Andrew is a chancery and commercial specialist, whose highly-regarded practice encompasses trusts, fraud and asset tracing, probate and estate administration, and commercial litigation and arbitration.
Chambers & Partners recommends Andrew as top-ranked (band 1) practitioner in his fields of expertise, with recent editions praising him as “one of the best of his generation“: a “great strategic thinker“, “incredibly tenacious and creative”, an “accomplished advocate”, and “a master of highly technical areas of law.”
Andrew is lauded both as “a clear draftsman who produces well-reasoned opinions” and as a highly effective courtroom advocate, with clients praising him as a “wonderful junior who is very good on his feet.” His focus on the client’s commercial outcomes is also the subject of consistent praise in the directories: he is “very responsive”; “a hit with clients”; “really user-friendly”; “very approachable, accessible and practical“… a “very commercial” barrister who “puts his legal knowledge into practice in a fantastic way.” Andrew is similarly recommended in the latest editions of Chambers Global, Chambers High Net Worth, Legal 500, Citywealth, and Who’s Who Legal.
In the United Kingdom, Andrew enjoys a busy and broad-based commercial and chancery practice. He is well known for his trusts, probate and estates work, with Chambers and Partners praising him as “a sought-after junior for his broader traditional chancery expertise“. Andrew is also a sought-after practitioner in relation to complex fraud, asset-tracing and commercial and company/shareholder disputes, particularly where they engage principles of equity.
Andrew also has an extensive international practice. He has deep international trusts expertise, including acting for the settlors, trustees, beneficiaries and protectors of private trusts, as well as for the institutional custodians, directors and professional advisers of trusts, funds and companies. Client feedback in Chambers and Partners is that he is an “outstanding trusts specialist“, with one client saying that “there is nothing in the trusts world that he is not familiar with.” Andrew also enjoys a highly-regarded practice in the field of international commercial litigation and arbitration, including international fraud and asset-tracing and connected matters engaging principles of international jurisdiction and enforcement. His briefs in this area demonstrate that he is well equipped to navigate clients through the legal and factual complexities inherent in high value international litigation and arbitration.
Andrew is the author of Trust Protectors (2011), a specialist practitioners’ text on the subject of protectors, and writes and publishes regularly in his fields of expertise.
Andrew’s reported cases include the following:
- Volpi v Volpi [2021] EWHC 2143 (Ch); [2022] EWCA Civ 464: Andrew acted for the successful Claimant at both trial and in the Court of Appeal, recovering a CHF 6 million loan together with interest.
- Richards v Kulczyk [2022] EWHC 863 (Ch) (ongoing): Andrew acts for one of the Defendants to ongoing proceedings claiming c.£7 million under an alleged oral contract and/or in restitution.
- Re Piedmont & Riviera Trusts [2015] JRC 196; [2016] JRC 016; [2018] JRC 210; [2021] JRC 248: Andrew acted for the applicant beneficiary in this groundbreaking multi-year trust litigation in Jersey, involving (i) setting aside appointments of fiduciaries for irrationality; (ii) setting aside deeds of revocation for undue influence; (iii) the proper role of a protector in consenting to/vetoing a trustee’s decision; and (iv) fiduciary costs in trust proceedings.
- AB v Line Trust Corporation Ltd [2022] GSC 002: Andrew appeared for the trustees of a nine-figure trust structure. The litigation, which was compromised with the Court’s approval, gave rise to important judgments concerning the privacy of trust proceedings.
- Dawson-Damer v Grampian Trust Company Ltd (ongoing); Dawson-Damer v Lyndhurst Ltd [2019] SC (Bda) 8 Civ: With Richard Wilson QC, Andrew is acting for the Plaintiff/Claimant in an action in the Bahamas to set aside distributions from a nine-figure trust structure. The action has given rise to proceedings in Bermuda and in England (Dawson-Damer v Taylor Wessing LLP [2017] 1 WLR 3255), which have addressed novel issues including the use of data subject access requests in a trust context and the ability of a trustee to assert privilege against its own beneficiaries.
- Re X Trusts [2018] SC (Bda) 56 Civ: With David Brownbill QC and Timothy Sherwin, Andrew acted for a group of beneficiaries in respect of a novel application in Bermuda to remove the directors of Private Trust Companies from office. The matter involved a breakdown in relations concerning a trust structure worth in the region of £5 billion and gave rise to an important judgment concerning the breadth of the court’s supervisory jurisdiction.
- Akhmedova v Akhmedov [2018] DIFC CFI 011; [2018] DIFC CA 003; [2018] EWFC 23 (Fam); [2018] 3 FCR 135: With Michael Black QC and Dakis Hagen QC, Andrew acted in respect of a major asset tracing exercise arising out of the largest divorce award ever granted by the English High Court. The claim involves in particular steps to enforce that award against MV ‘Luna’, a superyacht valued at in excess of $450 million.
- Ras Al Khaimah Investment Authority v Bestfort Development LLP [2015] EWHC 3197 (Ch); [2016] 2 CLC 714 (CA); [2018] 3 WLR 1099 (CA): With Stephen Moverley Smith QC, Richard Millett QC and Alexander Pelling, Andrew acted for one of the United Arab Emirates in its claims arising out of an alleged multi-million dollar fraud in the Republic of Georgia. The matter gave rise to important judgments in the Court of Appeal concerning the availability of security for costs and the proper test for the making of freezing injunctions.