Richard Bendall was called to the Bar in 1979 and for the majority of his career has undertaken a very varied spread of common law and criminal work in common law chambers. More recently, his practice has become almost exclusively criminal, and he joined Furnival Chambers in 2010.
He both prosecutes and defends equally and has appeared, usually as lead counsel, in a long series of serious cases involving homicide, violence, sexual allegations, drug supply, money laundering and fraud. He is very experienced in cases involving every conceivable aspect of alleged dishonest behaviour including embezzlement, bribery and corruption.
He has undertaken Courts Martial cases involving fatalities in Germany, Kosovo and Belize.
He has a very good reputation for arguing technical points of law in both the High Court and the Court of Appeal and has appeared in numerous cases in the law reports.
His very broad experience of quasi-criminal matters has included police disciplinary work and inquests. Because he has spent over 30 years arguing all manner of cases involving virtually every aspect of commercial and property law, he is, unlike many criminal counsel, un-phased by criminal prosecutions involving difficult areas such as equitable interests in jointly owned property, company law, directors’ responsibilities, bankruptcy, insolvency and trusts.