_{Goodhead and the Emiliano hotel, a great place from which to coordinate global justice.}

The barrister who led class action specialist Pogust Goodhead until he was ousted in a boardroom coup has denied allegations that he spent litigation funds on “unnecessarily lavish travel and entertainment”, which included luxury hotel stays and helicopter flights.

His replacement has denied that her own trips to Brazil and Japan, and an MBA funded by the firm, fall into the same category.

Thomas Goodhead, who co-founded Pogust Goodhead, was kicked out of his firm this summer after allegedly falling out with its funder, US asset management fund Gramercy.

Pogust Goodhead’s new board commissioned DLA Piper to investigate Goodhead’s reign and its interim report, seen by the Times, concluded that there was “excessive and uncontrolled spending directed and led by Goodhead”.

Goodhead, who denied the allegations, told RollOnFriday, “I went from being a solo self-employed barrister, working on personal injury claims, to the head of a global law firm, taking on huge corporations in a few short years. We raised $1bn of funding and at its peak we were a firm of 700 people”.

“We won substantial victories, including the Volkswagen emissions litigation and the British Airways and Uber data breach cases.”

“When you build a firm that takes on powerful corporate defendants, you make enemies – and I was removed from the firm in a boardroom coup.”

The firm is currently acting for claimants in the Mariana Dam disaster in Brazil, and much of the alleged extravagance related to Goodhead’s visits to the country.

The onetime slips-and-trips barrister stayed in Rio de Janeiro’s five star, £500 a night beachfront Emiliano hotel so regularly that he left his laundry, which was washed and hung in the wardrobe when he returned, according to the report.

He also spent around £80,000 on private planes and helicopters in Brazil between 2023 and 2025, although the report notes that some of the trips were to remote areas which weren’t directly serviced by commercial airlines.

Goodhead spread his largesse around, the report found. He threw two yacht parties for Pogust Goodhead’s Rio staff in 2023, costing £5,300 and £3,900 apiece and which featured a mobile steak restaurant and an open bar.

Rio staff also attended a samba school, while over £100,000 was spent hiring a film crew to make a documentary about their Mariana Dam work.

Goodhead rejected the claims he overspent, pointing out that he went to Brazil more than 70 times and was co-ordinating 400 of his staff and 3,000 local lawyers.

“It was often necessary to use helicopters and private aviation to reach inaccessible areas. I regularly stayed in business hotels in Rio, which was the centre of our operation. Any corporate hospitality was in line with other City law firms of our size”, he said.

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Goodhead's business at times appears to have been interwoven with his personal life. In 2022, the firm’s annual corporate celebration, held at the Wallace Collection, doubled as his 40th birthday party. In 2023, his parents were flown at the firm’s expense on business class flights to Sydney, where Goodhead set up a short-lived branch of the firm. Goodhead’s lawyers have categorised the trip as a legitimate personal expense.

DLA Piper’s report alleges that Goodhead wrongly used £500,000 of director’s loans for personal expenses which included a driver’s awareness course, and alternative accommodation while his flat was redecorated.

Goodhead disputed its conclusions, stating, “Pogust Goodhead was financed by commercial loans, not client funding. No client or ring‑fenced litigation funds were ever used for my personal expenditure. Any expenses were fully settled under my director’s loan account of which our funders were fully aware.”

Goodhead and members of his inner circle were expelled in dramatic fashion when security staff were stationed around the premises to prevent them re-entering their offices overnight.

“An email went out telling staff not to worry and Tom is out of the business on leave, then the very next day staff arrived at the office to find security guards camped outside”, a source told ROF.

Goodhead’s ignominious exit was a far cry from his boasts to a receptive press that his lawyers would be millionaires.

Staff told ROF there was “chaos” behind the scenes even as Pogust Goodhead acted for thousands of claimants in some of the biggest class action cases ever undertaken.

After Goodhead was ejected, the firm appointed Huw Dolphin, a turnaround consultant, as a new person with significant control of the business. Handing the reigns to a distressed business specialist “should not come as a surprise to anyone who has worked there”, said a source.

“Pogust Goodhead takes the award for the most inefficiently and chaotically run law firm in all of London. Most tasks were started and then dropped half way through due to lack of resources”, they said.

Other insiders told ROF that staff worked long hours in a basement office with limited access to natural light, and that coffee was rationed to one cup per day.

“It was an all-hands-on-deck atmosphere, with staff pushing beyond normal working hours for months,” they claimed. “There was talk of a bonus to reflect this effort”, but “instead, many of us were let go.”

Allegations of mismanagement received by ROF over the years reflect some of the points touched on in DLA Piper's report.

An insider told ROF in November 2024, “Senior management has burned through its Gramercy funding on half empty office spaces in prime locations across the globe, regular business class flights and luxury hotel stays and yacht parties”. 

In April 2025, another insider complained to ROF, “Instead of building a sustainable business that could make a lasting change for good”, the “massive funding provided has been spent on business class travel, lavish parties and accommodation as well as providing the biggest justice fighter of them all, Goodhead himself, with a £4.2M loan that is then just written off”.

It wasn't all one way, however. Goodhead said, “I am still owed £2.7m by the firm for money I injected to cover staff payroll before I left”. His claim was corroborated by a Pogust Goodhead lawyer at the time, who told ROF, “two months ago there wasn't enough money to pay employees, TG had to pay himself”.

Pogust Goodhead said in a statement, “The individuals concerned are no longer employed by Pogust Goodhead, following decisive action taken by the Board”.

“The alleged conduct is deeply concerning and does not reflect the values or standards of the firm today. Pogust Goodhead is now run by an experienced independent Board and leadership team with a robust governance structure in place.”

“We have put this chapter firmly behind us, and we remain fully focused on supporting our people and securing the best possible outcomes for our clients.”

The new management team’s attempt to distance itself from the Goodhead era may not be quite that simple. 

A source informed ROF that the new CEO, Alicia Alinia, “at all material times oversaw the finance department and was therefore in charge of reviewing and approving every line item of spend and every budgeting process that the firm went through”.

Her LinkedIn account may also need a scrub if the firm wants to crucify Goodhead for his overseas jaunts. It documents a trip Alinia took to Brazil featuring photos of the ex-Slater and Gordon MD enjoying the ‘indigenous experience’. A source said the jolly was undertaken by Alinia "despite having no role on the BHP/Mariana Dam case whatsoever".

_{100% NOT a jolly - a client meeting.}

The current CEO's LinkedIn account also details how she undertook a firm-funded Cambridge University MBA (estimated price tag: £60k) at the time Pogust Goodhead was making redundancies, which included a week-long trip to Japan.

_{Not sure what useful lessons this can teach law firm management.}

A spokesperson for Pogust Goodhead told ROF, “Throughout her tenure, Alicia has always acted with integrity and professionalism while navigating a deeply entrenched founder-led culture resistant to change". 

"It is entirely standard for senior executives to undertake an MBA as part of their professional development. Likewise, as COO, it was both appropriate and expected that she meet clients directly to understand firsthand the impact of the devastation they faced.”

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