Leonora Sagan

Practice Areas

Commercial litigation; fraud-civil; business and regulatory crime; financial services regulation; arbitration.

Leonora is a specialist in complex fraud across the civil and criminal legal spectrums, with a wealth of expertise in cases involving allegations of corruption, bribery, and asset misappropriation. She has extensive experience in business, financial, and regulatory crime matters, and regularly appears in and advises on both civil and criminal proceedings brought by the SFO and the FCA.

Leonora frequently acts for high-net-worth individuals, with her client list including members of the royalty, former premiers, top executives, and most recently the key individual in the 1MDB fraud.

Recent case highlights include the FCA’s prosecution of three former executives of Redcentric Plc, which represented the first ever prosecution for the offence of making misleading offences to the market under s.89 Financial Services Act 2012. Leonora acted for the company’s former CEO who was unanimously acquitted on all counts. She represents the Man Group in Public Institution for Social Security of Kuwait v Man Group concerning allegations of large-scale bribery She is currently advising on several sanctions cases, two of which are due to be heard in the Commercial Court in 2022-2023.

A significant part of Leonora’s practice is her representation of professionals accused of serious misconduct. In Tonstate v Wojakovski [2021] EWHC 1122 (Ch) she acted for the successful respondent solicitors against allegations of contempt of court and breaching a Worldwide Freezing Order in failing to disclose the source of third-party funds received on behalf of a client who was subject to the WFO. Leonora succeeded in recovering 100% costs on the indemnity basis on behalf of her client. Other examples include successfully representing a Big Four accounting firm in internal disciplinary hearings concerning bribery allegations, and resisting a Norwich Pharmacal application on behalf of a foreign legal representative. Relatedly, Leonora is often called upon to advise on matters concerning document use and misuse, disclosure, and privilege.

She is appointed to the the SFO’s panel of external counsel and is a contributor to Lissack and Horlick on Bribery (3rd Edition.), co-authoring the chapter on the “adequate procedures” defence to the offence of failing to prevent bribery under s. of the Bribery Act 2010.

Career

2012 Call, Inner Temple

2016-2019: Kobre & Kim LLP (New York and London)

Professional Memberships

COMBAR, Young Fraud Lawyers’ Association.

Personal

Harvard Law School, LLM; Oxford University, BA (Philosophy and Modern and Medieval Languages) (double first class honours); BPP College, BPTC; BPP College, GDL.

Languages Spoken

Greek (fluent), Spanish (conversational).