Reilly joins Boston office of 7th-largest US law firm
Former Massachusetts attorney general Thomas F. Reilly, who left the post after his unsuccessful bid last year for the Democratic nomination for governor, will join the Boston office of the law firm Greenberg Traurig.
As a partner at the firm, Reilly, 64, will draw on his breadth of experience as the state's former top prosecutor to work on a wide range of client matters, including litigation and healthcare, environmental, and insurance issues, according to the firm. He will begin his new job in about two weeks.
Gary R. Greenberg, co managing partner of Greenberg Traurig's Boston office, said Reilly would be a "significant asset" to the firm, noting "there's probably no industry he doesn't have significant background in."
"He's a proven, first-rate trial attorney; he has decades of experience in finding solutions to complex legal issues; and he has always been a person of unquestioned integrity," Greenberg said. "I see his assets as valuable in every one of our disciplines."
As attorney general, Reilly investigated Big Dig corruption, helped guide HMO Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center through financial crises, and successfully challenged additional legal fees sought by several law firms that helped Massachusetts broker an $8.3 billion settlement with the tobacco industry. He said that he had received a "great deal of interest" from other firms that considered bringing him on board.
He ultimately chose Greenberg Traurig because "it allows me to practice here in Massachusetts, where I live, but also to broaden my practice nationally and internationally," Reilly said. "This is the best place for me at this point in my career."
The new job dramatically increases earning potential for Reilly, who spent most of his career as a public servant and has lived with his wife in a rental apartment in Watertown for nearly four decades.
The firm declined to disclose his compensation, calling that information "private."
But average annual compensation for Greenberg Traurig partners in 2005 was $610,000, according to the American Lawyer magazine. And starting pay for first-year associates at some major Boston law firms is now $145,000 a year, more than Reilly's roughly $130,000 salary as attorney general.
Reilly had connections to the firm. John A. Stefanini, who was chief legal counsel to former House speaker Thomas M. Finneran and now chairman of Greenberg's Boston office's governmental affairs practice, and Robert A. Sherman, a co managing partner of the Boston office, served as informal advisers to Reilly during his run for governor. In addition, Reilly's campaign received $33,000 from Greenberg Traurig employees.
At Greenberg Traurig, Reilly will join several former senior government officials now in private practice, including A. John Pappalardo, previously US attorney for Massachusetts; Juan M. Marcelino, previously district administrator of the Securities and Exchange Commission; and Terence P. McCourt, previously deputy chief legal counsel to former Governor William F. Weld.
Miami-based Greenberg Traurig is the nation's seventh-largest law firm, with about 1,600 lawyers in 29 offices across the United States, Europe, and Asia.
The firm has been deeply involved in national politics, representing George W. Bush in the 2000 Florida vote recount.
It also employed Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who is now in prison after pleading guilty to fraud and corruption charges.
Greenberg Traurig's Boston office, at One International Place, was started in 1999 by three lawyers from the law firm Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott -- Sherman, Roderick MacLeish Jr., and Stephen I. Burr -- and has since grown to about 80 attorneys.
A graduate of American International College and Boston College Law School, Reilly was a prosecutor with the Suffolk district attorney's office before starting his own law firm in 1975 with Wayne Budd, who later became US attorney in Boston. Reilly later served two terms as Middlesex district attorney and two terms as attorney general before launching his bid for the gubernatorial nomination.
Sacha Pfeiffer can be reached at pfeiffer@globe.com. 
