Law firm Thomson Geer has hired all the partners of a rival practice
There’s a good reason it’s eerily quiet in the Eagle Street offices of one of the world’s biggest law firms: All four of the partners have upped stumps and defected to the Brisbane bunker of a rival outfit.
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MASS DEFECTION
There’s a good reason it’s eerily quiet in the Eagle Street offices of Dentons, one of the world’s biggest law firms.
All four of the partners have upped stumps and defected to the Brisbane bunker of rival outfit Thomson Geer in arguably the city’s most dramatic legal shake-up so far this year.
Jumping ship have been Matthew Rollason, Scott Guthrie, Jeff Baker and Kirsten Pike. Another Dentons lawyer, Melbourne-based Joe Ip, will also join the Brisbane outpost of Thomson Geer as a partner.
They are among 21 legal eagles and support staff at Dentons who have been poached by Thomson Geer in a reshuffle largely driven by COVID-19 pressures.
Somewhat ironically, the five new Thomson Geer partners were among a 17-strong contingent that had only joined Dentons two years ago in a mass exodus that triggered the demise of DibbsBarker.
TAKING ADVANTAGE
It’s notable that Dentons, which only opened its Brisbane outpost in early 2018, asked staff to take some combination of a 20 per cent pay cut and/or reduced hours earlier this year in response to the pandemic-driven squeeze on the bottom line.
By contrast, Thomson Geer, headed by longtime boss Adrian Tembel, has not been forced to take similarly draconian steps imposed across much of the sector.
Tembel has also nabbed Dentons staff in Melbourne and hinted at further announcements to beef-up his team, which includes 116 partners across the country.
“The move will strengthen Thomson Geer’s national real estate and banking capability and will provide more defence against any further downturn in the Queensland economy,’’ he told City Beat on Monday.
“Notwithstanding that the firm expects the next six months to be very difficult for the legal market as government stimulus packages end, the firm is among the first in Australia to take advantage of the instability caused by that economic outlook.”
A Dentons spin doctor described the talent drain as “amicable,’’ although we find that a tad hard to believe.
She said an internal “growth committee’’ had been established to support existing clients and rebuild its presence in the state. Just what the world needs--another committee!
MORE GRIEF
Speaking of legal eagles, it’s hard to see how a north Queensland bloke named William Robert Feeney could cop much more grief.
The one-time lawyer based in Mackay was struck off of the roll of practitioners recently by a Queensland tribunal and ordered to pay $20,000 in costs.
That followed his release from prison after a 2017 guilty plea to masterminding a multimillion-dollar tax avoidance scheme which saw him splash out on investment properties.
Feeney cooked up the ill-fated plan while working as an accountant at now-defunct National Mine Maintenance Services and National Mines Group, which provided services to Anglo American and other heavyweights in the Bowen Basin.
He acknowledged diverting for his own use $2.32m intended for PAYG withholdings in 2010 and 2011, including $1.4m transferred into a personal account used to buy real estate.
Ultimately, he tipped $3.82m into speculative property buys and managed to nearly double his money when later offloading them.
But it all came unstuck when the tax man examined 122 employee returns, which prompted Feeney to spin lies to the ATO and even falsify ASIC documentation.
Sentenced to 3½ years behind bars, he was also ordered to repay $2.8m and banned from serving as a company director for five years.
Based on this sorry history and the fact that “no attempt has been made to demonstrate any material change to his character,” the tribunal ruled that Feeney is “permanently unfit to practice’’.
Feeney, who didn’t fight the strike-off action, could not be reached for comment on Monday.