hughes (catastrophic injury team), Lisa James (personal injury) and Nicola Soden (corporate and commercial). Former Pannone & Partners assistant Estelle Machell also joins James Chapman’s catastrophic injury team after spending six months working in San Francisco.

Caroline Smalley leaves Oldham firm Mellor Small for the personal injury litigation department at Fentons.


Staying in Manchester, commercial firm John Hardman & Co has boosted its personal injury team by recruiting Peter Kellet as a solicitor from Cobbetts and promoting newly qualified Paul Williams to solicitor. Legal executive Stephen Evans also joins the firm. He was at Lloyd Lee Dures in Liverpool before serving several months in Bosnia with the Territorial Army.


Consultants

In London, barrister Carol Fraser joins Howard Kennedy as a tax consultant from Goldberg Linde.


Chris Walsh, former group legal director of Emirates Airlines, becomes a consultant in the aviation team at City firm Ince & Co.


Peter Scott, law firm management consultant and former managing partner of national firm Eversheds, has been appointed chief operations officer of Watford firm Matthew Arnold & Baldwin on a part-time basis.


Correction


Richard Williams, founding partner of Manchester firm Licensing Legal, worked most recently at London firm Joelson Wilson & Co and not Cobbetts (as stated in [2004] Gazette, 16 September, 46).