Called to the Bar 1988/Inner Temple
QC: 2006
Recorder : 2004 (Authorised to try Class 2 cases)

Education

• London University LLB (Hons) 1986

Areas of Practice

Criminal Law

Legal 500: "Adrian Waterman QC has 'an outstanding legal brain, and is a confident and commanding advocate.'"
A specialist in criminal and quasi-criminal litigation and advocacy, including disciplinary, regulatory and crime-related judicial review.
Frequently instructed pre-charge by either the prosecution or the defence in the most serious, complex and sensitive cases.
Lecturer and contributor to legal journals.
A member of the Editorial Advisory Board of Blackstone’s Criminal Practice (OUP)

Crime

• Homicide
• Gang-related killings and other cases of joint enterprise.
• Causation issues, involving medical/other expert evidence.
• Psychiatric issues.
• Gross negligence manslaughter in the context of deaths in custody/at the hands of state agents, or in other work-related contexts.
• Health and Safety at Work Act cases, especially those involving death.

• Fraud
• SFO cases.
• Proceeds of Crime.
• Fraud in the context of commercial disputes.       

• Drugs
• Large-scale conspiracies.
• Covert surveillance.
• Public Interest immunity.

• Sexual offences
• Rapes involving homicide.
• Cold-case rape.
• Historic sexual abuse.

• Pre-charge advice as to law, strategy and tactics.

• Advice to CPS in complex, high-profile and/or sensitive cases.
• Advice to defence, particularly in relation to SFO cases.

Recent Cases

R v Murphy and others. Prosecution of a multi-handed, high profile, racist murder of an Asian taxi driver.
R v Milakovic.  Defence of a profoundly deaf social worker for the “mercy killing” murder of his seriously ill baby.
R v Mook. Prosecution of a woman for poisoning her husband with Amitriptyline to cover up extensive fraud.
R v Clark. Prosecution of a known sex offender for rape and murder of a 14 year old neighbour.
R v Ballantyne and others.  Prosecution of a joint enterprise murder.
R v Walsh. Defending in a double murder of the accused’s partner and her daughter with bodily mutilation and complex psychiatric issues.
R v Hunt. A woman charged with murder and Section 5 of the Domestic Violence Crime and Victims Act 2004, relating to her baby. (One of the notorious Doncaster cases).
R v Mendez. A joint enterprise murder. Complex post-Rahman issues. Subsequently taken to the Court of Appeal and widely reported.
Operation Amarillo City. A case of attempted murder, involving allegations of police officers deliberately listening to and viewing privileged material in the possession of a solicitor defendant. 
R v Doherty. A woman charged with murdering her ex-police officer partner.
R v Simpson.  A cold-case review rape.
R (Hoare) v CPS. A judicial review of a decision by the CPS not to prosecute in a gross negligence manslaughter investigation.
R v El Harti. Complex legal issues relating to insanity.
Operation Pencader. A high profile multi-handed, joint enterprise murder of an Asian shopkeeper in Huddersfield.
Arran Coghlan. Involving complex issues of public interest immunity and disclosure.
R v Osman. A joint enterprise murder during a 6 hour period of detention in the victims’ home.
The death of Jackie Fisher. Involving health and safety investigation issues, an inquest and a Fatal Accidents Act civil claim.

Selection of Cases in Last Ten Years

R v Woodgate and others. Junior prosecuting counsel in a high-profile trial and re –trial of a number of Leeds United and England footballers.

R v Blackstone and Morrison. Conspiracy to commit armed robbery.  It was the first of a series of cases filmed from its inception, with the approval of the judiciary, by a BBC documentary team for a programme called “Anatomy of Crime”.

Donnygate cases. Prosecution and defence of a number of counsellors for fraud and election offences.

R v Dunlop. Prosecution of the accused for murder. The first ever re-trial of an acquitted person pursuant to the Criminal Justice Act 2003 provisions.

R v O’Dowd. Defending singer Boy George for false imprisonment of a male escort.

Many cases involving death at the hands of state agents. Before taking silk, the only person authorised to act on behalf of the DPP in such cases.

Appellate Cases

R v B [2003] 1 WLR 2809A. The prosecution of an allegation of rape in which the accused was convicted and appealed on the basis that the question “Do you know of any reason why the complainant should have made the allegation up” was impermissible.  The highest judicial authority in some Commonwealth jurisdictions forbids the question. Considerable Commonwealth case-law was cited. The Court of Appeal held that the question was a proper question.
Pattison v DPP [2006] 2 All ER 317. A judicial review, in which the Administrative Court redefined how a court can prove that a memorandum of conviction related to a particular accused, overruling R v Derwent Magistrates Court, Ex P Heaviside.
R v D [2007] 1 WLR 1657, Court of Appeal. The first re-trial of an acquitted person under the provisions of the Criminal Justice Act 2003.
R v Mitchell [2009] 1 Cr App R 31. Court of Appeal. The legal principles of joint enterprise murder and withdrawal.
R v Mendez & Thompson [2010] EWCA Crim 516. Court of Appeal. Introduced the “altogether more life-threatening” test in fundamental difference joint enterprise cases.
R v Barry Ward [2010] EWCA Crim 1932. Establishing that the Court of Appeal has no jurisdiction to hear an appeal against a refusal to vary a confiscation order pursuant to section 23 of the POCA.

Advice Work

Advice to a large commercial organisation on the POCA 2002 implications of compromising a commercial dispute in which fraud was alleged.

Legal advice to suspects during the SFO investigation into BAe and Balfour Beatty.

Advice to a well-known national commercial organisation as to the criminal fraud and proceeds of crime implications of a compromise in commercial litigations.

Articles and Lectures

A member of the Editorial Advisory Board for Blackstone’s Criminal Practice (OUP).
Abusing a Stay for a Grant. Covert Policing Review, 1 October 2005.
Bad Character: Feeling Our Way One Year On. [2006] Crim LR 614. An article with Tina Dempster, reviewing of the principles of admissibility of bad character evidence.
Be the Expert You Are. Advances in Psychiatric Treatment [2008], An article on the role of the expert witness.
Prosecution Appeals – Too Much of a  Good Thing? [2010] Crim LR 169. An article with Professor David Ormerod and Rudi Fortson, reviewing the provisions as to prosecutions appeals.
Lectured to senior journalists of a national broadsheet newspaper on the legal implications of undercover journalism [2009].
Lack of Responsibility. An article addressing the iniquity of the unique common law imposition of the legal burden of proof being placed upon the accused where the accused raises insanity.

Regulatory

• Acting in regulatory breaches/offences.
• Preventive advice to commercial organisations.
• Disciplinary proceedings, including sports such as rugby league, medical such as clinical psychology and police disciplinary proceedings.

Appellate

• Appeals on points of law.
• Judicial review, including decisions of inferior courts/tribunals, and decisions whether or not to prosecute by the CPS.