Failed merger divides firm

The managing partner and a founding partner of one of the state’s largest law firms are stepping down as the firm splits over a failed merger.

Kummer Kaempfer Bonner Renshaw & Ferrario Managing Partner Michael Bonner announced last week he and several other attorneys and partners are leaving the firm for a competing law firm.

About 30 staffers, lawyers and partners are leaving in June to join international firm Greenberg Traurig, which has about 30 lawyers in Nevada already.

“This is a difficult, but cordial decision that reflects the desires of certain practice groups in our firm to practice in an international firm,” Bonner said in a statement. “We will continue to work together with our Kummer Kaempfer colleagues as co-counsel on many matters now and in the future. More important, we will remain good friends.”

The severance comes after months of debate and negotiation over a planned merger with Greenberg Traurig. Earlier this year Kummer Kaempfer laid off about 10 lawyers and associated staff, who have said their jobs were eliminated because of the expected merger with Greenberg Traurig.

A vote of the firm’s board of directors earlier this year failed to garner enough support for the merger. But Kummer Kaempfer’s top litigation and transactional attorneys still wanted to join Greenberg Traurig and made a decision to leave Kummer Kaempfer this month.

Founding partner Thomas Kummer, Bonner and partner Mark Ferrario are joining Greenberg Traurig along with attorneys John Brewer, John Jeppsen, Gregg Vermeys and Brandon Roos, several associates and support staff.

Founding partner Chris Kaempfer and name partner John Renshaw will remain with Kummer Kaempfer.

“Some partners believed it would be in their best interest to join a large international firm where they would be exposed to a variety of cases throughout the United States,” said Bob Gronauer, who will take over as managing partner of Kummer Kaempfer. “There’s another group of partners who are of the opinion that they would chose to continue to represent clients in Nevada and regionally as Kummer Kaempfer has always done.”

“Just because you have two different opinions doesn’t make either opinion wrong or right. We decided the best way to handle the situation is to go through an amicable separation. We’re still friends and colleagues — we just won’t be under the same roof.”

Kummer Kaempfer is one of the five largest law firms in the state and the exit of about one third its attorneys is expected to shake up the legal community.

Managing partners of other major firms said it wasn’t wholly unexpected that some attorneys from Kummer Kaempfer would leave — that kind of thing happens all the time in Las Vegas. But this is the first major law firm that has splintered over a proposed merger. And it might not be the last.

Historically, there haven’t been more than two or three law firms in Nevada with more than 25 lawyers. But with the dramatic growth in the legal community and the introduction of larger out-of-state firms, there are now a dozen with 30 or more.

“I think it’s unprecedented,” said George Ogilvie, managing partner of McDonald Carano Wilson. “Just about anything that happens with a firm of any size and substance in Nevada these days is going to be unprecedented because the size and sophistication of the firms today is of a different magnitude than it was 10 years ago.”

Kummer Kaempfer has established a transition plan designed to provide a smooth continuation of services for clients. And the firm will not change its name until later this year.

Kummer Kaempfer expects most clients to follow the attorneys with whom they’ve worked and in some cases to use both firms, Gronauer said.

But partners at competing law firms said this change could make at least some of those clients easy pickings for other lawyers. Las Vegas clients are typically loyal to their attorneys, but if there’s an impression that service might suffer, it could affect both sets of attorneys.

“There could be some fallout relative to clients and some fallout relative to some of the partners that have not made the move to Greenberg Traurig,” said Ogilvie, whose firm is a major competitor of Kummer Kaempfer. “Any time you have a shake-up of this sort there is some collateral fallout of people looking around and saying, ‘Here’s an opportunity I wasn’t planning on and now that I’m confronted with it maybe there’s another firm I would like to practice with.’ I’m fairly certain we’ll see some of that.”