Two Los Angeles law firms recently raised their first-year associate salaries while facing key partner departures and a federal criminal probe into whether lawyers engaged in illegal wiretapping.

Greenberg Glusker Fields Claman & Machtinger, whose top rainmaker, Bertram Fields, has said he is a subject of the criminal investigation, has agreed to raise salaries to $135,000. In the past month, the 90-attorney firm has lost about a dozen lawyers, including two members of its management committee.