Gregory Fishwick is a leading junior in serious and heavy crime and represents those eligible for public funding and on a private basis. He has been described as an exemplar of the criminal bar and was once told by a client on acquittal that he had, in his words, “saved my life”. Furthermore, he has been instructed by the CCRC to deal with cases and refer them to the Court of Appeal whether or not instructed by the lower court.
He has represented people charged with homicide cases that have ranged from gangland shootings to the death of an infant at the hands of a parent. He was instructed very early in his career to defend in the trial of those first accused of the murder of Damilola Taylor (Operation Seale) and obtained a not-guilty verdict.
In the area of serious financial crime, he has successfully defended those accused with boiler room, MTIC, advanced fee, benefit, mortgage and charity frauds as well as those prosecuted by other agencies such as local authorities and Trading Standards.
His practice also includes serious organised crimes from the importation of kilo quantities of drugs to robberies such as the high-profile £53 Million Securitas case, which is still the largest cash seizure in criminal legal history (Operation Deliver).
One of the most resounding comments given in feedback after cases he has been instructed in is that he can engage with any client, fearlessly defend in every case and will always go the extra mile.
Mark Heywood KC leading Gregory Fishwick defended in this multi-company boiler room fraud that sold diamonds as investments. The Crown’s case was that a team of brokers including Lewis Bloor from The Only Way is Essex used false identities and pressure sales techniques to con elderly and vulnerable people from hundreds of thousands.The evidence against them included a purported confession that was excluded upon application by the Defence. The Crown also sought to include companies either side of the Indictment period as evidence of bad character but this again was successfully resisted. The Defence managed to show that the Crown’s disclosure was fundamentally flawed. Having read the written submissions the Crown initially dispensed with their own expert who had valued the stones and nearly worthless. Having then considered the supplemental written submissions on disclosure the Crown had to concede that they could not continue to prosecute any and all of the Defendants. Instructed by Bark & Co.
Gregory Fishwick acted for this Defendant who along with another had been charged with kidnapping a young investment guru, who had brokered multi-million pound deals with a number of people. The investors had seen no returns for their monies and had lost all their capital. The Defendant had taken on a near half million debt to collect and used social media and a honey trap to corner the complainant. The Crown applied under the bad character provisions of the Criminal Justice Act to play the jury an episode of TV journalist Donal McIntyre’s criminal underworld programme that focused on this Defendant. This was resisted and rejected by the Judge.
Through persistent applications for disclosure of phone records, CCTV and most importantly bank statements it could be shown that the complainant was a serial fraudster who had lied throughout his account to the police and, most importantly, to the jury. Both Defendants were acquitted after a two-week trial within less than an hour. Instructed by Bark & Co Solicitors.
Gregory Fishwick acted in this case that involved an allegation of facilitating sexual activity with a child by two Defendants. SK was a political asylum seeker who allowed his co-defendant to stay in his home office providing accommodation with two fourteen-year-old girls. It was alleged that SK engaged in sexual activity with both children and facilitated similar activity with his co-defendant. He was unanimously acquitted by the jury but his co-defendant was acquitted. Instructed by Emery Halil Brown.
Gregory Fishwick acted for this Defendant who was one of three people accused of defrauding a vulnerable elderly male of his life savings and his home to a total value of over £1Million. His name had appeared on the original conveyance file as the purchaser at a significant undervalue (£20,000) and he was also identified as being involved in the later transfer of title. Despite both other Defendants pleading guilty during the course of the trial, Gregory secured a unanimous acquittal for his client. Instructed by Paul Martin Solicitors.
Gregory Fishwick acted in this case involving an allegation of gangland kidnap by a serious crime group from Eastern Europe. The complainant was said to have been taken from his car and bundled into another by a group of men. After a painstaking trawl of unused CCTV, it was shown that this simply could not have happened. Further, after a number of section 8 applications, disclosure was obtained that cast doubt on the complainant’s veracity due to ongoing mental health problems. The Judge stopped the case at the conclusion of the Crown’s evidence.
