Clare Locke Forms Alliance With Schillings, Giles George

Clare Locke, a small law firm known for taking on large media organizations, is forging an alliance with the UK’s Schillings and Australia’s Giles George.

The agreement, while not a formal merger, will see the firms share resources to serve cross-border clients, they said in a joint statement Monday.

“The defamation and reputation protection space takes on a more global dynamic with the way communication channels are these days,” said Tom Clare, a Clare Locke partner. Clare and his wife Elizabeth “Libby” Locke formed their namesake firm a decade ago after leaving Kirkland & Ellis.

The trio of firms specialize in reputation management, privacy, and security-related legal matters. Clare Locke now has 14 lawyers, having rebuilt its ranks over the past few months, and Locke and Clare said they are eager to expand from their firm’s headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia.

The firm has previously partnered with Giles George and Schillings, and a desire to formalize the relationship and increase the services available to clients led to the new union, Clare said. Schillings is currently working with Clare Locke in representing a British business executive who filed a lawsuit earlier this year against Dow Jones & Co., owner of the Wall Street Journal, in a Delaware court.

Libel laws outside the US tend to be more favorable to plaintiffs. Locke said looking for friendlier forums for defamation actions was less the reason for the alliance than having easy access to the “deep benches” at Schillings, which has nearly 70 lawyers and other professionals, and Giles George.

Clare said his firm’s clients tend to be high-net-worth individuals, families, or multinational companies. Their reputations, when harmed, are often affected in multiple jurisdictions because of the “nature of the internet, social media, and a lot of the ways that traditional media gets distributed globally,” he said. “We have to address defamation wherever it exists.”

New Chapter

Prominent litigation boutiques such as Clare Locke can be appealing takeover targets for larger firms. Clare Locke has received interest from such suitors, but plans to remain independent, Locke said.

Clare Locke handles defamation-related referrals from legal giants like Kirkland, McGuireWoods, Davis Polk & Wardwell, and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison—work that would go away if the firm’s founders returned to Big Law. Locke and Clare said that maintaining their own standalone practice allows them the flexibility to take on the clients they want and avoid potential conflicts.

A lawsuit filed by Clare Locke in Delaware this year against G/O Media Inc., a private equity-owned media company, likely wouldn’t be possible at a larger firm. One holdover from their time in Big Law is Clare Locke’s fee structure, which generally avoids taking cases on contingency—a practice whereby a firm gets a cut of a final judgment or settlement—in favor of hourly rates, Locke said.

Clare Locke’s representation last year of Dominion Voting Systems Inc. in securing a landmark defamation settlement from the parent company of Fox News helped the firm solidify its own reputation as a go-to shop for clients looking to change the public narrative.

The high-profile case also put Clare Locke in the spotlight, with a group of lawyers leaving the firm last summer to start their own outfit, one that has a client that Clare Locke sued this month.

Locke and Clare declined to discuss that dispute or whether there are any other outstanding issues between the firm and its former lawyers who have formed Meier Watkins Phillips Pusch.