The College of Law in the UK is duelling with several of Kaplan Law School's Legal Practice Course clients after refusing to pay back thousands of pounds of fees to the firms' future trainees, reports The Lawyer. The dispute arose after three firms, all of which send their future trainees to Kaplan, offered training contracts to students who had already paid fees to the College, which in some cases amounted to £5,890 ($9628).

GERMAN FIRM TAKES ON FROM HOGANS

German independent firm Noerr will grow its Frankfurt arm with the hire of Hogan Lovells German head of banking, Olaf Grabowski, reports legalweek.com. Grabowski will join Noerr's corporate finance practice in October. He has been heading up the banking group since 2007, specialising in real estate and acquisition finance with special experience in transactions in Central and Eastern Europe.

BP LAWYERS SCRAMBLE FOR TOP SPOTS

Over 100 lawyers who are involved in suing BP PLC over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill have applied for positions on the committee that will lead the multidistrict litigation, reports law.com. Eager lawyers are citing extensive work they've done on the case, or the role they would serve as the representative of a specific group of victims, in an attempt to land the role. The committee will carry out discovery, decide which motions to file and (surprise, surprise) pocket the largest fees.

DAVID IS KING, SAYS RESEARCH

According to exclusive research conducted on behalf of The Lawyer, David is the most popular partner name at the UK's top 50 firms. Accounting for just over 5 per cent of the 7,098 partners, David is the name of choice, followed by Andrew, Michael, Richard and Simon. The most popular female partner names are Sarah, Catherine, Susan, Helen and Elizabeth.

PROFESSOR FACES GUNMAN AT SCHOOL

An adjunct professor at the University of Texas School of Law in Austin came face to face with a gunman last week, reports law.com. The professor was driving to the law school when he pulled up to a stop sign and a man armed with an assault rifle and wearing a ski mask ran in front of his car. "He fired three shots to my left. At that point, I realised it was a serious problem," he said. The man did not try to shoot students who were scrambling for cover nearby, but eventually shot himself.