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WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

NEW LOCATION – Barnes & Thornburg has launched a New York office, nabbing Akin Gump partner Robert Boller to lead the endeavor. Jack Newsham reports that nine partners are listed on the firm's website as working from New York, with most of them also linked to another one of the Indianapolis-based firm's 19 offices. Ex-Cahill Gordon counsel David Slovick and former Davis Polk counsel Scott Beal are listed as exclusively working from Barnes & Thornburg's new location. 

SEARCHING - Lawyers for Alphabet, Google's parent, will spend the next three days in the EU Court of Justice in Luxembourg trying to convince EU judges to overturn a $2.6 billion fine imposed by the European Commission for abusing its dominant position in the search engine sector. As Simon Taylor reports, five judges hearing the case will decide whether they agree with a finding by EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager that Google unlawfully favored search results that linked to its Google Shopping site.   

STRATEGIES – Attorneys representing the alleged victims of Jeffrey Epstein are pursuing divergent strategies in civil lawsuits against the accused sex trafficker's Virgin Islands estate. Tom McParland reports that the case brought by Roberta Kaplan, who's representing an unnamed Epstein accuser, will center on the testimony of her client and an expert witness, without digging into the deceased financier's complex web of businesses. Meanwhile, lawyers at Boies Schiller plan to call former alleged co-conspirators who have been accused of helping Epstein procure young women and underage girls for his sex ring. A federal magistrate judge on Tuesday ordered fact discovery in the cases to proceed.

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EDITOR'S PICKS

Every Roger Stone Prosecutor Quit the Case After Main Justice Overrode Their Call for Tougher Sentence

Taking Control: Legal Ops Teams Asserting Themselves in E-discovery Relationships

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WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING

MORE TIME – U.K.-based Allen & Overy has joined rival firms Ashurst and Linklaters in updating its parental leave policies, including increasing paternity leave from two to 12 weeks. Simon Lock reports that the new provisions, which will go into effect on March 1, will apply to the firm's U.K. and United Arab Emirates offices. 

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WHAT YOU SAID

"Maybe in law you're never really friends because you are always competing for business."

— Eilene Zimmerman, whose ex-husband, a partner at Wilson Sonsini who died of a drug overdose, commenting on the difficulty of lawyers finding support from peers. 

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