Eleanor Sanderson
Expert regulatory and corporate defence barrister
Eleanor Sanderson has featured in Chambers and Partners and the Legal 500 for many years as a leader at the Bar. Her specialist practice focuses around complex and high-profile proceedings in the fields of regulatory investigation and prosecution, inquests and inquiries, and professional disciplinary law. She is renowned for her subject matter expertise, straightforward advice, effective advocacy and client care skills.
If the field of regulatory criminal defence, Eleanor is instructed by companies, individuals and public authorities to defend prosecutions brought by the Crown Prosecution Service, Health and Safety Executive, Environment Agency, Fire Authorities, Care Quality Commission, Civil Aviation Authority, and Local Authorities and the Crown Prosecution Service. She has huge experience in cases that attract public, press, and political interest. She acts from the pre-charge stage to the conclusion of proceedings and any appeal, and is able to advise in respect of how related civil or public law proceedings will impact upon criminal allegations.
She is similarly expert in inquests and in public inquiries. Her inquest experience includes acting for a wide range of interested persons, individuals, companies and public bodies, in hearings lasting from one day to several years, and draws upon her regulatory specialisms across the fields of health and safety, fire safety, and patient safety.
She frequently acts for clients from the healthcare sector and has significant experience acting for interested persons including NHS Trusts, private healthcare companies, and care providers at Coroner’s inquests, and advising in respect of CQC prosecutions. She is also instructed to act in public inquiries where their subject matter intersects with her regulatory practice.
Eleanor also specialises in the defence of professionals subject to disciplinary proceedings by their regulatory bodies, including those brought by the General Medical Council, General Dental Council, Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, General Optical Council and Nursing and Midwifery Council. Her specialism brings with it an understanding of medical practice across a range of disciplines, with exceptional expertise in understanding and challenging expert evidence.
Practice Areas
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Eleanor specialises in the defence of regulatory criminal proceedings and the most serious prosecutions brought under health and safety and fire safety law. She is ranked by Chambers and Partners legal directory as a “Star Individual” in the field.
She acts on behalf of companies and directors in relation to allegations of gross negligence and corporate manslaughter, fatal breaches of sections 2 and 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act and in prosecutions for breaches of Health and Safety Regulations. Her clients extend from family-run businesses to publicly listed global companies and household names and her huge experience spans the full spectrum of regulated sectors. Eleanor acts in challenges to improvement and prohibition notices, throughout trial and on appeal to the Court of Appeal, but is often instructed at the very earliest stage of an investigation, having an expert understanding of the approach likely to be taken by both prosecutors and independent industry investigators.
In respect of the healthcare sector, Eleanor has a wealth of experience within the and represents NHS Trusts and private healthcare providers, as well as individual managers and clinicians subject to health and safety enforcement by their regulators.
FIRE SAFETY
Eleanor has similar expertise in the field of fire safety regulation and prosecutions under the Fire Safety Order, and frequently acts in technical cases concerning matters such as causation and spread of fire, building construction and the Building Regulations, manufacture and storage of explosives, emergency response, fire prevention and means of escape, and the polluting effects of fire. One of the foremost practitioners in this field, her experience includes claims for Judicial Review in relation to enforcement activity by Fire Authorities, the referral of technical disputes to the Secretary of State for determination, and parallel litigation arising from alleged failings in the emergency response. Eleanor acted in the public inquiry into the Grenfell Tower fire, and the lengthy inquest into the deaths at Lakanal tower block, Peckham.
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Eleanor is highly experienced in defending allegations of gross negligence and corporate manslaughter. In the course of her corporate defence practice Eleanor has acted for companies and individuals spanning the full spectrum of industries and benefits from significant technical expertise across a range of disciplines, where her manslaughter practice intersects with her expertise in the fields of health and safety and fire safety. She is also able to offer huge depth of experience in respect of the healthcare sector and allegations of clinical negligence that give rise to manslaughter investigations and prosecutions. She is expert in both the civil law of negligence upon which gross negligence allegations are made, and the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007.
Eleanor’s expertise in this field incorporates pre-charge advisory work, and she has advised numerous corporate and public bodies and their directors regarding investigations and potential liability for the offences. She additionally provides advice and acts at inquest when manslaughter allegations have been or are likely to be made, and the possibility of an unlawful killing conclusion exists.
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Eleanor is an experienced Environmental Law practitioner and defends Environment Agency and local authorities prosecutions in relation to matters such as breaches of permit conditions, handling of waste, use of land and response to investigations. Her clients span a range of industries and vary from individual land owners to global corporates and public utility companies. Her expertise extends to matters pre-charge, including the effect and required responses to section 108 notices, at interview under caution, providing advice on the approach to enforcement undertakings, and defending in in prosecutions and any subsequent appeal.
She has acted in cases engaging the Environmental Permitting Regulations 2016, Environmental Protection Act 1990, the Water Resources Act 1991, and has defended allegations in respect of breach of permitting conditions, breach of duty of care in respect of waste transfer and at the intersection of the Permitting Regulations and the Radioactive Substances Act 1993. She also acts for landowners issued with notices to clear controlled waste. Eleanor provides advice as to the extent of the Environment Agency’s investigative powers and recently acted for one of five water company employees charged together with their employer, with obstruction of Environment Agency officers at visits to Waste Water Treatment Works, both at trial and subsequently on appeal before the High Court.
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Eleanor is an expert inquest advocate and has acted for individuals, companies, public authorities and investigating authorities in inquests and inquiries lasting from a single day’s hearing, to those stretching over a number of years.
In the context of workplace deaths, she is frequently instructed on behalf of companies, directors and employees where an inquest follows a regulators’ investigation, and where it is anticipated that criminal charges may be brought after the inquest. Her experience in the fields of health and safety and fire safety provide her with particular insight as to the potential ramifications of inquest conclusions, and any proceedings that are likely to follow thereafter.
Eleanor also has significant expertise in inquests touching upon the deaths in health and social care settings and has represented the interests of Trusts, private healthcare providers, care homes, doctors, nurses, and individual carers, and thereafter advised on CQC investigations and prosecutions.
Eleanor frequently represents clients in Article 2 inquests and inquiries: she was instructed for Whirlpool UK in the Public Inquiry into the deaths of 72 residents at Grenfell Tower, for the Home Office investigation Operation Resolve in the Hillsborough Inquests into the death of 96 (now 97) football supporters in 1989, and for Southwark Borough Council in the super-inquest into the 6 deaths at Lakanal tower block, Peckham. She acts in public inquiries where its subject matter intersects with her specialist regulatory practice and/or when issues of causation of death arise.
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Eleanor’s extensive experience in the healthcare regulation and medico-legal fields incorporates:
Acting for healthcare and social care providers in prosecutions brought by regulators including the CQC, HSE, Fire and Rescue Services and Local Authorities,
Acting in inquiries and inquiry-style inquests for doctors, NHS and private healthcare providers, social care providers, and local authorities where medical causation of death and alleged clinical and/or health and safety failings are in issue, including where Article 2 ECHR is engaged;
Acting for doctors, dentists, nurses, optometrists, veterinary surgeons and other healthcare professionals in disciplinary proceedings including where death is alleged to have resulted from deficient care;
Defence of allegations of gross negligence and corporate manslaughter in a medical context.
Eleanor has defended in cases where deaths have arisen from a variety of causes including post-surgical complications, anaesthetic events, undiagnosed cancers, respiratory failure and medication errors, and often where difficult clinical decisions have been required that later become subject to criticism.
She is familiar with the challenges facings healthcare and social care providers and has defended in many prosecutions focusing on the provision of safe care and treatment, but also in respect of more diverse issues relating to health and safety policy and procedure and the safety of healthcare premises.
She is hugely experienced in the cross-examination of medical expert witnesses across the full array of disciplines, and also has extensive experience of pathology evidence including where multiple experts have given evidence and cause of death has remained in dispute. Her expertise in the field of health and safety and fire safety brings a detailed understanding of the complexities of their interaction with the Health and Social Care (Regulated Activities) Regulations and the division of investigative responsibilities.
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Eleanor has a wealth of experience in the field of professional disciplinary law. Her practice includes those most serious cases where death is alleged to have resulted from misconduct, and she is also able to act at inquest and in any subsequent criminal proceedings that may arise. She is frequently instructed in cases where practitioners face suspension or erasure from their register, or significant fines. Her practice in the field of criminal law also provides her with expertise in respect of fraud and conviction cases.
Eleanor is skilled at mastering the detail of professional standards and guidance across the array of disciplines and is highly experienced in calling and challenging expert evidence. In the medical field, she has acted in cases concerning a wide range of specialisms including oncology, geriatrics, paediatrics, emergency medicine, anaesthesia, complex surgical procedures and in the territory of “never” events, and is also experienced in the field of veterinary medicine.
Eleanor regularly appears before a range of tribunals including proceedings brought by the General Medical Council, General Dental Council, Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, General Optical Council, Nursing and Midwifery Council, PLDPs, First Tier Tribunal, and in unusual high profile proceedings defending a large company before the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors. More diverse regulatory experience includes appearances before the Security Industry Association licensing appeals panel, the UK Council for Psychotherapy and before the Traffic Commissioner in relation to Vehicle Operator licences.
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For nearly 20 years Eleanor has advised the boards of companies and public bodies spanning the spectrum of industries through the course of investigation and litigation, from the beginning of proceedings until their aftermath. She is familiar with the demands that litigation poses upon directors and managers and the need for clear thought and strategic advice, often on the tightest of timescales. However hard-fought litigation may be, Eleanor also works to her client’s priorities in respect of regulatory, commercial and employee relationships. She is also experienced at representing both companies and individuals before their professional regulators.
Eleanor has wide experience of a range of financial regulatory, fraud, money laundering and other dishonesty proceedings. She acted for Deutsche Bank trader AK, a trader acquitted of “interest rate fixing”, namely conspiring to rig the Euro Interbank Offer Rate (EURIBOR) between 2005-2009 at the conclusion of a three month trial, prosecuted by the Serious Fraud Office. Other high profile cases include “Imperial Consolidated”, an alleged $250 million offshore Ponzi fraud prosecuted by the SFO in which the defendant was acquitted after two six month trials, and acting for the Liberal Democrat donor Michael Brown, who was alleged to have defrauded the former Manchester United Chairman of over $12.5 million. Previous instructions include from the Serious Fraud Office to review FBI/Grand Jury material where the UK trial was preceded by convictions in the US Federal Court. In addition to her trial work in this area, Eleanor was a consultant editor of the Lloyds Law Reports on Financial Crime between 2012-2018.
Her experience in corporate and complex crime also includes the “News of the World Trials”, Operations Sacha, Elveden and Weeting, in which Eleanor was instructed for a defendant acquitted of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.
Eleanor understands the importance of communication to stakeholders regarding the approach a business or public body will take to litigation and is well used to working closely with communication teams to ensure the legal process is properly understood by all affected.