Liisa Thomas, the former chair of Winston & Strawn's global privacy and data security practice, has joined Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton's Chicago office, treading a path familiar to four colleagues that have made a similar move in the Windy City.

In April, Sheppard Mullin hired the former chair of Winston & Strawn's tax practice, Amit Kalra. Prior to that, the firm brought over a four-lawyer energy team from Winston & Strawn in Chicago in March that included partners Katherine Gillespie, Laurette Petersen, Andrew Ratts and special counsel Katarzyna Levecke. That group also included San Francisco-based partner Christine Hourcade-Hoefliger.

Thomas said her move was not driven by those previous additions, but instead by Sheppard Mullin's focus on growing a privacy and cybersecurity practice that she will now co-chair alongside Craig Cardon, a partner and member of the firm's executive committee who works out of San Francisco and Century City, California.