Sunil Rupasinha

Year of Call: 1983

Education / Qualifications

LLB (Hons)

Mediator (accredited by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolutions, 2005)

Specialist practice areas

Serious & organised crime
Asset Forfeiture & Confiscation
Crime

Profile

Sunil has for most of his career specialised in criminal advocacy.  In the early years he frequently appeared on behalf of the Kent CPS and other government agencies such as the Department of Work and Pensions prosecuting in a wide range of frauds and general crime.  He then joined the Attorney General’s list and began prosecuting for HMC&E (as it then was).  He quickly advanced to being ‘A’ grade counsel whereupon he was regularly instructed to prosecute in heavyweight crime such as vat and duty frauds, drug importations and money laundering. This provided the requisite experience for Sunil to successfully undertake a wide variety of defence work in the Crown Courts where he now represents clients in the full range of criminal work.

 

Sunil has also specialised to a considerable extent in money laundering cases (civil and criminal) and has frequently appeared in applications for the detention and forfeiture of cash (civil recovery of the proceeds of unlawful conduct governed by Part V of the Proceeds of Crime Act, 2002), having been instructed by HMRC, the UKBA and various police authorities in this field.   He has considerable experience in cases in which HMRC seeks the condemnation of seized goods (governed by Schedule 3 to the 1979 Customs and Excise Management Act).  He has also recently been instructed by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets to undertake prosecution work on behalf of its specialist illegal money lending team.

 

In the light of the above areas of expertise Sunil has been regularly invited to give seminars and lectures by various bodies concerned with various aspects of asset forfeiture.

 

Articles

 

The Forfeiture of Cash derived from tax evasion : see the Proceeds of Crime Review, the Journal of Asset Forfeiture (edition 1,  May 2008, Wildy and Sons Ltd.)

 

Condemnation Proceedings: A Guide:  see Volume 2 of the above-mentioned journal (December, 2008).

Professional Memberships

Criminal Bar Association

Sri Lankan Lawyers Association

Proceeds of Crime Lawyers Association

South Eastern Circuit
Kent Bar Mess