Expertise

His prior role as the Group Senior Sanctions Officer for a private bank, combined with extensive financial crime and investigations experience in private practice, results in David being expertly placed to advise on the legal, regulatory, commercial and practical aspects of sanctions, fraud, corruption, money laundering, market manipulation, market abuse and insider trading. David has a reputation for providing commercial, pragmatic advice and is particularly adept in conducting internal investigations and representing corporates and individuals in global regulatory investigations.  He also has an excellent grasp of data privacy considerations and e-discovery solutions.

Before honing his extensive experience in international sanctions and internal and regulatory investigations in a banking environment, David worked for several years in the Corporate Crime and Investigations team at an international law firm. His expertise includes conducting internal bribery and corruption investigations for domestic and multinational companies, representing traders investigated for market manipulation, and advising and dealing with sanctions and money laundering risks and issues. He successfully advises and defends in matters concerning the FCA, SFO, HMRC, NCA, CPS, OFSI and the DOJ, SEC and OFAC in the USA.

David brings expertise in international sanctions at a level usually found only within financial institutions, advising individuals, banks and corporates on their obligations and exposure when conducting business globally.

Experience

David successfully represented senior individuals in relation to the SFOs investigations into both Barclays’ 2008 Qatari capital raising and the misreporting of profits by Tesco Stores Ltd. He also represented an individual in the FCA, DOJ, SEC and FBI’s investigation into manipulation of global foreign exchange markets, and acted in a Metropolitan Police bribery investigation into an energy and assets support company. David successfully defended Martin King, director of the Tech Unicorn “Ve”, in an HMRC prosecution relating to a corporate tax scheme.

David has led on numerous internal investigations for multinational companies, including for:

• a global manufacturer of medical devices arising out of a sting operation in Malaysia
• a leading global provider of risk management, insurance brokerage and reinsurance brokerage in respect of allegations of anti-competitive behaviour and bribery, and
• a global manufacturer of paints, following a whistleblowing report of fraud and bribery.
  David was also heavily involved in Barclays’ expansive review of the sale of interest rate hedging products to SMEs.

David has advised a multitude of clients on the commercial and legal impact of international sanctions. Recently David has been instructed by a number of Russian companies to opine on their exposure to UK sanctions, a European electrical component manufacture in relation to suspicious payments linked to Huawei and Iran and a green energy company following director misconduct.

David is currently instructed by a UK social media platform to undertake a wholesale review of their compliance policies and is also representing an international upstream oil major in relation to potential regulatory exposure in Africa. He is conducting a multijurisdictional fraud and conspiracy investigation for a large European company.  He was recently instructed to undertake litigation in the High Court, following the utterance of forged documents by an insurance broker.

Recognition

Chambers HNW Guide: David is recognised as an “up and coming” partner, with commentators stating “I find him very good to work with. He is very friendly, innovative in his approach and has a lot of experience,” and “I have found him to have extremely good judgement, and to be exceptionally hard-working and organised […] he has great expertise when it comes to sanctions, which makes him a valuable adviser to any HNW client.”

The Legal 500: David is recognised as a “next generation partner”.  Commentators noted that he “…is a brilliant attorney. We worked with him on a complicated foreign exchange matter involving the US Department of Justice, and he provided extremely good advice about international exposure for our client and was an extremely pleasant person to work with.’ And “has extensive experience in financial crime matters including orchestrating significant internal investigations and dealing with economic sanctions matters both on an advisory and contentious basis.”

Accreditations and memberships

David is a member of the Law Society, the International Compliance Association (the ICA) and the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS), the Fraud Lawyers Association, the International Association of Young Lawyers and Interlaw. He holds an International Diploma in Anti-Money Laundering from the ICA and a Sanctions Specialist Certificate from ACAMS.

David is a coach on the Future Frontiers programme and a mentor on the Just Like Us scheme.

Publications

David speaks internationally on various financial crime subjects, including for the Infoline AML forum, the Financial Crime and Sanctions Forum, the BPP Guernsey and Jersey Sanctions Forums, the Finnish Investment Academy, LexisNexis, GIR and Lexology.

David is regularly quoted in the press on topical financial crime issues and publishes articles on legal developments and thought leadership topics.

Career

David trained at Reed Smith, qualifying in 2009, before moving to the Corporate Crime and Investigations team at Eversheds Sutherland. In 2017, David moved to Kleinwort Hambros as the Group Senior Sanctions Officer.

David has written his career story and experience of Stewarts for our careers section, you can view his story here.