Paul is a senior criminal defence Solicitor Advocate with more than 20 years’ experience specialising in criminal law. Before joining Carter Osborne as a Consultant, he spent 17 years as Head of Crime at a Midlands law firm, where he was a long-standing Partner and latterly Senior Partner.
Paul was called to the Bar in 2003 before cross-qualifying as a Solicitor Advocate in 2006. He is also a qualified Mediator. He has extensive advocacy experience and regularly represents clients in trials and contested hearings in both the Crown Court and Magistrates’ Court.
His practice encompasses serious and complex criminal litigation, including serious violence, drugs conspiracies, sexual offences, fraud, regulatory and Trading Standards prosecutions and financial crime. He has particular expertise in Proceeds of Crime Act and confiscation proceedings, including cases involving complex financial evidence, criminal lifestyle assumptions, cryptocurrency and digital assets.
Paul also specialises in football-related criminal law and, in particular, Football Banning Orders. He has considerable experience advising and representing football supporters facing applications for banning orders, as well as applications for the early termination of existing orders.
Paul has been instructed in a number of substantial and high-profile cases. He successfully represented a defendant in a high-profile Trading Standards prosecution concerning an alleged fraud worth tens of millions of pounds. Following a complex eight-week jury trial at Nottingham Crown Court, his client was acquitted. Paul also successfully represented a defendant prosecuted for stirring up racial hatred arising from social media posts made in the immediate aftermath of the 2024 Southport killings and against the background of the disorder which followed nationally. The case attracted national media attention and, following a week-long Crown Court trial at Loughborough Courthouse, his client was acquitted by the jury.
Having spent much of his career both leading a busy criminal department and conducting his own advocacy, Paul brings a strategic and practical approach to criminal defence. He is known for meticulous preparation, robust advocacy and providing clients with clear and realistic advice from the outset.
Outside of his legal practice, Paul is Chairman and co-owner of Coalville Town Football Club, where he is actively involved in the running and development of the club.