3 Verulam Buildings

Head of Chambers: Ewan McQuater QC and Adrian Beltrami QC
Senior Practice Managers: Stephen Penson and Stuart Pullum
Number of tenants: 81
Languages: Arabic, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Punjabi, Russia, Swedish, Sinhala, Spanish, Urdu

Members:
Ewan McQuater QC (1985) (QC-2003)
Adrian Beltrami QC (1989) (QC-2008)
Ali Malek QC (1980) (QC-1996)
John Jarvis QC (1970) (QC-1989)
Christopher Symons QC (1972) (QC-1989)
Richard Salter QC (1975) (QC-1995)
Michael Blair QC (1965) (QC-1996) (Hon Causa)
Gregory Mitchell QC (1979) (QC-1997)
Hodge Malek QC (1983) (QC-1999)
Andrew Sutcliffe QC (1983) (QC-2001)
Andrew Onslow QC (1982) (QC-2002)
Rory Phillips QC (1984) (QC- 2002)
Tom Weitzman QC (1984) (QC-2003)
Andrew Fletcher QC (1980) (QC- 2006)
Johnathan Nash QC (1986) (QC-2006)
John Odgers QC (1990) (QC-2012)
Hefin Rees QC (1992) (QC-2013)
David Quest QC (1993) (QC-2013)
Jonathan Davies-Jones QC (1994) (QC-2013)
Matthew Hardwick QC (1994) (QC-2014)
Catherine Gibaud QC (1996) (QC-2014)
Ewan McKendrick QC (1998) (QC-2015)
Richard Edwards QC (1993) (QC-2016)
 David Head QC (1995) (QC-2016)
Richard Brent QC (1995) (QC-2017)
Ian Wilson QC (1995) (QC-2018)
Peter Cranfield (1982)
Michael Lazarus (1987)
Angharad Start (1988)
Jonathan Mark Phillips (1991)
James Evans (1991)
Matthew Parker (1997)
Peter Ratcliffe (1998)
Peter de Verneuil Smith (1998)
Nicholas Craig (1998)
Sophie Mallinckrodt (1999)
Tariq Baloch (2001)
Jane Davies Evans (2001)
William Edwards (2002)
Christopher Harris (2002)
Rajesh Pillai (2002)
Saima Hanif (2002)
George McPherson (2003)
David Simpson (2003)
Lisa Lacob (2004)
Charlotte Eborall (2004)
Adam Kramer (2004)
Farhaz Khan (2005)
Richard Hanke (2006)
Robert Purves (2007)
Alexia Knight (2007)
Christopher Bond (2008)
Philip Hinks (2008)
Anne Jeavons (2008)
Kate Holderness (2008)
Tom De Vecchi (2009)
Theodor van Sante (2009)
Christopher Burdin (2010)
Teniola Onabanjo (2010)
Paul C K Wee (2010)
Miriam Schmelzer (2010)
Ian Higgins (2011)
Yash Bheeroo (2011)
James Potts (2011)
Cleon Catsambis (2011)
Scott Ralston (2012)
Antony Pavlovich (2012)
Nathaniel Bird (2012)
Sarah Tulip (2012)
Pia Dutton (2013)
Emmanuel Sheppard (2013)
Hannah Glover (2013)
Georges Chalfoun (2014)
Mark Wassouf (2014)
Hannah Knight (2014)
Cameron Miles (2015)
Rebecca Zaman (2015)
Dominic Kennelly (2016)
William Day (2016)
Ryan Ferro (2017)
Sophia Dzwig (2017)

The Chambers:
3 Verulam Buildings is one of the foremost sets of barristers’ chambers specialising in commercial law, with 81 members based in London (ranked by Chambers UK in 28 practice areas) and with many highly prominent legal practitioners across the World. Members advise and represent clients in court, arbitration and other tribunals in England, other jurisdictions worldwide and internationally. 3VB’s approachable and responsive members and practice managers understand the pressures on solicitors and clients and the importance of providing a superb quality of service, in which legal excellence is combined with a commercial attitude.

Main Areas of Practice:
Civil Fraud Recent high profile cases include the unprecedented overturning of a Court of Appeal decision in the Supreme Court arising out of alleged frauds following the collapse of an Ecuadorian bank, two on-going Commercial Court actions by Kazakh claimants asserting complex financial frauds with values in excess of US$150m, and substantial multi-party fraud claims brought by lenders against real estate professionals. The value of instructing a set with such a core strength in civil fraud is reflected in members’ involvement in other cases such as the £2.5bn claim against Grant Thornton by Vincent Tchenguiz and the high-profile £350m claim Hirco Plc & ors v Niranjan Hiranandani & ors.

Commercial Dispute Resolution:
Members of Chambers have appeared in leading commercial cases such as; VTB Capital v. Nutritek and Plevin v Paragon Finance in the Supreme Court; the $8bn DB v SHI prime broking battle which continues in the Court of Appeal; the RBS Rights Issue litigation, involving seven members of Chambers; Terra Firma v Citigroup; the continuing Italian derivatives cases in the Court of Appeal, Dexia v Piedmont; and the recent and continuing ratings agencies litigation. 3VB’s commercial practice extends well beyond these core areas including members’ participation in the £2.5bn Vincent Tchenguiz v Grant Thornton conspiracy claim relating to the SFO investigation into the Tchenguiz brothers.

Financial Services:
The Chambers’ work includes transactional advice; advice on the regulatory treatment of new financial products; advice and representation on contested applications for regulatory approval of transactions and persons; advice on prudential regulation; regulatory enforcement (for and against the regulator); legislative drafting; and expert evidence. Barristers have particular expertise relating to transfers of insurance and banking business, both for the regulator and for the applicant. Recent cases include OJSC Rosneft v (1) The Majesty’s Treasury; (2) The Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, and Skills; (3) The Financial Conduct Authority, Figurasin v Central Capital [2014] EWCA Civ.

Insolvency & Restructuring:
Members are regularly instructed for and against IPs in high value litigation, such as office-holder remuneration and claims on bonds. Members are instructed on substantial cases with an international bias, involving the attempted recovery or defence of claims worth many hundreds of millions.
Cases include: the £100m+ claim Liquidators of Rangers Football Club v Collyer Bristow LLP, the £multi-million David John Standish and Richard Heis (as joint liquidators of Quarry Hill Investments Limited) v Robert Basil Hersov and the €Multi-million litigation arising from the collapse of Icelandic bank Kaupthing

Insurance & Reinsurance:
Barristers have been instructed in most of the major insurance and broking disputes of recent years, including film finance, the PA Spiral (losses relating to workers’ compensation and personal accident claims) and 9/11, and ‘credit crunch’ related insurance disputes, including acting for the FI/PI and D&O insurers of various banks and other large financial institutions. One of 3VB’s high profile cases is Federal Mogul Asbestos Personal Injury Trust v Federal Mogul Limited & Others — an asbestos liability case currently valued at £500m. A number of 3VB’s barristers also have experience of PPI disputes, including appearing in a number of important recent reported cases.

Professional Negligence:
Several barristers have acted in the high-profile claim brought by Richard Desmond against Credit Suisse International over the alleged mis-selling of investments in structured derivatives. Members of 3VB are also regularly instructed to represent lenders, typically in claims against solicitors and surveyors, but also against a property developer in the unusual case of Platform Funding Ltd v Persimmon Homes (South East) Ltd, which raised a novel issue as to whether a developer owed a duty of care to a mortgagee. A growing area of importance is art and cultural property, and members of 3VB recently successfully defended Sotheby’s against a claim that it had mistakenly identified as a copy an original work by Caravaggio.