Mills & Reeve boosts private client offering as SGH Martineau team defects
FOUR members of SGH Martineau’s private client team have transferred to the Birmingham office of rival Mills & Reeve.
The move significantly strengthens Mills & Reeve’s existing private client team in Birmingham and increases the number of private client lawyers to 46 in total across the firm’s six offices.
The announcement is the second high profile departure from SGH Martineau following its merger with city rival Shakespeares. Squire Patton Boggs announced earlier today that it had strengthened its Corporate team with the recruitment of Andrew Glaze as partner.
The new team members of the Mills & Reeve team are consultant Keith Dudley, principal associate Sarah Wood and senior associates Lucy Cooling and Stephen Atkinson.
Dudley is a leading legal practitioner in private client matters. He advises directors and business owners and has a wealth of experience in estate planning, including trust formation and will planning, and gives specialist advice on the operation of charitable trusts and cross-border trust and tax issues. He is also a member of the STEP Worldwide Council.
Ms Wood has extensive experience in the administration of estates with values over £20m and works for clients including landed estate clients and entrepreneurs.
Ms Cooling, a former Legal Executive of the Year at the Birmingham Legal Awards, has experience of all aspects of private client work, including tax planning, will drafting, creation of trusts, applications to the Court of Protection and drafting lasting powers of attorney.
Atkinson deals with individuals of high net worth and has experience in will drafting, advising on employee benefit trust matters, trust formation and administration and inheritance and capital gains tax planning.
Matthew Hansell, head of Mills & Reeve’s award-winning private client team, said: “Private client work is an integral part of Mills & Reeve’s offering and links seamlessly with much of our work in our other key sectors. We offer a complete legal service to all clients, from entrepreneurs and business owners to high profile sports stars and owners of landed estates.”
Steve Allen, head of Mills & Reeve’s Birmingham office, added: “We are delighted to welcome the new team members to Mills & Reeve in a move that will really enhance our offering. Everyone concerned is excited to see a combination of two leading private client teams in Birmingham.”
The appointments are further proof of Mills & Reeve’s aim to grow its Birmingham office and follow three other high-profile hires in the last four months alone. The most recent addition was commercial partner Jayne Hussey, who joined from Pinsent Masons. She was preceded by Claire O’Brien, national head of intellectual property litigation, and Rhian Vandrill, a commercial partner specialising in work for the independent health sector and NHS, who both moved from Wragge Lawrence Graham & Co.
