The search firm Wise Counsel is suing Cooley and the chair of its intellectual property department in New York, Walter Hanchuk, alleging Hanchuk interfered with a placement fee when a recruit moved with him to Cooley from Chadbourne & Parke. Wise Counsel claims it identified and introduced microelectronics engineer Lesly Pinol to Chadbourne after the firm requested a search for a technical adviser in its IP practice. Hanchuk, the former chair of Chadbourne’s IP department, interviewed Pinol twice before she was hired in July 2012, the suit said.
As part of the search agreement, Chadbourne was to pay Wise Counsel a placement fee of $26,250, which was 25 percent of Pinol’s starting base salary of $105,000, the suit alleges. But Wise Counsel wouldn’t be paid if Pinol left Chadbourne within about six months. In November 2012, Hanchuk joined Cooley as a partner, and shortly after, Pinol accompanied him, preventing the fee to Wise Counsel, the suit said.
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