Red Lion Chambers

Having historically had conduct of many of the most complex cases for all the major fraud prosecution agencies (including as former Standing Counsel to the Revenue and Customs Prosecutions Office and Standing Counsel to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills), David’s work is now almost exclusively for front-rank fraud defence firms.

He is the founder and frontman of the updating website [crimecast.law] on which he presents video case reviews of recent judgments. The site currently hosts more than 200 free-to-view videos. He is also the crime correspondent for the New Law Journal, commenting on recent case law in his ‘Crime Brief’ column.

Elected President of the Cambridge Union Society (Michaelmas, 1985)

Standing Counsel to the Revenue and Customs Prosecutions Office (2005 – 2010)

Standing Counsel to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (2013 – 2017)

CPS Specialist Panel Advocate (Fraud)

CPS Specialist Panel Advocate (Organised Crime)

SFO Panel Advocate (List A)

Regulatory List ‘A’ for the Health & Safety Executive, Office of Rail Regulation and Environment Agency

In October 2020, David launched the updating website crimecast.law which hosts video case reviews of recent case law and legislation. The website now has more than 200 videos, many of them in the field of Business Crime & Fraud. Daniel Cundy (Partner and Co-Head of Dispute Resolution at Blackfords LLP) says: “CrimeCast.Law has become the indispensable resource for specialists in Fraud, AML, Corruption and Regulatory Compliance”. His Honour Judge Lucas QC (Honorary Recorder of Haringey and Resident Judge at Wood Green Crown Court) says: “David Walbank QC’s expert oral explanation of points of principle in recent appeal decisions is an invaluable tool in keeping up to date with developments in criminal law”. For free and instant access to all David’s video case reviews, visit CrimeCast Law

David is also the crime columnist for the New Law Journal. His recent ‘Crime Brief’ articles include commentaries on:

‘Government of the United States of America v Assange [2022] 4 WLR 11 on the US Government’s attempts to extradite Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, for disclosing defence and national security material’, NLJ, 200th Anniversary double issue, 15 & 22 April 2022

‘Bloomberg LP v ZXC [2022] 3 All ER 1 on the leaking of the confidential contents of a Letter of Request sent by the UK authorities to US prosecutors’, NLJ, 27 May 2022)

‘R v Keal (Jonathan Robert) [2022] 2 Cr App R 4 on the M’Naghten rules and the English criminal courts’ approach to the concept of insanity’, NLJ, 15 July 2022

‘R (Lynch) v Westminster Magistrates’ Court [2022] 1 WLR 2065 on the long-running litigation arising from Hewlett Packard’s controversial $11 billion takeover Autonomy Corporation plc’, NLJ, 27 May 2022

David is also a prolific speaker on topical issues of interest to criminal practitioners and other professionals in the financial and wealth management sector. He has given keynote lectures at each of the following events:

The BNP Paribas Economic Crime Conference in Paris. He spoke to a live audience at the worldwide headquarters of the French international banking group and his lecture was simultaneously live-streamed to nearly 500 delegates in multiple jurisdictions, including the United States, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg, India, Singapore, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates.

He founded the Red Lion Lectures and, as well as hosting many of the events, his own talks have included a ‘Review of the Year in Business Crime’, ‘Safe Havens in the Perfect Storm?’ (on the extra-territorial criminal offences of corporate failure to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion under the Criminal Finances Act 2017) and ‘Still Draining the Swamp’ on the continuing efforts to combat money laundering in the London prime property market.

The annual conference of STEP Alpine (the Swiss and Liechtenstein Federation of the International Society of Trust and Estate Planners) in Interlaken, Switzerland. His fellow lecturers included Her Excellency Jane Owen (HM Ambassador to the Swiss Confederation), Count Francis von Seilern-Aspang (Chairman and Managing Director of the wealth preservation experts, Industrie-und Finanzkontor Ets.) and Her Serene Highness Princess Therese of Liechtenstein. Other speakers included leading academics from the University of Geneva and King’s College London as well as an array of private client specialists from across the globe and some of the top tax and trust lawyers from leading London firms.

David has twice in recent years been invited to deliver the keynote lecture on recent developments in Business Crime & Fraud to the Annual Government Legal Service Prosecutors’ Conference, speaking alongside the then Director of the Serious Fraud Office and the Solicitor General.

He has also lectured on the Fraud Act 2006 with Professor David Ormerod QC and on Legal Professional Privilege to the Metropolitan Police Fraud Squad.

David has a particular expertise in complex disclosure issues. In Butterworths’ ‘Fraud: Law, Practice & Procedure’, he wrote the chapter on prosecution disclosure and in Gross LJ’s ‘Review of Disclosure In Criminal Proceedings’, the so-called ‘Walbank Protocol’ was described as a model for prosecution disclosure.

FLA

CBA

South Eastern Circuit

Aylesbury Grammar School; Queens’ College, Cambridge, MA Hons in Law