Embattled class action leader Milberg Weiss & Bershad has seen two more partners leave the firm in the latest in a long line of departures over the past nine months.
Competition partners Douglas Richards and Michael Buchman are the latest to leave the firm since it was indicted by a federal grand jury in connection to an alleged kickbacks scheme on 18 May last year.
At that point the firm had 47 partners, but the exits have seen it reduced to 30 partners.
Richards and Buchman, who will join New York class action boutique Pomerantz Haudek Block Grossman & Gross in March, have worked together as lead or co-lead counsel in numerous competition class actions and have recovered more than $340m (£172m) for purchasers of prescription drugs, Microsoft software and for international auction house customers.
Buchman worked for the New York State Attorney General¹s Office before joining Milberg Weiss in 1997. Richards had been a partner at the firm since 2000.
The news follows the resignation of former name partner Steven Schulman last month. Schulman was indicted alongside fellow name partner David Bershad and Milberg Weiss as a firm last year, with prosecutors alleging that the class action leader paid more than $11m (£5.5m) in inducements to claimants over the last two decades.
The firm has subsequently dropped his name from its banner.
The firm and the lawyers have pleaded not guilty and pledged to vigorously fight the charges.