Then-New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman answering questions about the Bridgegate controversy. June 25, 2015. (Photo: Carmen Natale/ALM)

Arnold & Porter has launched a Newark, New Jersey, office, aiming to bolster its business with the state's pharmaceutical industry and other clients.

The office, which opened on Thursday, has been in the works for nearly a year, since the arrival in March of partner Paul Fishman, the former U.S. attorney in New Jersey. He said he and the firm's leadership discussed and agreed on a Newark office at the time he joined the firm.

Fishman, 61, will lead the office. Arnold & Porter senior counsel John Fietkiewicz, who joined the firm in May and who served with Fishman as counsel to the U.S. Attorney's Office, will also work there.

“During the course of the discussion about the prospect of joining the firm,” Fishman said in an interview Tuesday, “it became clear to me and clear to them [firm leadership] that our [business] relationships would be most successful if we could couple my joining with the opening of an office in Newark.”

But the business motivation to launch in Newark goes further back. Arnold & Porter and its 2017 merger partner, Kaye Scholer, have represented for decades pharmaceutical, health care and life sciences clients that have a presence in New Jersey. The firm's clients include Novartis, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Sanofi.

“The firm already has a substantial client base in New Jersey and does an enormous amount of litigation and regulatory and transactional work for those clients,” Fishman said. “This will enable us to provide all of those services faster and better, and I think it will enhance our ability to maintain and grow those relationships.”

Fishman, who heads the firm's crisis management and strategic response team, focuses on civil litigation, white-collar criminal defense and internal investigations. Fishman, a resident of Montclair, New Jersey, and Fietkiewicz will split their time between the New Jersey and New York offices.

While Arnold & Porter lawyers previously worked on New Jersey matters out of New York and other offices, Fishman said having a local presence is “a statement to the legal community and the judicial community about the firm's commitment in the market.”

Arnold & Porter has signed a long-term lease for about 6,000 square feet at One Gateway Center in a space that previously housed the campaign headquarters of Phil Murphy during his run for governor, Fishman said. Arnold & Porter gutted and renovated the space to make its own office, Fishman said.

Other firms in the same office complex, near Newark Penn Station, include Gibbons and Herrick Feinstein.

While the office is home to Fishman and Fietkiewicz for now, other partners will work out of the Newark office occasionally. Fishman said Arnold & Porter aims to expand the number of people in the office, but it doesn't have a target head count in mind there.

“Our goal is to have a serious, established presence in New Jersey,” Fishman said. “If we need to hire people from other firms, we will do that.”

The new office is an investment for Arnold & Porter, which last opened an office in Houston in January 2014, not including the offices gained from the Kaye Scholer merger.

“Offices are not free. It costs some money to rent space and furnish and renovate,” Fishman said, declining to specify the expense to the firm. “It's an investment that the firm is making with confidence that it will enhance the firm's relationships with clients and its ability to attract new clients.”

Fishman continues to lead a full-time practice while serving in other community roles, including co-leading a task force with retired New Jersey Supreme Court Justice Virginia Long. They are examining whether the state's Attorney General's Office should create a conviction review unit to review claims of actual innocence by those convicted of serious crimes. It's anticipated the group will recommend such a unit and its upcoming report in the coming weeks will contain specific recommendations on how to go about it. They are also evaluating a cold-case unit.