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AF Legal Group expands criminal law practice with newest acquisition
AF Legal Group, the parent company of Australian Family Lawyers, has acquired Armstrong Legal’s criminal and family law practices.
Naomi Neilson
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For a $2.25 million initial payment plus GST, listed company AF Legal Group (ASX: AFL) has acquired the two Armstrong Legal practices and its website, armstronglegal.com.au.
The group’s CEO, Chris McFadden, said the acquisition was consistent with its “slated growth strategy”, with the firm now diversified across family law, wills and estates, and criminal law.
“Thanks to all our tremendous team members who make it happen across all our legal brands and who, through doing so, pave the way for us to act on such exciting opportunities for the future of our organisation,” McFadden said.
“We are equally excited to see our new colleagues join us before month’s end as we begin this new chapter for the AF Legal Group.”
While criminal law is currently confined to NSW, McFadden said the group would look to expand into other states “in the short to medium term”, particularly given all three sectors “are characterised by the absence of significant national players”.
The website acquisition would also allow AF Legal Group to capitalise on the “search activity and resultant lead volume”.
AF Legal Group – which also controls Watts McCray Lawyers, AFL Kordos Lawyers, and AFL Withnalls Lawyers – said the $2.25 million payment would be adjusted for debtors and work-in-progress less employee leave, and other miscellaneous adjustments.
However, the deal “requires no further earnout payments”.
Back in April, AF Legal Group completed its acquisition of contested wills and estates practice of Go To Court Lawyers (GTC), trading as Armstrong Legal, which has offices in five cities across the country.
The group acquired key components of this business, which included work-in-progress, client matters and direct staff, for $2,732,724.55 plus GST upfront.
Go To Court Lawyers was also entitled to receive two further earnout payments of up to $375,000 each, “subject to meeting revenue targets and payable after FY24 and FY25 accounts (respectively) have been settled”.
Naomi Neilson
Naomi Neilson is a senior journalist with a focus on court reporting for Lawyers Weekly.
You can email Naomi at:
