Profile
Shortlisted by the Legal 500 for Crime Junior of the Year 2025.
“One of the best juniors at the criminal bar.”
“He has a really charming way with clients; he puts people at ease.”
“Denis is a brilliant jury advocate: he is highly articulate, amusing and quick on his feet. His style of advocacy calms and concentrates a jury taking them by the hand and leading them over what can be exceptionally difficult areas of law.
“Denis is one of the gentlemen of the criminal Bar. He is intellectual, persuasive, and has a glorious manner with juries.”
Denis has been defending and prosecuting in serious and complex criminal cases for almost 30 years. He is regularly instructed as leading junior counsel in cases against Kings Counsel. He has particular expertise in homicide and has appeared in a number of high-profile murder cases. He is a Category 4 Prosecution Advocate (confiscation, serious and organised crime, and fraud panels), and has been since the inception of the panel scheme. He is on the A list of the Panel for The List of Specialist Regulatory Advocates.
He has broad experience in organised crime, and corruption offences. He has appeared in many cases involving complex medical evidence, particularly those involving the mentally ill, and also cases involving the abuse and death of children. He is regularly instructed in complex tax fraud. He has prosecuted and defended high-profile cases involving serving police officers.
He is also a leading junior in Consumer law.
Expertise
Denis is instructed in all types of serious criminal litigation. Recent experience has included acting as junior counsel in the following high-profile murders.
R v Prosper: in which the defendant pleaded guilty to the murder of 3 members of his family and had planned the largest UK mass murder (at a primary school).
R v Blake: in which the defendant tortured a cat to death before selecting a random member of the public to murder by drowning him.
R v Kigundu: in which the defendant received a whole life order for the murder of two people when a block of flats was set on fire.
R v L T and J: the 14-year-old defendants were found guilty of the murder of a 13-year boy.
R v O’Brien: the defendant was the UK’s most wanted fugitive.
He has appeared in two corruption cases involving professional football. R v Boateng was the first corruption case for match fixing in football, and R v Price involved an investigation by the Daily Telegraph. He has represented police officers charged with alleged offences relating from the performance of their duties.
Denis has extensive experience of professional disciplinary tribunals and regulatory cases. He has acted for many police officers before regulatory tribunals. He has particular expertise with professionals with mental health difficulties. He has also acted for medical professionals (doctors and pharmacists) before their regulatory bodies.
He has extensive experience in Consumer law, is a Leading Junior in this area in the Chambers and Partners rankings and has been for over decade. Denis was the Editor of the Blackstone’s Guide to the Consumer Rights Act 2015. It deals with substantial changes to the law between consumer and businesses for goods, digital content, services, and unfair contract terms.
In addition, his areas of specialisation include Trademark, Copyright, Product Safety, Planning and Environmental offences, for which he is instructed by both defendants, companies including supermarkets, and local authorities. He has substantial experience in the maze of European Directives and Regulations creating criminal offences.
Denis has extensive experience in allegations of fraud, both prosecuting and defending. He is currently instructed as junior counsel in the first prosecution arising from the Covid furlough scheme, a £120 million pound VAT fraud with 20 defendants, an allegation of corruption involving a local authority, and investigations into misconduct in a public office.
Denis has broad experience in Inquests including Article 2 Jury Inquests. He has acted for both professionals (police officers and medical professionals) and families as Interested Parties.
His expertise includes Inquests dealing with particularly sensitive matters: coercive and controlling behaviour, police misconduct, gross negligence manslaughter, and suicide. He has a lot of experience in cases with particularly complex medical evidence.
Denis frequently appears in the appellate courts, principally for the Crown ( instructed regularly by the Appeals Unit of the Crown Prosecution Service). He has advised and appeared in cases involving the appropriate treatment of those found to be both dangerous and mentally ill, whether on sentence or conviction, old convictions for sentences for public protection, and sensitive cases involving public interest immunity. He has been in some of the leading cases involving procedural errors (see Public and Administrative Law section) but also appeared in the only appellate criminal case involving the game of poker (R v Kelly).
Denis has particularly expertise in the judicial review of decisions to prosecute. He appeared in two of the leading cases on this topic (R (Robson) v Crown Prosecution Service [2016] EWHC 2191; R v (on the application of Rooks) v CPS [2024] EWHC 1941) and regularly advises in respect of cases involving prosecutorial discretion in politically sensitive cases.
He is also sought after to advise in respect of the overlap between the public law and appellate remedies for alleged procedural breaches, whether by way of case stated, judicial review, or appeal against conviction. See by way of example R v Butt [2024] 1 WLR 5361.
He has also recently advised in respect of the Human Rights implications of terribly slow-moving investigations.
- Criminal Bar Association
- Association of Regulatory and Disciplinary Lawyers
- Wimbledon College
- Birmingham University LLB
- Warwick University LLM
Recognition
