Clement recruits Kirkland & Ellis lawyers for spinoff law firm

(Reuters) - A partner and two associates from Kirkland & Ellis have jumped to the new Washington, D.C.-area small law firm led by appellate veterans Paul Clement and Erin Murphy, who left Kirkland last month after it said it was ending its legal work on Second Amendment cases.

Bartow Farr, the former Kirkland partner and a longtime colleague of Clement and Murphy, and former associates Nicholas Gallagher and Darina Merriam, were named as part of the legal team on the new Clement & Murphy website.

The firm will focus on appellate and U.S. Supreme Court work.

A second Kirkland partner, Andrew Lawrence, is expected to join the firm next week, Clement told Reuters on Thursday. He declined to comment further on the new hires.

A Kirkland spokesperson declined to comment.

A former law clerk to the late Justice William Rehnquist, Farr has argued 32 cases at the Supreme Court, according to his online law firm bio. Farr earlier was a partner at the small firm Bancroft with Clement and Murphy prior to Kirkland's move in 2016 to hire lawyers from the firm. Farr declined to comment on Thursday on his departure from Kirkland.

Lawrence also formerly worked at Bancroft.

Kirkland said in a June 23 statement it would "no longer represent clients with respect to matters involving the interpretation of the Second Amendment." At the same time, the firm also said Clement and Murphy would leave.

The statement came hours after Clement and Murphy won a landmark Second Amendment case at the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices in a 6-3 ruling struck down a New York law that had restricted the carrying of firearms in public. Gallagher also worked on the case at the high court.

In leaving Kirkland, Clement and Murphy said last month in their own statement that the firm's decision to stop its Second Amendment work would impact client relationships.

"The representations in question were approved years ago, and withdrawing from them now would cost the clients years of institutional memory," Murphy said.

On Wednesday, the National Shooting Sports Foundation said it had hired Clement and Murphy for a federal appeals court case. The firearms group is seeking to revive a lawsuit challenging a New York law that allows certain legal complaints against gun manufacturers.

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