Murchison & Cumming, LLP Names Jean M. Lawler as Managing Partner
January 17, 2008
Metropolitan News Enterprise Jean M. Lawler has taken over as managing partner of Murchison & Cumming, LLP.
The Los Angeles attorney, who took over the post Jan. 1, told the MetNews that her elevation marked a new chapter in the firm's 77-year history, but said that she did not expect any "major changes" to the firm's "very solid" practice beyond the normal "change that comes with the times."
Lawler first associated with the firm in 1985 and became its first female partner in 1993. She said she looked forward to working "with current clients and potential clients to let them see what we can do and further enhance the firm's reputation for quality and excellence."
She succeeds Friedrich W. Seitz, who had served as the firm's managing partner since 1986 and will continue to serve as chair of its Product Liability and International practice groups.
"Jean has the leadership and strategic vision to bring continued success to the firm," Seitz said. "I am pleased that she has agreed to step into this role."
Lawler graduated from Loyola Law School in 1979, and was admitted to the State Bar of California that year. She was also admitted to the State Bar of Oregon in 1981.
In addition to her duties as managing partner, Lawler will continue to chair the firm's Insurance Law and Business Transactions practice groups. She said that one of her priorities will be continuing an internship program founded by Seitz in the early 1990s that brings German legal trainees, or Rechtsreferendare, to California in order to familiarize them with the American legal system by observing lawyers in depositions, mediations, arbitrations and trials.
A past president of the Federation of Defense & Corporate Counsel-the only woman to have served in that position-Lawler has also served as a Director of the Defense Research Institute, Lawyers for Civil Justice, Association of Southern California Defense Counsel and the FDCC Foundation.
She is a frequent author and speaker on topics relating to the insurance industry and, in 2005, co-founded the National Seventh Amendment Summit on the Right to Trial by Jury, "The American Jury Trial - Do We Allow Its Death or Lead Its Rebirth?", a joint project of the FDCC and ABOTA. About Murchison & Cumming, LLP With a firm history dating to 1930, Murchison & Cumming, LLP is a premier civil litigation firm with five offices in California and Las Vegas, whose attorneys specialize in the defense of domestic and international businesses, insurers and individuals, at trial and on appeal. The Firm’s attorneys also handle employment matters and business transactions. For additional information, please visit our website at www.murchisonlaw.com.
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