A mixture of 0.95 g of 2-chloro-3-iodo-5-(methylsulfonyl)pyridine, 0.91 g of α-ethenyl-3,4-dichlorobenzenemethanol, 0.77 g of N,N-diisopropylethylamine, 0.04 g of tri-o-tolyphosphine, 0.02 g of palladium diacetate and 3 ml of dimethylformamide was heated to 100° C. under nitrogen. The mixture was heated at this temperature for 20 minutes and then at 116° C. for an additional 20 minutes at which point thin layer chromatography showed no iodopyridine starting material. The mixture was then cooled and partitioned between 1N hydrochloric acid and methyl acetate. The ethyl acetate layer was washed twice with aqueous saturated sodium chloride solution, dried over magnesium sulfate and filtered and the filtrate was concentrated to a dark solid residue. Column chromatography of this residue (silica gel, 1:1 ethyl acetate/hexane) gave a pale yellow solid. This was recrystallized from ethanol/ethyl acetate to give 3-[2-chloro-5-(methylsulfonyl)-3-pyridinyl]-1-(3,4-dichlorophenyl)propan-1-one melting at about 128.5°-130.5° C.
