For further information please contact:
Richard Preston, Principal Family Clerk, 020 7421 5300
Profile
John Buck specialises in family law work but is also instructed in property matters, as well as actions against the police.
His family work has included representing parents faced with residence and care applications, working on difficult cases involving individuals with severe personality disorders and ancillary relief in sensitive and high net worth cases.
His property work includes commercial and residential landlord and tenant disputes, disrepair claims where housing conditions have exacerbated illnesses such as Crone’s disease and sickle cell anaemia.
John has developed a wide-ranging civil practice, achieving success in several more unusual cases including acting on behalf of musicians, working on professional negligence cases involving surveyors valuing unique properties with no obvious comparables and obtaining damages in sensitive clinical negligence cases.
He began his career in a predominantly criminal chambers and joined Tanfield Chambers in 2000.
Experience
Family
Advocacy work in private Children Act cases with particular experience of those in which either or both parent suffer from a mental illness; make allegations of physical or sexual abuse against the other; hold fanatical religious beliefs or belong to an obscure religious sect.
Advocacy work in public law Children Act cases instructed on behalf of local authorities, parents and guardians alike.
Advisory and advocacy work in matrimonial property and Trusts of Land and Appointment of Trustees Act cases where assets range from a joint tenancy of a council flat to multi-million pound property or business empires. Particular experience of cases involving asset disposal or transfer to third party individuals or companies.
Property
Litigation relating to real property disputes, in particular between landlord and tenant, boundaries.
Advising Dacorum BC on restrictive covenants concerning land in their ownership.
Advisory and advocacy work involving professional negligence, inparticular of solicitors and surveyors.
Actions involving allegations of false imprisonment, assault, malicious prosecution or misfeasance in a public office against police officers and bailiffs. In the majority of cases psychiatric injury is alleged, necessitating the calling of competing expert evidence before a jury.
Significant Cases
Cerqueira & Moreira Lda v Bush & Alba Radio [1992] CA
Security for costs against a Portuguese company which sought to resist enforcement of a summary judgment in Portugal obtained in an English court on grounds such a judgment was not known to the Portuguese courts.
Li v Chung [2002] RCJ (Lawtel)
Represented Claimant who was a Chinese chef and obtained damages against his dentist for the negligent extraction of a molar which resulted in a partial loss of taste and smell. Reported in the Evening Standard on conclusion of case.
Treasure Island v CSSN for Social Care Inspection Care Standards Tribunal [2003]/223/EA
Appeal by owner of fostering agency against a refusal to register her as a fit person under the Care Standards Act 2000, involving 27 live witnesses over 16 days and with a QC as an opponent. Benchmark case on burden and standard of proof in establishing fitness.
Salim V Malik [2004] (Lawtel) RCJ, Morland J
Successful appeal against the decision of Deputy Master on an interesting point of law: namely whether leave should be given to defend an action brought on a dishonoured cheque in consideration for the transfer of leasehold commercial properties pursuant to an oral contract in breach of the formalities required by the LR(MP)A 1989.
Bargate V Chief Constable of Sussex Police [2005] Lewes County Court
Successful claim arising from the negligent bailment by the Sussex police of a herd of sheep pending a criminal prosecution which were either lost, destroyed or converted into lamb chops by a complainant farmer.
Mchugh V Reast And Dca [2006] Central London County Court
Represented Claimant in claim for false imprisonment, assault and malicious prosecution found by a jury to have been assaulted by a court bailiff thereby causing a relapse of a bipolar affective disorder which had lain dormant since late adolescence.
In The Media
John lectures regularly on topics such as Pensions in Ancillary Relief, Child Maintenance and Dowries.
In April 2004 Family Law Journal published an article from John entitled 'Can dowries be claimed in English law?' on the enforceability of Muslim dowries in the English courts.
Memberships
Member, Family Law Bar Association
Member, South Eastern Circuit Bar Mess
Qualifications
BA, MA (Christ Church, Oxford)
Dip Law (Polytechnic of Central London)