The new managing partner of Cozen O’Connor’s Las Vegas office has taken a less-than-typical route to the firm leadership ranks—he’s a recent lateral hire, and fresh out of a two-year stint as a federal appellate court clerk.

Cozen O’Connor has named commercial litigator and trial lawyer Karl Riley as the new managing partner of its Las Vegas office. For the past two years, Riley has served as law clerk to Judge Johnnie Rawlinson at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in Las Vegas.