James Ramsden QC and Sarah Bousfield win judicial challenge arising out of intervention into Neumans LLP

In Neumans LLP v The Law Society [2017] EWHC 2004 (Ch) London and Manchester practice Neumans LLP challenged the original decision to intervene into the firm as being "fundamentally flawed" and contended that the intervention ought to be withdrawn in any event having regard to all material available to the court at the hearing.

James Ramsden QC and Sarah Bousfield acted for the defendant, the Law Society (the Solicitors Regulation Authority) and successfully resisted all challenges to the decision to intervene into Neumans. Fenella Morris QC acted for Neumans LLP.

As a result, the SRA's intervention into Neumans LLP, effective from July 2017, has been continued. The boutique law firm specialised in criminal law with 35 lawyers and offices in central London and Manchester.

The grounds for intervention were that (1) there was reason to suspect dishonesty on the part of a founding partner Mr Sheikh and the firm (on whose behalf Sheikh acted) in connection with the firm's business, and (2) the firm had failed to comply with rules applicable to it under section 9 of the Administration of Justice Act 1985.

The decision in Neumans was handed down almost simultaneously with another (unrelated) case, concerning the SRA's decision to intervene into the practices of Ms Inyang and Mr Coker for suspected dishonesty and rule breaches, which James Ramden QC also successfully defended for the Law Society as sole counsel. See: Inyang and Coker v The Law Society [2017] EWHC 1932 (Ch).