Lee Paul, 94; Helped Found Law Firm With Global Reach

Lee Paul, the last surviving name partner of the law firm of Paul, Hastings, Janofsky and Walker, has died. He was 94.

Paul, who co-founded the firm with Robert Hastings and Leonard Janofsky in 1951 and saw it grow into an operation that has 790 lawyers in offices in many major U.S. cities as well as London and Tokyo, died of natural causes Saturday at his home in Laguna Beach.

“Leonard Janofsky was the country’s leading employment lawyer, Bob Hastings was a corporate generalist and Lee Paul was a litigator--and a really tough, charismatic jury trial litigator,” said Paul Grossman, former chairman of the firm’s employment law department.

“Lee had a tremendous presence and a marvelous sense of humor, and all the attributes that make a great jury trial lawyer, and he was the founder and leader for many years of our very extensive litigation practice,” he added.

As a civil litigator, Paul represented Toyota Motors, Union Oil, McCulloch Oil, Singer Sewing Machine, the Los Angeles Times, the Pasadena school board, the southern division of the Pacific Maritime Assn. and many others.

“When he battled in court, he was awesome to watch,” said Jenifer Monroe Bode, Paul’s daughter. “His background was in literature, and he drew on that kind of thing in court. He loved the English language and wrote beautifully as well.

“He was formidable if he was your foe, but for the people that knew him he had this wonderful sense of humor,” she said.

Paul retired in 1978 but maintained an office at the firm until about five years ago, when he and his wife, Gordon, moved from Pasadena to their summer home in Laguna’s Emerald Bay neighborhood.

He was born Anthony Lee Gilmour Paul in 1907 in Denver. He attended the New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell, graduated from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, in 1929, and graduated from Harvard Law School in 1932.

In 1942, after establishing private practices first in San Francisco and then Los Angeles, Paul was commissioned as the resident industry member of the Shipbuilding Commission of the National War Labor Board in Washington.

After the war, he returned to Los Angeles and co-founded the firm that was joined by partner Charles Walker in 1962.

The firm, usually referred to as Paul Hastings, has offices in Los Angeles; Costa Mesa; New York City; Washington, D.C.; Connecticut; Atlanta; London and Tokyo. It is one of only two law firms founded after World War II ranked in the top 50 of the American Lawyer’s “AmLaw 100” list of major law firms.

“Our firm is very fortunate in having had four founding partners, all of whom lived long, active lives, all of whom remained interested in the law firm throughout their lives, and all of whom were unselfish in the sense of their desire to create an institution that would live beyond their legal careers,” said Don Daucher, former managing partner of the firm.

Paul had a longtime concern for civic affairs. Over the years, he served as a member of the Child Guidance Clinic board, president of the Los Angeles Boys & Girls Club, director of the Pasadena Public Library and the Pasadena Humane Society, chairman of the Pasadena Council on Alcoholism and founder of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation.

In 1964, he established the Lee and Gordon Paul Scholarship Fund at Bowdoin, which provides financial assistance to graduates of the college who are attending Harvard Law School.

Paul’s wife died in 1998. In addition to Bode, he is survived by daughters, Mollie Paul Collins of Belvedere, Calif., and Deborah Paul Barkley of Pasadena; five grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. Wednesday at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena.

Donations may be made to Bowdoin, the Pasadena Humane Society or Doe Library in Berkeley in Paul’s name.