The News
Pogust Goodhead — the law firm behind an ambitious, transatlantic class-action lawsuit over a mining disaster — is cutting around 100 jobs and is reportedly months behind in filing its accounts.
The firm was among the most prominent to utilize litigation finance to power lawsuits against companies alleged to have damaged the environment, notably relying on a $552.5 million secured loan from the US hedge fund Gramercy in order to fund lawsuits against mining giants BHP and Vale over the 2015 Marina dam collapse as well as against a dozen carmakers over the Dieselgate scandal.
The former case in particular made headlines when it opened in October for both its scale and its global scope, involving Brazilian claimants suing an Anglo-Australian mining company in a London court. The lawsuit — which is expected to conclude in March — is also unusual in that class-actions of its kind are rare in Britain, and for its funding mechanism of litigation finance, which has mostly only been used in patent or international arbitration disputes.
Yet The Law Society Gazette noted that “the nature of large group claims… is that there is no regular income stream during litigation.” Law.com, meanwhile, reported that the firm’s annual accounts for the most recent financial year were eight months overdue at the UK’s Companies House registry.
In a statement, Pogust Goodhead appeared to blame slow-walking by the companies it is targeting, saying: “We were established with the ambitious goal of providing justice for millions of people who have been wronged by multinational companies. It is well known these companies have infinite resources.”