Shine Lawyers is an Australian

law firm A law firm is a business entity formed by one or more lawyers to engage in the practice of law. The primary service rendered by a law firm is to advise clients (individuals or corporations) about their legal rights and responsibilities, and to r ...

specialising in

personal injury Personal injury is a legal term for an injury to the body, mind or emotions, as opposed to an injury to property. In common law jurisdictions the term is most commonly used to refer to a type of tort lawsuit in which the person bringing the suit (t ...

compensation law, operating on a

no win no fee A contingent fee (also known as a contingency fee in the United States or a conditional fee in England and Wales) is any fee for services provided where the fee is payable only if there is a favourable result. Although such a fee may be used in many ...

basis. The firm has expanded into providing professional negligence, coal seam gas and aviation law legal services through a number of acquisitions. The firm is commonly associated with its spokesperson,

Erin Brockovich Erin Brockovich (née Pattee; born June 22, 1960) is an American legal clerk, consumer advocate, and environmental activist who, despite her lack of education in the law, was instrumental in building a case against Pacific Gas & Electric Compan ...

. Founded in

Toowoomba Toowoomba ( , nicknamed 'The Garden City' and 'T-Bar') is a city in the Toowoomba Region of the Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. It is west of Queensland's capital city Brisbane by road. The urban population of Toowoomba as of the 2021 C ...

in 1976, the firm is now headquartered in

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

, Australia, and currently has over 700 employees based across more than 40 offices across Australia and New Zealand.

History

Shine Lawyers was founded in 1976 (then known as KG Shine & Co) by

Kerry Shine Kerry Gerard Shine (born 5 October 1948) is an Australian Labor politician who was member of the Legislative Assembly of Queensland for Toowoomba North from 2001 to 2012 and served as Attorney-General of Queensland from 2006 to 2009. He was el ...

, an

Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also simply known as Labor, is the major centre-left political party in Australia, one of two major parties in Australian politics, along with the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia. The party forms the f ...

politician who was member of the Legislative Assembly from 2001 to 2012 and

Attorney-General of Queensland The Attorney-General of Queensland is a ministry of the Government of Queensland with responsibility for the state's legal and justice system. The current Attorney-General of Queensland is Shannon Fentiman. List of attorneys-general of Queens ...

from 2006 to 2009. It was rebranded as Shine Lawyers in 2006, under then managing partner Stephen Roche and current managing director Simon Morrison. It was one of the first law firms in the world to list on the

ASX Australian Securities Exchange Ltd or ASX, is an Australian public company that operates Australia's primary securities exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange (sometimes referred to outside of Australia as, or confused within Australia as ...

, in May 2013.

Acquisitions and mergers

Since 1976 Shine Lawyers has acquired and integrated more than 20 other legal firms. The firm has revealed plans to move into the UK legal market as part of an international acquisition strategy.

Notable current and past cases

Since 1976, Shine Lawyers have handled some difficult and widely publicised cases that have come before Australian Courts. *In 2001, Shine Lawyers represented a woman who had suffered abuse as a student at

Toowoomba Preparatory School , motto_translation = , location = Toowoomba, Queensland , country = Australia , coordinates = , pushpin_map = Australia Queensland , pushpin_image = , pushpin_maps ...

. The civil court decision awarded a record payout to the victim, and a subsequent inquiry led to the resignation of the governor-general

Peter Hollingworth Peter John Hollingworth (born 10 April 1935) is an Australian retired Anglican bishop. Engaged in social work for several decades, he served as the archbishop of the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane in Queensland for 11 years from 1989 and was the ...

. *Notable personal injury cases include the car accident compensation case for Ray and Marion Whitley, the medical negligence compensation case for Zac Ward and the workers compensation case for Steven Reynolds.

Notable class actions

*On 27 September 2011, Shine Lawyers commenced a class action against DePuy International Ltd and

Johnson & Johnson Johnson & Johnson (J&J) is an American multinational corporation founded in 1886 that develops medical devices, pharmaceuticals, and consumer packaged goods. Its common stock is a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the company i ...

on behalf of Australians affected by faulty DePuy ASR hip implants. It is alleged that the DePuy ASR hip implants were defective, not fit for their intended purpose and/or not of merchantable quality, in contravention of provisions of the Trade Practices Act 1974 (Cth). *On 16 October 2012, Shine Lawyers commenced a class action against

and Ethicon on behalf of Australians suffering complications as a result of faulty prolapse mesh implants. In March 2020, the Federal Court decided in favour of the three lead applicants, awarding them $2.6 million in damages. Johnson & Johnson’s appeal was dismissed in March 2021. On the 5th of November 2021, the High Court of Australia dismissed Johnson & Johnson’s application for special leave to appeal.

Notable employees

*Erin Brockovich consults with Shine Lawyers and assists the firm with environmental cases and

class action A class action, also known as a class-action lawsuit, class suit, or representative action, is a type of lawsuit where one of the parties is a group of people who are represented collectively by a member or members of that group. The class actio ...

s. She has also featured in a number of advertising campaigns employed by the firm.

Notes and references

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shine Lawyers Law firms of Australia Companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange Law firms established in 1976 1976 establishments in Australia