Robert Dacre
“Robert is polished and assured. His written and oral advocacy is top drawer and he has the capacity to cope with large quantities of case papers and drill down to what is actually relevant. He is a rising star of the criminal Bar.” - Legal 500 UK BAR 2024
Robert specialises in crime, business crime and financial services, professional discipline, inquests and regulatory law.
He has been involved in a number of significant cases across the spectrum of business crime, including high value and large scale fraud, corruption and misconduct in public office, cheating the public revenue and money laundering. He advises companies and individuals in complex and sensitive cases.
He is regularly instructed in complex and serious crime. His recent work has involved high profile terrorism and murder cases.
He also specialises in regulatory crime. His recent cases involve prosecutions by the Health and Safety Executive and the Environment Agency.
He also has a busy professional discipline practice. He appears before a wide variety of tribunals including the MPTS, GDC, GOC, ACCA, ICAEW and RICS.
He is frequently instructed to represent the interests of hospital trusts and individual doctors at inquests.
Current and recent instructions include:
- Operation Agave: sole counsel representing a businessman and company director who acted as introducer to a multi-million pound investment scheme. Robert’s client was acquitted following successful submissions that there was no case to answer.
- R v H: sole counsel to a senior IT executive who is alleged to have embezzled more than £500,000 from a household name company, and to have thereafter agreed significant contract extension without appropriate authorization.
- R v A: sole counsel prosecuting a company and individual in respect of a £3 million counterfeiting scheme.
- R v X: junior counsel in a very large case relating to corruption and misconduct in public office.
- Operation Obi-Wan: junior counsel in a hidden income and VAT fraud.
- Operation Mickey: junior counsel acting for company director in large insurance fraud.
- Operation Capparis: sole counsel prosecuting in a private prosecution of a credit card fraud.
- Operation ARK: junior counsel prosecuting in a conspiracy to defraud in respect of a group of companies with a turnover of over £46 million.
- R v NAA: sole counsel in a private prosecution brought on behalf of leading brand in respect of a counterfeiting operation with a value of over £800,000.
- X v ZH and others: Advising in a private prosecution relating to an alleged fraud with a value of over £2 million.
- R v P: sole counsel in prosecution relating to several offences under the Terrorism Act 2006.
- R v W: junior counsel in a widely reported murder trial.
Qualifications:
2013: BPTC, City Law School
2012: Queen Mother Scholarship, Middle Temple
2012: BA (Hons) Law, Magdalene College, Cambridge
2011: Astbury Scholarship, Middle Temple
2010: BA (Hons) History (First), Exeter College, Oxford
2009: Simon Pointer Prize for History
2008: Ellison Scholarship
