Ben Rowe represents client given suspended sentence for part in £9mil scheme.

Ben Rowe, instructed by Lokaswaran Dharshini and Ditesh Patel of Bark & Co, represented a client (one of two men) accused of playing a significant role in an international money laundering conspiracy valued by the prosecution at over £9 million.

With strong support from the team at Bark, Ben was able to undermine the Crown's case and demonstrate first that the conspiracy was significantly smaller than originally alleged and, secondly, that his client only played a much smaller part in the scheme than that claimed by the prosecution.

The defence team worked together to craft a basis of plea that was acceptable to the prosecution, and limited the defendant's role in the overall enterprise.

In the eventual sentencing hearing, despite an indicative starting point of over three years' immediate custody, Ben was able to use the client's personal mitigation prepared by Bark&Co to convince the Judge to step outside of the sentencing guidelines and reduce the sentence to one of two years' custody. Ben was then able to persuade the Judge to suspend this sentence, meaning the client was free to go home to his family. Conversely, the co-defendant received a sentence of five years' immediate custody.