Law News from Times Online en-uk Tue, 30 Oct 2007 15:37:29 GMT Copyright 2007 Times Newspapers Ltd. custserv@timesonline.co.uk http://www.timesonline.co.uk Fri, 10 Oct 2008 02:10:39 BST Newspapers 144 21 http://www.timesonline.co.uk http://images.thetimes.co.uk/TGD/picture/0,,116979,00.gif Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:00:56 BST Is the British “loser pays” rule sweeping America? The idea is popular in polls, and already it is in effect in Alaska and some parts of Florida. Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:00:53 BST Geoffrey Robertson, QC, head of Doughty Street Chambers, acted for the author Sir Salman Rushdie, who received unreserved apologies from the publisher and ghost writer for allegations made in a book by Ron Evans who was his police protection officer. Four thousand copies of the book have been pulped and a declaration of falsity was accepted, but no damages were sought. Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:00:24 BST Is a judge's private life relevant to his court rulings? In a dissenting judgment in 2001, Judge Alex Kozinski, of the United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, stated that the private life of a judge was not relevant to the validity of a decision he had made in court. His colleagues disagreed, rejecting Judge Kozinski’s warning: “Welcome to the fishbowl.” Now the private life of Judge Kozinski himself is under investigation. Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:00:08 BST No such thing? Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:00:05 BST Peter Lodder, QC, paints a grim picture of the justice system as it faces its own credit crunch. Well-publicised criminal trials are in jeopardy because of a dispute over barristers’ fees, courts are hit by a cash crisis and the Bar risks becoming the enclave of the wealthy. The courts, says the new chairman of the 4,000-strong Criminal Bar Association, were already pared to the bone — even before the £90 million black hole of debt revealed last week. Sat, 11 Oct 2008 11:36:20 BST Relatives of Mark Saunders, the barrister shot dead by police, welcomed a ruling by a High Court judge yesterday that said allowing officers to confer with each other during inquiries into police conduct raises a risk of collusion. However, although Mr Justice Underhill criticised the established practice, he dismissed the Saunders family’s claim that an investigation into how police killed the barrister was unlawful. In a landmark legal decision, the judge said that the “opportunity for collusion was institutionalised” in the system for investigating fatal shootings. Mr Saunders, 32, a divorce lawyer, died in May when seven officers fired 11 rounds at him, ending a stand-off at his flat in Chelsea, West London. Eleven firearms officers conferred with each other before producing their accounts of the incident, a practice that Mr Saunders’s family argued was unlawful under the European Convention on Human Rights. Police have been able to discuss cases with each other for more than 50 years and the practice is prescribed in the police firearms manual. But it has been widely criticised since the shootings in London of Harry Stanley in 1999 and Jean Charles de Menezes in 2005. Mr Justice Underhill said there was a “real risk” that officers’ recollections would be “contaminated” after talking to their colleagues. The courts should be very wary of “a general practice under which officers who are key witnesses in an investigation are expressly permitted to collaborate in the production of their statements. The opportunity for collusion is, so to speak, institutionalised.” However, the judge held that the Independent Police Complaints Commission’s inquiry into Mr Saunders’s death was not unlawful, as forcing officers not to confer would create “a very serious risk of individual officers refusing to provide a statement”. He added: “A departure from the long-established practice of collaboration would encourage a perception that they were, whatever assurances were given, suspects and not witnesses.” Charlotte Saunders, 26, Mr Saunders’s sister, is appealing against the decision and said that she would lobby the Home Secretary for a change in the law. “I brought these proceedings because I was concerned that the police officers who shot Mark were allowed to confer before giving their statements to the IPCC,” she said. “It is encouraging that the judge agrees that this practice might be unlawful and that he decided that the opportunity for collusion is ‘institutionalised’.” Police chiefs are considering changing the police manual to ban collaboration. Nick Hardwick, the chairman of the police complaints commission, welcomed the judgment. “It supports the calls the IPCC has been making for changes to the way officers confer to write their notes after a fatal shooting, which does not provide best evidence or secure public confidence,” he said. The Police Federation said: “Conferring before making notes is a long-accepted practice which is intended to achieve best evidence.” Thu, 09 Oct 2008 12:03:16 BST An attempt by the liquidators of Courts, the failed furniture retailer, to stop payments to the majority of unsecured creditors and former staff failed today. Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:55:09 BST * Millions of pounds held by law firms could be at risk if any more banks go under. Money held in firms’ client accounts — house deposits, probate funds, compensation — is only as safe as the bank it is kept in. Mark Stobbs, director of legal policy at the Law Society, has told the Law Society Gazette: “We concluded that if a bank account is held by a solicitor on behalf of a client and the bank goes bust, it is going to be the client’s problem, rather than the solicitors.” Estimates of sums involved vary from £1 billion to £3 billion. So where is all this clients’ money? One solicitor tells Law Diary: “RBS went out a few years ago to target professional accounts. So they must have a good slice of the market.” Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:54:17 BST There is more to life than law — and law firms that want to show that they have wider interests are increasingly drawn into the world of art. Even so it is a powerful statement by Walker Morris, the Leeds-based firm, to be principal sponsor of The Revolution Continues: New Art from China that opens at the Saatchi Gallery this week. Ian Gilbert, the partner responsible for the sponsorship deal, says: “I think there’s going to be a ‘wow’ factor. People will be asking, ‘How did a Leeds firm pull that off?’” Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:53:17 BST Graham Nicholson, a corporate partner at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, has been appointed chief legal adviser to the Bank of England. In that role he will also advise the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King. His appointment will begin on January 1 next year. Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:52:22 BST Snapping China as it changes for our Law competition Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:48:01 BST It has been a good week for the cause of diversity among Britain’s judges. Just months ago one of only three of 36 Court of Appeal judges lamented the lack of women in senior judicial posts. In the past three years, Lady Justice Arden said, only one woman had been chosen for the High Court bench compared with 29 men. Thu, 09 Oct 2008 00:00:00 BST The BBC yesterday abandoned its claim that a Panoroma investigation into the country’s top fertility doctor constituted “responsible journalism”. Wed, 08 Oct 2008 16:01:13 BST Technology companies will find it easier to safeguard their innovations in the UK after a court ruled that software should receive wider patent protection. Wed, 08 Oct 2008 11:23:01 BST Class actions are back on the agenda after the Civil Justice Council (CJC), the body responsible for advising the Lord Chancellor on the modernisation of the law, recently published proposals to make it easier for consumers and small businesses to seek redress through the courts. Wed, 08 Oct 2008 11:10:29 BST The Treasury today guaranteed that no British customers of Icesave would lose their savings after the Icelandic online bank collapsed yesterday. Wed, 08 Oct 2008 11:08:34 BST The former general counsel of UBS's investment banking unit will pay $6.5 million to settle an allegation that he dumped his investments in auction-rate securities after getting an internal company email warning that the market was in trouble.$ Wed, 08 Oct 2008 10:01:52 BST Gordon Brown today vowed to protect British savers who face losing money in the Icesave online bank which collapsed yesterday, and threatened legal action against the Icelandic authorities to force it to honour its obligations. Wed, 08 Oct 2008 00:00:00 BST Old Bailey Tue, 07 Oct 2008 13:56:24 BST The credit crunch may dominate world headlines but closer to home lawyers are feeling the impact of their own pay squeeze.