Law Firm

TIANJIN, China - Three years ago, Gary Biehn, a partner with White & Williams in Philadelphia, wanted to expand his law firm's reach to this port city in northern China, an economic powerhouse that gets special attention from the country's central planners. The firm already had a business tie to a law firm in Shanghai and saw benefits to connecting with Chinese lawyers here. Biehn reached out to the International Visitors Council of Philadelphia, and a string of calls and connections that played out over the last year culminated in a business agreement signed here Monday under the eye of Mayor Nutter and his Tianjin counterpart, Huang Xingguo.

Henry G. Schaefer, 73, of Fort Washington, senior partner in a Philadelphia law firm, died last Friday at Abington Memorial Hospital. He had been affiliated with Peck, Young & Van Sant since 1951, specializing in real estate matters, and was still active with the firm. Mr. Schaefer was born in Philadelphia and graduated from Central High School in 1942. He then served as a sergeant with an Army intelligence unit in Germany and Belgium. After the service, he earned his bachelor's degree in 1948 and his law degree in 1951, both from the University of Pennsylvania.

Law firm mergers in the Philadelphia region and around the nation continued at a robust pace in 2012, as firms sought to offset tepid business development by acquiring existing practices and clients. A survey released Monday by Altman Weil, the Newtown Square-based legal-consulting firm, said there were 60 mergers involving U.S. firms last year, including several in Philadelphia. That equaled the pace of mergers and acquisitions of the year before. The most prominent merger of a Philadelphia firm involved Center City's Pepper Hamilton L.L.P.

Sara Duffy, 64, of West Philadelphia, a partner in what was reportedly the first female law firm in the country, died Thursday at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. Miss Duffy and her sister, Mary Alice Duffy, formed Duffy & Duffy in 1960, her sister said. A national news magazine pronounced it the nation's first women's law firm in an article on women in law, she said. She recalled that she and her sister had dressed especially nicely the day that photographers came to take pictures for the article.

Edwin P. Rome, one of the founding members of the Philadelphia-based law firm of Blank, Rome, Comisky and McCauley, died yesterday. He was 71 and lived in Gladwyne, Montgomery County. During his career as an attorney, which began in 1940, Rome argued cases before state and federal courts which included a number of landmark cases involving the rights of the accused, freedom of speech and press, federal antitrust and international trade issues. He was recently honored by the city of Philadelphia and was presented the Philadelphia Bowl for a half-century of service to the city and in defense of humanitarian causes.

Stewart M. Duff, 53, a corporate lawyer and member of the Committee of Seventy, died Saturday at his Main Line home. Mr. Duff was a partner in the Center City law firm of Clark, Ladner, Fortenbaugh & Young, where he had worked since 1985. A member of the corporate department, he also was involved with the firm's marketing and executive committees. Before joining the firm, Mr. Duff was a member of the corporate department of Obermayer, Rebmann, Maxwell & Hippel in Center City.

A Common Pleas Court judge has ruled that the Cozen O'Connor law firm cannot forgive nearly $450,000 worth of legal work done for U.S. Rep. Bob Brady's 2007 mayoral campaign without violating the city's campaign finance law. The powerful Center City firm successfully defended Brady, also head of the city's Democratic party, against rival Tom Knox's effort to get him kicked off the ballot in the 2007 mayoral primary, eventually won by Mayor Nutter....

Glenn R. Paulsen, longtime chairman of the Burlington County GOP, one of New Jersey's strongest Republican organizations, announced yesterday that he was stepping down. Paulsen, 57, a partner in the Capehart Scatchard law firm, said it was time to move on after another successful election. Also, he said, the recent death of a onetime political foe made him realize that there was more to life than politics. Paulsen, chairman for about 15 years, informed the county's Republican leadership of his decision at GOP headquarters on High Street in Mount Holly in the morning.

Ballard, Spahr, Andrews & Ingersoll, one of the city's largest law firms, has signed a letter of intent to move its offices to Mellon Bank's planned Center City skyscraper in a leasing deal valued at more than $30 million. The letter of intent, between Ballard Spahr and developers Mellon Bank, Richard I. Rubin & Co. and the Equitable Life Assurance Society, was signed last week. Construction of the 54-story Mellon Bank Center is expected to begin next spring and the building is expected to be completed in late 1989.

Robert J. Reger, 43, of Worcester, founding partner of the law firm Reger, Rizzo & Darnall in Philadelphia, died of an apparent heart attack Sunday at his vacation home in Avalon. Since its establishment in 1992, Reger, Rizzo & Darnall has expanded to seven offices with 50 lawyers. Mr. Reger was managing partner in the firm's headquarters in the Cira Centre skyscraper in West Philadelphia. He specialized in complex commercial and casualty litigation cases. "Bob was energetic, charming and charismatic," said Thomas Schindler, managing partner of the firm's West Chester office.