The Shuman Law Firm today announced that it is investigating potential breaches of fiduciary duty by certain officers and directors at Ormat Technologies Inc.

The investigation concerns whether the Company's directors and officers caused the Company to issue materially false and/or misleading financial statements. These statements eventually resulted in the Company restating its financial results.

On February 24, 2010, Ormat disclosed that the Board of Directors and Audit Committee of the Company, upon recommendation of management and after discussions with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, had concluded that the Company's financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2008 required restatement and should no longer be relied upon. The Company restated its results because it improperly capitalized costs incurred in connection with the exploration and development of certain properties that it did not plan to develop. Upon this news, the price of Ormat stock declined more than 12.81% over the three days following the disclosure of this announcement.

If you currently own shares of Ormat and are interested in discussing your rights as an Ormat shareholder, or have information relating to this investigation, please contact Kip B. Shuman or Rusty E. Glenn toll free at 866-974-8626 or email Mr. Shuman at kip@shumanlawfirm.com or Mr. Glenn at rusty@shumanlawfirm.com.

Lanny J. Davis, a high-profile Washington lawyer who was the special counsel to President Bill Clinton in the 1990s, is leaving McDermott Will & Emery to form his own law firm. The new firm, Lanny J. Davis & Associates, will specialize in general litigation issues, media crisis and public policy issues.

“I am excited by this opportunity to offer multidiscipline, solution-oriented legal-media-legislative strategies services to U.S. and international clients,” Mr. Davis said in a statement. “I especially look forward to working with not only McDermott attorneys and clients, but also with other attorneys and law firms on high-profile litigation and regulatory matters.”
Mr. Davis, who writes a weekly column in The Hill newspaper, is a well-known figure in the world of political punditry, appearing on news programs that cater to both the right and the left. Mr. Davis also writes columns for  The Huffington Post and opinion pieces for The Wall Street Journal.

Mr. Davis will continue to contribute to the Legal Crisis Strategies blog that he and his former colleague at McDermott, Eileen M. O’Connor, began in 2009, together with other former colleagues at McDermott.

Washington, D.C. & Albany, NY – Tully Rinckey PLLC is pleased to announce the addition of attorney Brandy Hood as an associate in its Washington, D.C. law office. Ms. Hood joins the firm’s federal sector labor and employment law practice.

Ms. Hood will provide representation to federal employees in a wide range of employment and labor issues including discrimination, sexual harassment, equal pay, adverse action, and Title VII claims. She has previous experience in immigration, bankruptcy, civil litigation, and business transactions.

Prior to joining Tully Rinckey PLLC, Ms. Hood was a Judicial Extern for Honorable Lance Africk at the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana and a Judicial Intern for the Honorable Frederick H. Wicker at the Louisiana Fifth Circuit of Appeal. 

Ms. Hood earned her Juris Doctorate at Tulane University Law School, graduating cum laude and earning the David L. Herman Award for her high professional standards in law. In addition to her law degree, Ms. Hood holds a B.A. degree from The George Washington University.

She is admitted to practice in New York and her District of Columbia admission is pending.

For more information about Brandy Hood’s addition to Tully Rinckey PLLC or the firm’s federal labor and employment law practice, please contact Jessica Brociek at 202-787-1900 or via email at jbrociek@tullylegal.com.

Richard Thorp and Harriet Unger, formerly with Maples and Calder, will lead the Asian practice.

Both are authorised by the Law Society of Hong Kong to practise Cayman Islands law in the firm’s new Hong Kong office and are also admitted in the British Virgin Islands.

Thorp is a securities and funds lawyer who has acted on a broad range of funds and general corporate matters, including the establishment of private equity and hedge funds and advising the directors and administrators when complex issues arose.

He joined Maples and Calder in London in 1998 and was transferred to Maples’ Hong Kong office in 2001 where he was made partner in 2004.

Unger is a structured finance specialist whose expertise covers all areas of capital markets transactions. She also has extensive experience of banking and corporate transactions and has been based in Asia for almost ten years.

Prior to her work at Maples and Calder, Unger worked for Simmons & Simmons in its London, Hong Kong and Tokyo offices and has been seconded to two major European investment banks in London.

Atlanta law firm King & Spalding LLP has won a $700 million judgment for Chevron Corp. in an arbitration between the energy giant and the government of Ecuador.

An international tribunal ruled that Ecuador must pay damages for delaying court rulings on commercial disputes with Chevron subsidiary Texaco Petroleum Co. for more than a decade.

The ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague resolves some Texaco claims against the Ecuador government dating as far back as 1991.

The court determined that by refusing to rule on Texaco's claims, Ecuador violated international law by breaching an investment treaty with the United States.

The $700 million in damages includes principal and interest dating to Dec. 22, 2006, when Chevron and Texaco initially filed the arbitration. Further hearings will determine whether Ecuador owes more for taxes, interest and costs.

Chevron and other energy companies have additional arbitration actions pending against the Ecuador government. 

The Lovells law firm plans to close its Chicago office by the end of October, sending 22 lawyers and 25 other employees scrambling to find work.

The London firm is set to merge with Washington-based Hogan & Hartson on May 1, creating one of the world's largest law firms with $1.8 billion in revenue and 2,500 lawyers in 40 offices. But the new firm, to be called Hogan Lovells, will not have a presence in Chicago.
Lovells said it decided to exit the city after 15 years because the performance of the Chicago office has declined in recent years.

In a statement Tuesday, David Harris, Lovells managing partner, said: "[The reinsurance market] is an area which has seen changes in work patterns and the office has been affected by a number of significant conflict situations. Despite the best efforts of partners in Chicago and elsewhere, this has had an impact on the office's overall performance in recent years and the position is not expected to change."

Conflicts and deteriorating performance had contributed to departures from the Chicago office in recent months. The office used to have more than 30 lawyers.

Yet, legal observers in Chicago said they thought the merger with Hogan would save the office. The decision to shut down was made independent of the merger, Harris said.

The McLane Law Firm — with offices in Manchester, Portsmouth and Concord as well as Woburn, Mass. — announced the firm has absorbed the Colucci Norman Law Firm, of Beverly, Mass.

John Colucci, William Norman, Larry Plavnik, all corporate lawyers and Andrew Botti, a litigator, join McLane's business-focused firm of more than 90 attorneys, 44 of whom actively serve Massachusetts businesses in some capacity.

"Bringing the Colucci Norman team onboard delivers an opportunity for McLane to establish an immediate and trusted presence within the North Shore business community, a strategic goal we have been working towards for years," said Steven Burke, managing director of the firm's Woburn office.

The addition of these attorneys and associate support staff to McLane's Woburn, Massachusetts office necessitates the second office space expansion within a year at the TradeCenter.

"In a time when most Massachusetts firms are retracting, we're happy to be bucking the trend. McLane has seen a revenue increase of more than 40 percent over the past five years," Burke said. "It goes to show that the breadth and depth of McLane's legal expertise and the fee structure we offer is really taking hold."