Sarah Wood

Barrister, 5 St Andrew's Hill

Sarah is Joint Head of the Business Crime Team at 5 St Andrew’s Hill and is ranked in both Chambers & Partners and Legal 500 for her confiscation and asset recovery work.

She specialises in criminal and family matters involving high-value assets and complex financial arrangements. In her criminal work she prosecutes and defends lengthy, complex, high-value fraud and money laundering cases. Sarah has a detailed knowledge of restraint, confiscation and enforcement proceedings with experience in this area in the Appellate Courts, the High Court and the Crown Court. She has extensive experience of POCA orders in relation to cryptocurrencies.

In her family work she has experience in all aspects of the financial proceedings that follow a divorce or separation, including proceedings involving third party interveners and international assets.

She is one of a handful of counsel at the Bar with experience of dealing with cases where there are contemporaneous proceedings in the criminal and family courts in relation to the same assets and is therefore able to advise clients and appear in all aspects of both sets of proceedings.

Contributed to

1

Dealing with competing matrimonial claims in confiscation proceedings

Practice Notes

This Practice Note provides guidance to practitioners representing prosecutors, spouses and defendants in contested proceeds of crime matters involving competing claims under the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 (ie claims in respect of matrimonial assets where there has been a breakdown of a marriage). It explains why contested matrimonial proceedings create an issue for those working on proceeds of crime matters, the interplay between the criminal and family courts in such cases, how the parties can or should litigate these matters in either the criminal or family courts including which claim takes precedence, steps to bringing or intervening in proceedings and other practical points to consider.

Corporate Crime