Intervention: Firm closed in March
The COFA of an eight-office Home Counties law firm shut down by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) earlier this year has been barred from the profession.
Jeffrey Hazelgrove, who was head of finance and operations and the compliance officer for finance and administration at Hunter’s Solicitors, acted dishonestly in transferring client money, it said.
As he is not a solicitor, the SRA has issued Mr Hazelgrove, whose last known address was in Buckinghamshire, with a control order under section 43 of the Solicitors Act 1974, which means he cannot work at a regulated law firm in future without its permission.
It said he worked at Hunter’s from March 2021 until 12 February 2026. “Between May 2025 and 12 February 2026, Mr Hazelgrove authorised and made transfers from the firm’s client account to its office account, to ensure its liabilities could be met and in circumstances where those transfers could not be justified.
“Mr Hazelgrove’s actions were found to be dishonest.”
Headquartered in High Wycombe, Hunter’s had about 44 staff offering litigation, insolvency, family, residential and commercial conveyancing, and private client services.
It is not to be confused with well-known Lincoln’s Inn law firm Hunters.
When it intervened in the firm in March, the SRA said it acted because there was “reason to suspect dishonesty” on the part of Mr Hazelgrove.
Further, the SRA intervened in the individual practices of Angelo Luiz-Barrea, Christopher Stocker and Howard Rind, as managers of the firm for failing to comply with SRA rules.
The firm operated as Hunter’s in High Wycombe and Westcliff-On-Sea, near Southend, and also as Franklins Solicitors (Abingdon, Oxfordshire), Batemans (Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire), Kealy Farmar (Henley-on-Thames), Grower Freeman (central London), Colemans (Maidenhead, Berkshire) and Graham White & Co (Bushey, Hertfordshire).
Mr Hazelgrove was ordered to pay “a proportion” of the SRA’s costs of £600.
