Nick has considerable experience in all areas of serious crime leading junior and junior. His specialises in fraud and white collar crime, bribery, drugs offences, and serious violence, in cases involving multiple defendants, large volumes of electronic evidence and long-running high profile investigations. Nick prosecutes and defends in cases involving the NCA (formerly SOCA), RSPCA, DEFRA and the SFO as well as the CPS at both branch and special casework levels.
He has been a Grade 4 prosecutor on the CPS advocate panel since its inception, and a member of the Serious and Organised Crime, Fraud and Proceeds of Crime specialist panels.
Fraud work includes substantial frauds committed against financial institutions in the UK and beyond, often with an “insider” element as well as revenue fraud, advance fee fraud and frauds committed by solicitors, bankers and accountants. He undertakes VHCC and private client work.
Nick has particular experience of immigration fraud, including acting as leading and led junior in a serious of trials arising out of Operation Berg Meeker a joint Home Office / HMRC operation involving over ten defendants in what is thought to be the largest fraud of its type involving the points based immigration system and PAYE fraud. He was instructed as both Leading Junior and 1st Junior in trials that in total ran for eight months. The operation involved vast amounts of evidence, requiring specialised knowledge of the immigration system, involved numerous government bodies and the use of iPads for presentation of evidence to the juries.
He has appeared in a number of significant cases involving the joint Metropolitan Police / UK Border Agency / Home Office Operation Swale. He led for the Crown in the cases of Koka and others (one of the largest immigration frauds to be prosecuted in the UK), led in the case of Sorthia and others (substantial fraud against the Home Secretary involving a manipulation of the HSMP scheme), led in the case of Shah and others (fraud involving educational qualifications and immigration applications). He led for the Crown in the case of Souleiman and others, a fraud involving the organization of sham marriages where the Defendants were the senior partner of a firm of solicitors and the entirety of the firm’s immigration department. He has recently led for the prosecution in the seven handed case of R v Sultan and others (Operation Tobin) a trial involving allegations against immigration advisors and accountants involved in a commercial scale fraud against the immigration system.
Nick has been involved in a number of prosecutions involving gambling fraud, and also acts in relation to licensing and regulatory matters. He has lectured in this field to the gambling industry and law enforcement. He has prosecuted numerous cases involving “cheat” teams, whether using complex technology or sleight of hand. Cases include those where “insider” elements appear, and those where computer systems have been “hacked”.
Nick has been instructed as leading junior and sole junior in cases involving bribery, including R v Swaibu an allegation involving football match fixing orchestrated by an international gambling syndicate. Nick has also provided advice in cases concerning bribery offences involving mutli-national companies.
He is regularly instructed in cases that involve money laundering, often with an international element and in particular those involving the National Crime Agency. He was instructed in Operation Heterodon, an international money laundering prosecution involving sums in the hundreds of millions.
Other fraud cases have included (as a junior) a vast fraud involving the sale of battery eggs labelled as free range eggs, the prosecution of a senior NHS consultant (as a junior) for a fraud involving artificial insemination. He prosecuted what is thought to be the largest example of internet romance fraud, arising out of Operation Podium (the London 2012 Olympics team).
Away from fraud Nick’s cases have included appearing as a junior in the first conviction for GBH by reckless infection with HIV (R v Dica), as well as cases arising out of Operation Manzana, involving child prostitution and the supply of drugs, and prosecutions resulting from Operation Aciento, which concerned the large-scale supply of class A drugs and firearms in West End nightclubs. He regularly deals with cases involving the importation of Class A drugs into the UK, including those where covert resources have been employed. Nick acted as leading junior in one of the first prosecutions for the importation and supply of so called “legal highs”.
Nick has been instructed in a number of cases involving the importation and supply of firearms, and is currently instructed to prosecute a series of trials involving a substantial OCG importing and distributing firearms within the UK.
Most of Nick’s cases involve the managing substantial volumes of evidence and disclosure often in electronic form beginning when he led the prosecution team in cases arising out of the May Day Riots in Central London in 2001, 2002 and 2003.
A particular area of expertise is handling cases involving sensitive public interest immunity and complex third party disclosure issues, such as informant evidence, covert surveillance and the interception of communications. He is adept at handling situations requiring both technical excellence and discretion, which has also given him a growing reputation for matters involving sensitive media or political issues, including those with “celebrities” or serving police officers as defendants. He has been instructed in cases under section 74 of SOCPA (re-sentencing of informants).