Bel Partners, founded by Bruce Lubin, and Milestone Legal Search, founded by Scott Hodes, today announced that they have come together to form BellStone Legal Recruiting LLC. The new firm brings the two practices under one name and one team, serving law firms nationally and internationally.
The name tells the story. BellStone takes its first half from Bel Partners and its second from Milestone, and the firm is built the same way: two recruiters who each spent years earning the trust of law firms and attorneys, now working side by side.
Associates and partners, one firm
Most legal search firms pick a lane. Some focus on associates, moving volume across class years. Others focus on lateral partners and practice groups, where a single placement can take months of quiet work. BellStone is built to do both.
Bruce brings two decades of placing partners and full practice groups at top-tier firms around the world, including energy, infrastructure, and project finance work in New York and beyond. Scott, founder of Milestone Legal Search, brings 16 years as Managing Principal of a large national search firm and a national practice placing associates, Counsel and partners. He leads the firm's growing team of recruiters. Together, they give clients one relationship for every hire a firm needs to make, from a second-year associate to a group leader with a portable book.
"Scott and I have known the same firms, the same partners, and the same market for years. Putting our practices together means our clients get more reach and more insight on every search, without losing the personal attention they came to us for."
Bruce Lubin, Founding Partner
For attorneys, the combination means one confidential conversation opens more doors. BellStone recruiters share market intelligence across practice areas and geographies, so the opportunities a candidate hears about reflect the full market, not a single recruiter's list.
"Candidates want someone who knows the firms from the inside and will tell them the truth. That is what we built at Milestone, and that is what BellStone will be known for, at every level of seniority."
Scott Hodes, Founding Partner
A firm built to grow
BellStone is joined by Jason Kahan as a founding partner leading operations, technology, and business development. Jason's focus is the infrastructure behind the firm: the systems, research, and outreach tools that let recruiters spend their time on the phone and in the room with attorneys rather than behind a screen.
The firm is actively hiring recruiters and has launched a structured training and certification program so every new recruiter learns the BellStone process from day one.
The team
Founder of Bel Partners. Twenty years placing partners and groups at top-tier firms globally.
Founded Milestone Legal Search, a legal search firm with national and international scope, after 16 years as Managing Principal with a large national legal recruiting firm.
Leads operations, technology, and business development.
Works with associates and firms across BellStone's markets.
What stays the same
For the law firms Bel Partners and Milestone have worked with, nothing about those relationships changes, except that the team behind them just got bigger. Your contacts remain your contacts. Existing searches continue without interruption under the BellStone name.
We are growing, we are hiring, and we would be glad to hear from you, whether you are a firm with a search, an attorney thinking about what comes next, or a recruiter who wants to build a career with us.