Julia Flanagan

e: Julia.Flanagan@charterchambers.com

Year of Call: 1993 BA (LSE)

Languages: German

Specialist Areas: Homicide, Large Drugs Related Offences, Sexual Offences, Serious Fraud & White Collar Crime

Julia Flanagan is a very experienced criminal advocate, acting as both leading and junior counsel. Her practice covers the whole spectrum of criminal work, dealing with pre-trial hearings through to appeals. She has appeared successfully in both the House of Lords and the Court of Appeal. Her main specialisations include:

Fraud
Sexual Offences
Homicide & Violence
Drugs

Concerning fraud, Julia is experienced in both multi-handed conspiracies and fraud by individuals, including VAT fraud, international advance fee, money laundering, benefits, and mortgage fraud. She deals with pre and post trial applications re: freezing and recovery of assets and is currently acting as leading counsel in multi-handed, large scale, fraud on a well known national bank.

In the field of sexual offences, Julia has particular expertise acting in cases involving abuse and assault of the most serious nature: stranger rape, trafficking of young girls and subsequent rape and enforced prostitution, rape within marriage and cases involving both multiple complainants and defendants. Sexual offences involving children is another area within which Julia has a wealth of experience, including the most complex types of abuse: incest, torture, child prostitution and internet paedophile crime. She has particular expertise in relation to the law in this field, regarding the restrictions on cross-examination, the use of intermediaries for witnesses with special needs, and cross-examination of experts. Julia has become well accustomed to the intricacies of drafting the necessary written applications in such cases. Julia regularly deals with, and cross-examines, medical, psychiatric and technical experts, in cases of computer crime. In a recent case involving child prostitution a senior Judge described her successful application to admit a particular type of 3rd party, bad character material as “groundbreaking”.

Having acted in cases involving the most serious violence, Murder, Manslaughter, S18 and Child cruelty, homicide and violence is an area of particular strength for Julia.
 
In drugs cases, Julia has worked on large scale importation, by both civilians and customs officers and is skilled at dealing with issues surrounding admissibility of covert surveillance, telephone intercepts, lip reading experts and the associated disclosure regime.

Julia also acts on behalf of police officers re: crime and misconduct and is used to dealing with associated aspects of criminal cases, such as acting against national press to resist pre-trial publicity. She also prosecutes, with particular dealings regarding prosecution of multi-handed gang crime and immigration fraud.
 

FRAUD
R v F & Others [2010] (Leading counsel in a high value multi-handed fraud perpetrated on a well known private bank)
R v F & Others [2010] (Counsel instructed in an international fraud focused on a company based in the UAE, by method of cloning legitimate UK based companies)
R v U & Others [2009] (Junior counsel for the Crown, prosecuting a large scale immigration fraud involving both the creation of false companies to support a bogus work history and the arrangement of sham marriages with EU nationals)

SEXUAL OFFENCES
R v A & Others [2010] (Defence counsel for the principal defendant, charged on 3 separate indictments, concerning one of the most serious cases of familial sexual abuse of family members, including rape, sexual slavery and the publication of material on the internet. Unusually complex because of the number of experts and agencies involved to deal with the special needs and learning difficulties of the young complainants including the need to communicate through intermediaries)
R v G & Others [2010] (Defence counsel in a case involving an allegation of gang rape of a highly intoxicated complainant, bringing in the issues not only of consent, but capacity to consent)

SERIOUS VIOLENCE
R v N & Others [2011] (Junior counsel in one of the most infamous murders of 2010, involving an alleged group attack upon a schoolboy at the height of rush hour in Victoria station)
R v E & Others [2010] (Counsel for the principle defendant, where the Crown alleged that 2 male complainants had been tricked into entering premises by means of a honey trap. Once inside they were tortured in turn, by gang members, with the use of a burning hot iron and a knife, leaving permanent scarring and psychological injury)

DRUGS
R v N [2010] (Junior counsel in a multi-handed drugs trial involving the importation of class A drugs to the value of £8m)