Richard Hearnden

Year of Call: 1998

Practice Profile

In recent years Richard Hearnden has appeared in serious and complex cases concerning organised crime, fraud, inquests, regulatory crime and rape and sexual offences. He is on the Attorney General's B List and is a Grade 4 prosecutor for the CPS.

Last year, Richard was instructed as junior counsel in the defence of a police officer accused of fraud and misconduct arising from the alleged embezzlement of a multi-million pound recruitment budget, and was instructed as leading counsel in the defence of a company director being prosecuted for breaches of environmental protection and international law.

Also in 2011, Richard prosecuted a father who had sexually abused his own child forty years ago, a man who had raped a woman after drugging her with the Victorian anaesthetic, chloroform, and a pensioner accused of sexually abusing three of his neighbour's children. He appeared in a four-day long contested confiscation hearing, represented the directors of a construction company charged by the Health and Safety Executive and has advised in respect of drivers delivering hazardous goods by road. He has represented families and others in coroner's inquests and is currently instructed in a death in custody inquest in Manchester.

In 2010 Richard was leading counsel for the Crown in the trial of two British Airways managers and an accountant charged with serious fraud at the company. In the same year he also appeared in an attempted murder trial and in the trial of a man accused of raping a woman after a forced marriage.

Richard has advised prisoners seeking to appeal convictions or sentences. Late last year (in the Court of Appeal) he succeeded in overturning the conviction of a man accused of raping and beating his wife. He is presently instructed as leading counsel for the prosecution in a cold case being brought against a serving life prisoner.

Richard has appeared in long Revenue and Customs trials, prosecuted complex multiple defendant cases, and has been instructed by numerous local authorities, government departments. He was, in 2007, seconded to the Attorney General of the Cayman Islands for a time.

Richard teaches advocacy regularly to the pupils of Gray's Inn, has given lectures to solicitors on indeterminate sentences, police powers and witness immunity and protection. He is a skilled lawyer who has appeared in five reported cases, four of which are cited in the 2012 edition of Archbold. They are:

T v DPP [2003] Crim L.R. 622
Where the High Court (Administrative Court) defined the term "actual bodily harm" as including momentary loss of consciousness.

R v Matthews [2004] Q.B. 690, [2003] 3 W.L.R. 693, [2003] 2 Cr. App. R. 19, The Times 28.4.03
The Court of Appeal ruled on whether aspects of the law against carrying a knife or other sharp implement in public breached the European Convention on Human Rights.

R (on the application of H) v Balham Youth Court (2004) 168 J.P. 177
This case concerned the circumstances in which a youth court is entitled to commit a juvenile to the Crown Court for trial.

R v Golding [2007] 1 Cr. App. R. (S) 79, [2006] M.H.L.R. 272, [2007] Crim. L.R. 170
The Court of Appeal had to decide on the criteria needed to be proved before a judge can sentence an offender to a Restriction Order under the Mental Health Act 1983.

R v A (Ashraf) (2011) 175 J.P. 437
Another Court of Appeal case where the necessity to give to a jury certain legal directions arising from an allegation of rape was decided.