Practice Areas
Ian Ryan is head of Howard Kennedy's well-regarded Business Crime team. He is a white-collar crime solicitor with over 30 years' experience of dealing with complex and high-profile matters, both domestically and internationally. He advises both individual and corporate clients in serious fraud and regulatory investigations as well as criminal matters.
Ian advises in SFO, FCA, CMA, NCA, CPS, police and SRA investigations. His clients are typically: corporates; boards of directors, CEOs, senior executives, non-executive directors, General Counsel, compliance and risk officers, financial directors and money-laundering reporting officers.
He is presently acting for Ramon Labiaga in the Glencore bribery trial due to start at Southwark CC in June 2027; suspects in the SFO Ultra and Greensill investigations; a suspect in the CPS/HMRC investigation into the activities of GVC/Entain in the Turkish gambling market; and an international defence and security company in inquest and related proceedings.
He recently successfully acted for Tyron Frampton aka SlowThai in a sexual offences trial; tennis world number 3 Alexander Zverev in an ATP investigation into an alleged assault; a premier league footballer in an assault matter; and other individuals that cannot be identified due to the sensitive nature of the cases. He is also presently representing another well known individual in relation to a sexual offences matter.
Notably Ian acted for Mark Hanna in the phone hacking trial in 2014 (acquitted); Achim Kraemer in the first SFO Euribor trial in 2018 (acquitted); Andreas Hauschild in the third SFO Euribor trial in 2019 (acquitted); Martin Backburn in the Gary Senior SDT hearing in 2020 (acquitted); Supreme in a successful private prosecution in 2021; a Middle Eastern bank successfully defending a private prosecution in 2021 (case dismissed and defence awarded costs of £250,000); and for British Gymnastics in the Whyte Review (reported July 2022). He has also been involved in many other high profile SFO investigations including Tesco, Harlequin and Tchenguiz.
In addition to the above, Ian advises corporate clients, including solicitor's firms, on cyber crime issues, production orders, dawn raids, confiscation proceedings, warrants and the extent of legal professional privilege. He has represented both multi-nationals and individuals in numerous internal investigations.
He is an expert in solicitors' disciplinary work and SRA investigations, having previously prosecuted for the SRA for over 15 years. He acts for individual solicitors, including many at magic circle firms, and solicitor's firms at all stages of the proceedings, particularly on issues of self-reporting.
Ian also continues to represent high-net-worth individuals (celebrities, politicians, artists, journalists and sports people) in general criminal matters. As a result of his recent work with a national governing body of sport, he has specialist safeguarding experience.
