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S.
Clive Freedman
Call
1975; CEDR Accredited Mediator; FCIArb; FBCS; MA
(Cantab); TECBAR approved Adjudicator
E-mail: cfreedman@3vb.com
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Clive
Freedman's practice covers information technology, banking,
building and engineering, and commercial fraud. He is particularly
interested in cases involving IT (including internet and e-commerce),
technical, scientific and accounting issues. He also deals with
arbitration, expert determination, employment, insurance, oil
and gas, professional negligence, sale of goods and international
trade, and company law. He is a CEDR Accredited Mediator and
a Chartered Arbitrator, and is named as a leading junior in
Information Technology in Legal
500 and Chambers
& Partners UK Guide directories.
Information
Technology
Clive's
main area of expertise concerns disputes about software development
projects, and he often gives talks on this subject to solicitors
and groups such as the Society for Computers & Law and Intellect.
He has also been instructed on disputes concerning web site
design, intellectual property rights in computer software and
databases, and regulatory matters such as electronic money and
data protection.
He also mediates and acts as arbitrator in these fields.
He has been named as a Leading Junior in Information Technology
in Chambers
& Partners Guide since 1995, and in Legal
500 since 2003.
He has given talks on the subject of electronic disclosure and
helped the LiST Group with the drafting of a proposed Practice
Direction dealing with electronic disclosure and the use of
technology in the courts. He is a member of a sub-committee
of the Civil Procedure Rules Committee which is considering
the preparation of a questionnaire on electronic disclosure
for parties to answer, to be included with the Practice Direction
for CPR Part 31. See www.edisclosure.uk.com.
Clive has written articles published in the Journal of the Society
for Computers & Law on the subject of abortive IT projects
(Abortive
IT Projects - clearing up the mess, Computers & Law
December 2000/January 2001) and Avoiding Pitfalls in IT Mediations
(February/March 2004). An article on J Pereira Fernandes
SA v Mehta [2006] EWHC 813 (Ch), [2006] 1 WLR 1543 was published
in Computer Law & Security Report (2007, written with Jake
Hardy of Reed Smith, Richards Butler). Clive prepared the specimen
pleadings on IT disputes for the 14th and 15th (2004) editions
of Bullen & Leake & Jacob's Precedents of Pleadings.
In June 2004 he became a Fellow of the British Computer Society,
and is Chairman of the BCS Disciplinary Panel.
He is a Trustee of the Society for Computers & Law. He has
been a Member of the Bar Council's IT Committee since 1990,
and has sat on committees concerned with the use of IT in the
Courts (eg ITAC). He is a Trustee of the British and Irish Legal
Information Institute (www.bailii.org),
and wrote the software for converting judgments to HTML for
the BAILII web site.
Practical experience in Information Technology
Clive acted for a period as the Chambers network administrator.
He has experience of a wide variety of applications, including
programming for both Microsoft Windows and Linux (e.g. MS Office,
MS Access, MS Visual Basic, HTML, Perl, Javascript, e-mail).
Clive wrote the software for his Chambers' Library bar-coding
system. He set up the first Chambers web site. One of his hobbies
is home automation.
Professional
Negligence
Clive
has dealt with many cases of alleged professional negligence.
Examples:
- solicitors
and barristers (eg concerning trade mark infringement proceedings
brought against an online auction site)
- accountants
and auditors (eg reconciliation errors in annual accounts;
failure to detect fraud; GE Capital v. Bankers Trust
- due diligence report for syndicated lenders concerning
management buyout of Magnet Kitchens)
- software
developers and consultants (eg software for banks, civil
engineering contractors and builders' merchants)
- architects
(negligent supervision of construction)
- engineers
(negligent design of basement water-proofing system)
- surveyors
and valuers (valuations for mortgage lenders)
- investment
advisers (negligent investment advice and liability for
fraud).
Banking
Banking
cases in which Clive has been instructed include:
- liability
of banks for commercial fraud (AMF v. Hashim - international
commercial fraud/constructive trust/conflict of laws)
- cheque
fraud
- syndicated
lending (GE Capital v. Bankers Trust - management
buyout of Magnet Kitchens)
- letters
of credit
- banking
regulation (deposit-taking and electronic money)
- advising
on setting up a web site for aggregating accounts.
Clive
co-wrote the chapter on electronic banking in Banking Litigation
(edited by Warne and Elliott, Sweet & Maxwell, 1999 and
2005).
Commercial
fraud
Commercial
fraud cases include:
- cheque
fraud
- liability
under bank guarantees
- fraudulent
investment schemes
- theft
of money by an employee using a company's online banking
facility
- applications
for freezing orders.
Clive
has given talks on commercial fraud to firms of solicitors.
Building
and engineering
Clive
has been involved in many cases concerning defect claims,
loss and expense claims, extension of time disputes, and professional
negligence allegations concerning architects, engineers and
surveyors. Examples:
- Balfour
Beatty v. Docklands Light Railway (1996) 78 BLR 42 (Court
of Appeal): heavy civil engineering dispute - conclusiveness
of certificate
- allegations
of professional negligence against an engineer concerning
water penetration into a basement
- adjudications
- international
and domestic arbitrations (including drilling problems in
an oil and gas joint venture, and defects in a petrochemical
plant)
- various
cases concerning buildings in Hong Kong.
Clive
is a TECBAR approved Adjudicator.
Insurance
Cases
have included:
- disputes
regarding aggregation clauses
- liability
under a D & O policy
- calculation
of liability for rebuilding costs following an oil refinery
explosion .
Other
commercial disputes
- Employment
(breach of restrictive covenants and misuse of confidential
information, including cases requiring an application for
an interim injunction)
- Company
law (breach of directors' duties and misuse of confidential
information by directors, claims based on warranties in
share sale agreements)
- Financial
services: advising on deposit-taking and electronic money,
questions concerning MiFID, liability of investment advisers
for negligence, fraudulent investment schemes
-
Sale of goods (including product recalls), and international
trade
- Oil
and gas (international arbitration concerning drilling problems
in an oil and gas joint venture)
- Insolvency
( setting aside statutory demands, injunction against presentation
of a petition, priorities between creditors)
- Cases
concerning sale of horses and bloodstock breeding.
Mediation
Clive
Freedman qualified as a CEDR mediator in 1997, and has conducted
over 20 mediations. He has also carried out two early neutral
evaluations through CEDR.
Most
of the mediations conducted by Clive have concerned IT disputes,
although he also mediates in other commercial fields. Clive
believes that his professional experience in dealing with
IT cases and IT clients and his own experience of computers,
networks and programming assists parties in the resolution
of disputes in this area. He has given talks on mediation
of IT disputes.
Examples of mediations:
- A
claim for £16 million against the supplier of an integrated
accounting and stock control system for a nationwide retailer
- A
claim for £11 million relating to satellite TV technology
- A
cancelled project for design of an e-commerce website
- A
highly-charged dispute between two companies who had shared
office premises and administrative staff but who had fallen
out
- A
dispute relating to ownership of farmland
- A
dispute concerning alleged copying of software
Arbitration
and Expert Determination
Arbitration
Clive
is a Chartered Arbitrator. He has been appointed as Arbitrator
by the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (a dispute concerning
payment for professional services) and by the British Computer
Society (a dispute regarding licensing of software). He was
also the arbitrator in an ad hoc appointment concerning interpretation
of a commercial contract. He has conducted two Early Neutral
Evaluations for CEDR.
As Counsel he has been involved in a number of domestic and
international arbitrations, including:
- defects
in a petrochemical plant (ICC, hearings lasted over 3 months,
claim of £32 million)
- insurance
claim following an oil refinery explosion (claim of $150
million)
- directors
and officers insurance for a failed US Savings Bank (claim
of $60 million)
- oil
and gas exploration joint venture (ICC, claim in excess
of $1billion)
- dispute
concerning electronic instrumentation in a process plant
- acting
on behalf of a foreign government in a commercial dispute
- several
building contract arbitrations in UK.
Arbitration
disputes:
- China
Agribusiness v. Balli Trading [1998] 2 Lloyds Rep 76;
enforcement of CIETAC arbitration award.
Expert
Determination
Co-author
of Expert Determination, Sweet & Maxwell, 2008
(with John Kendall and James Farrell). He has been instructed
in disputes concerning expert determination in relation to
He
often gives talks on expert determination.
Articles
and publications
- Co-author
of Expert Determination, Fourth Edition, John Kendall,
Sweet & Maxwell, 2008 (Kendall, Freedman and Farrell).
- Contributor
to Bullen & Leake & Jacob's Precedents of Pleadings
(IT disputes), Fifteenth Edition, Sweet & Maxwell,
2004.
- Contributor
to Banking Litigation (edited by Warne and Elliott,
1999 and 2005).
- The
UK's Draft Electronic Communications Bill, [1999] JIBL
377 (October 1999).
- Abortive
IT Projects - clearing up the mess, Computers &
Law December 2000/January 2001.
- Avoiding
Pitfalls in IT Mediations, Computers & Law, February/March
2004.
- An
article on J Pereira Fernandes SA v Mehta [2006]
EWHC 813 (Ch), [2006] 1 WLR 1543 Computer Law & Security
Report (Vol 23, No. 1, 2007), written with Jake Hardy
of Reed Smith, Richards Butler).
Additional
Professional Qualifications
- Fellow
of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, Chartered Arbitrator.
Member of the CIArb Panel of Mediators
- Fellow
of the British Computer Society
- CEDR
Accredited Mediator
- TECBAR
Approved Adjudicator
Appointments
- Chair
of the Disciplinary Panel of the British Society
- Trustee
of BAILII (Britain and
Ireland Legal Information Institute)
- Trustee
of the Society for Computers
& Law
- Member
of Bar Council's IT Committee since 1990
Professional Associations
- COMBAR
- TECBAR
- London
Common Law and Commercial Bar Association
- Society
for Computers and Law
- Society
of Construction Law
- Franco-British
Lawyers Association
- LCIA
Languages
French
(fluent), German (working knowledge).
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