Ben Davies is a partner in the civil litigation team.  He works principally on high value, complex fraud claims in the Commercial Court, which often involve ancillary proceedings in other jurisdictions. He has particular experience in the obtaining, policing and discharging of freezing orders.

Ben is ranked as a leading civil fraud lawyer in the current edition of the Chambers & Partners guide to the UK legal profession, which describes him as “brilliant” and “very knowledgeable about freezing orders”. He is also recommended as an asset recovery specialist by Who’s Who Legal, which describes him as “a skilled civil litigator who sources consider ‘a real star’ and ‘a measured, balanced and fair opponent’”. Ben is a solicitor-advocate and holds rights of audience in both the civil and criminal higher courts

Elena has been a solicitor since 2006 and specialises in immigration, nationality, asylum and human rights.

Elena joined Charles Douglas Solicitors in January 2018 after merging her existing boutique law firm into the practice. She provides a bespoke service offering representation and advice in respect of complex immigration, nationality, asylum and human rights law matters to globally based English, Russian and Arabic speaking migrants, high net worth individuals and businesses drawn to the UK.

Elena has experience in a variety of human rights, asylum, nationality, and immigration cases, specifically those of an exceptional and high-profile nature. Her particular expertise lies in dealing with Russian-speaking clients from the Russian Federation and the Commonwealth of Independent States including Ukraine and Kazakhstan. She is a former member of the Russian Speaking Community Council and continues to play an active part in British-Russian community matters in the UK.

Anand Doobay deals with criminal and regulatory matters including fraud, extradition, mutual legal assistance, corruption, sanctions, tax and money laundering. 

He was appointed by Theresa May (then Home Secretary) to a panel to review the United Kingdom’s extradition arrangements and the European Parliament asked him to prepare an expert report on potential reforms to the European Arrest Warrant system.

Anand was also consulted as an expert by Fair Trials when they prepared their report on Interpol. 

He provided expert evidence on fraud proceedings for the Law Society of England and Wales to the High Court and has dealt with many Serious Fraud Office prosecutions. 

Anand has advised a serving Prime Minister, a former Deputy Prime Minister, a Deputy Foreign Minister and three G20 Governments.

He has been involved in high profile and politically sensitive investigations and prosecutions in over fifty countries.

He is consultant editor on extradition for Halsbury’s Laws of England and the author of the chapter on Extradition in Blackstone’s Criminal Practice.

He is a Council Member of Justice and is on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office pro bono panel.

Maria has extensive experience of advising corporate and individual clients on all aspects of business crime, including corruption and money laundering. Her practice focuses on white-collar cases with a truly international dimension.

Maria regularly represents high-profile individuals and companies subject to complex corruption, money laundering, insider dealing and tax investigations. Maria provides strategic advice, including where there is underlying political motivation and potential abuse of a state's criminal justice system.
 

Maria advises on all aspects of extradition and has also successfully acted for a number of prominent individuals who were the subject of red notices and / or diffusions on INTERPOL's information systems.
 

She has extensive experience of advising on, and carrying out, complex and often sensitive internal investigations both here and overseas. Both as part of an internal investigation and also separately, she is asked to advise companies on their compliance with the UK Bribery Act, the money laundering regulations, sanctions and export controls.
 

Given the international nature of her cases, Maria works closely with teams of professional advisors both here and overseas.

Chambers UK 2023 rates Maria as fast becoming a go-to lawyer for POCA matters, including those arising out of corruption, conspiracy and money laundering investigations, with clients saying that she "is an exceptional lawyer" and that she "knows her stuff".

Maria is former President of the Criminal Commission of the UIA (Union Internationale des Avocats); and, in 2018, was appointed as the UK National President of the UIA. Maria also sits on the Advisory Committee of the Fraud Advisory Panel. She regularly speaks and chairs panels on issues of corruption, money laundering, corporate liability and general financial crime.
 

Prior to joining Peters & Peters, she worked at the European Commission. She is a native French speaker, who also reads Russian and German.

Nikos Asimakopoulos joined Alaco in 2008. He focuses on dispute-related assignments on behalf of law firms and their clients, working internationally. He has developed specific expertise in the extractive industries, particularly in Russia, Central Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. Nikos holds a BSc and an MSc in Economics from the universities of York and Bath, respectively.  He speaks Greek and Russian.

Emma has extensive expertise in civil fraud litigation, in particular obtaining and defending worldwide freezing injunctions. As a result of her work on behalf of the Department of Health, Emma has experience in litigating private damages actions in competition cases alleging abuse of dominant position and entry into anti-competitive arrangements. In the competition litigation practice area, Legal 500 described Emma as “very sharp”.

Emma’s work often involves cross-border or international elements: amongst other things Emma was part of the team that defended the former CEO of what was Nigeria’s fourth largest bank, conducting 2 weeks of the trial of the claim in Lagos. Emma has also assisted in the taking of evidence from witnesses in Nigeria, made representations on behalf of clients at the United Nations In New York and drafted evidence in support of an anti-suit injunction seeking to prevent the continuation of a claim filed in Israel.