Law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell recruited the Securities and Exchange Commission's former enforcement chief and another former high-level government lawyer to join its white-collar defense group, part of an effort to expand its Washington practice.

Linda Chatman Thomsen, who left the SEC earlier this year, and Raul Yanes, former staff secretary to President George W. Bush, are joining the law firm as partners.

Both had worked at Davis Polk in New York before joining the government.

The duo will be the first litigators in the 11-person Washington office in years.

Former SEC Commissioner Annette Nazareth and Robert Colby, a former deputy director of the SEC's trading and markets division, also recently joined the firm's Washington office to focus on financial regulatory issues.

Davis Polk clients, including large financial institutions, are closely entangled with the government as it has pumped billions of dollars into financial rescue plans. Congress is studying new regulation of financial markets.

The White House said Hamilton, from Indiana, will serve on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals covering his state, Illinois and Wisconsin.

Hamilton served as counsel to Democratic Sen. Evan Bayh when he was governor. He is a federal judge in Indianapolis.

A senior administration official, who would only speak on condition of anonymity to discuss the nomination, said Indiana's Republican senator, Richard Lugar, told the White House he supports Hamilton.

The official said Obama is looking for nominees who will overcome partisan Senate acrimony of the past. Some nominees have bitterly divided the Senate, no matter which party was in the majority or controlled the White House.

The administration also is looking at candidates for any future Supreme Court vacancy, but the official described that search simply an effort to be prepared.

There are 11 U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeals that cover specific regions, and the circuit for the District of Columbia. There currently are 15 vacancies, including the seat to be filled by Hamilton.

Since most cases do not reach the U.S. Supreme Court, federal appellate decisions often are the final word on legal matters that affect millions of Americans — from civil liberties and civil rights, to abortion and challenges to government actions.

Crist asked the justices for an advisory opinion after William Abramson defeated Circuit Judge Richard Wennet in November's election. Abramson was declared the winner by 61 votes after a third recount.

In December, though, the Supreme Court suspended Abramson from practicing law for 91 days over a 2005 outburst in Wennet's court. Even after the 91 days are up, Abramson cannot practice law unless reinstated by the Florida Bar.

In a letter Wednesday to Crist, the justices wrote it's "common sense" that Abramson also cannot preside over a court he cannot practice before.

In his new job, Jenkins must periodically face the voters, but he reaped one immediate benefit — a 20 percent jump in his annual salary.

Jenkins' case highlights what Chief Justice John Roberts and many other federal judges have identified as an emerging crisis — the failure to pay judges enough to keep them on the job and lure talented lawyers from private practice to the federal bench.

Not everyone sees it the way Roberts does. Committees in the House and Senate this year voted nearly 30 percent salary hikes for federal judges, but neither house of Congress acted on the measure.

Judges last received a substantial pay raise in 1991, although they have been given increases designed to keep pace with inflation in most years since then.

For 2009, though, judges are alone among federal workers — members of Congress included — in not getting a cost-of-living adjustment. Lawmakers get their COLA (cost-of-living allowance) automatically — $4,700 for 2009 — but they refused to authorize the same 2.8 percent bump for judges.

"Federal judges are currently under-compensated because Congress has repeatedly failed to adjust judicial salaries in response to inflation," said James C. Duff, director of the Administrative Office of the U.S Courts. "By its failure to do so once again, Congress only exacerbates a long-standing problem it must someday address."

Duff acknowledged that the current economic turmoil makes the judges' case harder. After all, federal trial judges are paid $169,300 a year, have lifetime job security and can retire at full salary at age 65 if they have 15 years in the job. Appellate judges make more, ranging up to Roberts' salary of $217,400.

But those salaries, large as they are, are much smaller than what judges' peers make in private practice. Attorney General-designate Eric Holder said his partnership at the law firm of Covington & Burling earned him $2.1 million this year. Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who retired as a federal judge in 2006 after 18 years, made nearly $2 million in 21 months at a New York law firm.

U.S. District Judge Samuel Kent was indicted last week on what he called "flagrant, scurrilous" charges following a Justice Department investigation into complaints by case manager Cathy McBroom.

"I plead absolutely, unequivocally not guilty and look very much forward to a trial on the merits," a feisty Kent told 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Edward Prado, brought to Houston to hear the case.

Kent was released on his own recognizance and did not speak to reporters. His wife, Sarah, attended the hearing and the couple left the courthouse holding hands.

"The charges are lies. He's now eager for his day in court," Kent's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, said after the hearing.

Prosecutors wouldn't comment after the hearing.

Kent, 59, faces two counts of abusive sexual contact and one count of attempted aggravated sexual abuse. If convicted of attempted aggravated sexual abuse, Kent could face up to life in prison and a fine of up to $250,000. Each of the two counts of abusive sexual contact carries a sentence of up to two years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

McBroom accused the judge of physical sexual harassment over a four-year period starting in 2003 when he was the only U.S. district court judge in Galveston, an island beach town 50 miles southeast of Houston.

Patrick Meehan is to be a shareholder in the Philadelphia-based professional corporation starting Monday. He is to handle white-collar criminal defense, internal corporate investigations and corporate commercial litigation.

Meehan's decision to join Conrad O'Brien was announced Wednesday, the day after his last day as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. He had served in that job since 2001 and was the district attorney of Delaware County before that.

There has been widespread speculation that Meehan will seek the Republican nomination for governor in 2010.