Prosecutors have approached the Barry Bonds defense team about a settlement, a lawyer familiar with the case has confirmed. It isn’t clear what the government has offered, or whether Bonds will accept.

In all, it took just seven days for partners at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe to pressure their respective firm leaders to call off merger talks.

Townsend spokesman Brian Colucci has confirmed that the firm’s merger talks with Kilpatrick Stockton have ended. Townsend veteran partner Paul Vapnek heard late last week from another partner that the talks were off, he said, because of irreconcilable conflicts with a major Kilpatrick client

Simmons & Simmons and Mayer Brown have called off merger talks, the two firms said in a joint press statement sent Tuesday. The firms did not say why the talks ended, but some partners had questioned how the two firms could combine their London presence, while Simmons partners had also questioned whether they wanted to merge with a larger and more profitable firm.

With great fanfare, plaintiffs sent out press releases Thursday to announce a $173 million settlement in a class action over computer memory chips.