The news you have won will quickly feel empty if assets have been transferred or hidden in the meantime. At every stage of litigation – including in your very first decision about whether it is worth investing your time and resources to go ahead at all – information is key.

This is why we actually start at the end when you come to us for help. We think about how we will recover what you are owed. We establish what assets exist, and how we will actually access them. The location, nature and value of these assets then play a critical role in the way we set the whole strategy of your case. For example, this information will help us decide where in the world to have your case heard. Or it will help us deploy “interim” solutions like freezing and disclosure orders to preserve the assets while your underlying case is heard.

Acting in a £450 million enforcement

The ability to effectively trace and recover assets was the reason Ms Akmedova chose us to fight her corner. Her husband was fighting dirty in their dispute, hiding assets globally. He was ordered by the English High Court to pay our client £350 million plus an art collection valued at around £90 million. Defying these orders however, he transferred money and artwork to Liechtenstein, created debts to himself and sailed their superyacht from Turkey to Dubai. We led the global enforcement battle for Ms Akmedova. We took action in Dubai – in the DIFC and local courts – to seize the yacht and then obtained a worldwide freezing order in the English High Court that allowed us to pierce the corporate ownership structures that had been set up to hide the yacht and other assets. We then worked to have English judgment recognized in New York and the Marshall Islands, and pursue enforcement orders in Liechtenstein and Switzerland. We recovered a Bombardier jet and E360 helicopter from Isle of Man companies they had been registered with.

Getting results

Winning your case can turn on the quality of information and evidence we can secure on your behalf. Then once you have a decision in your favor, tracing information globally helps us successfully deliver on what you are owed. Being part of a team of over 150 litigators globally helps us find information across the world, and to liaise with local courts when needed. We have people who focus entirely on trusts and offshore structures so that we can dismantle or reverse structures that have been designed to put your assets out of reach. We are the only major onshore firm with a presence actually in the BVI which gives us the unique combination of a major international platform and access to these complex offshore structures.

Securing information like this helps you avoid cost and effort. We have decades of experience using the tools that are essential to chasing down and recovering the assets awarded to you in a court decision, to doing all we can to make your result a success.