7 BELL YARD is a well established common law set of barristers' chambers with an emphasis on crime but with some members practising in civil, family and immigration. In recent years Chambers has had to adapt to meet the rapidly changing demands of practice at the Bar and are soon to be in a position to apply for Quality Mark. 7 BELL YARD guarantees a fast and friendly, efficient and conscientious, dynamic and completely professional service, providing cutting edge expertise throughout the range of the membership. Chambers can rightly claim to offer capable, confident, courageous, eloquent and learned representation before a wide variety of courts and tribunals at every level, and the barristers of 7 Bell Yard are happy to advise and assist at all stages in the process of cases towards their conclusion. 7 BELL YARD has always made a point of cultivating an approachable and entirely unstuffy attitude towards their professional and lay clients, a culture reflected in the high order of results members achieve from the conversational nature of members' advocacy, results which are widely attested to by the enormous number of solicitors who use their services.
Instructions are accepted from a broad range of clients, including those funded by the Legal Services Commission, the Criminal Defence Service, Premier Monitoring, and local authorities. Many of the members prosecute regularly and frequently on behalf of the Crown Prosecution Service.
The clerks are happy to advise on the selection of the suitable advocate for your requirements.
Chambers operates a flexible fees structure.
7 BELL YARD runs a lecture programme accredited by the Law Society and ILEX and members are available to give lectures in-house by arrangement.
Under the leadership of David Wolchover, a prolific and learned author in the field of criminal law matters with thirty years experience of practice at the criminal bar, the academic and scholastic atmosphere inspired among our members has made 7 BE LL YARD a true CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE .
In 2001 chambers published David Wolchover's latest textbook Silence and Guilt , the leading authority on the controversial silence provisions of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. Copies can be obtained from chambers. The work is regularly updated in the shape of a Noter-Up insert which can be downloaded from a web page on this site.
History of 7 Bell Yard
The historical roots of 7 BELL YARD go back to 1981 with the founding of one of the early "mega-sets" at 11 South Square, Gray's Inn, under shadow Attorney General Arthur Davidson QC MP. By the mid-1980s "South Square" was headed by Lord (Ivor) Richard QC, formerly British Ambassador to the United Nations under the Callaghan Government and later t o become leader of the Lords in the Blair Government. In 1992 chambers went through a period of contraction but a number of members chose to stay together, in particular because it meant retaining our status as a preferred prosecuting set for Luton and Bed s CPS. Moving to premises in Chancery Lane more suitable for our needs as a smaller set and adopting the name Lion Court to mark the transition, we were headed initially by Steven Jacobs under whose stewardship chambers proceeded to grow apace in terms of business turnover and in our numbers and by 1995 we had been joined by Neil Taylor QC a very distinguished silk and former deputy High Court judge. In 1998 Steven announced his retirement from practice at the Bar, followed not long afterwards by Neil, and David Wolchover, one of the original South Square contingent, who had left in 1995 to work as a sole practitioner so that he could better care for his infirm mother, accepted an invitation to return as new Head of Chambers. Not long afterwards problems which had been building on the administration side resulted in our taking on Kevin Tarrant as senior clerk and a new era in the life of chambers began. In September 1999 Chambers moved to its present address, and the expansion which this necessitated forced a respectable rise in numbers and an exponential growth in business.
David Wolchover's idea of a chambers motto (not accepted with universal acclaim by the other members!)
"Ex facto adversa tintinnabula septi feriamus" is David's idea for a humerous motto. It translates as "We knock Seven Bells out of the Opposition." The origins of the phrase "knock seven bells" out of an adversary appear to be naval. The seventh bell of the third watch of the night was half past seven in the morning, probably the hour when hapless tars sentenced to a flogging were brought up on deck to receive their punishment. The punishment we mete out to our opponents is more refined.
The premises at 7 BELL YARD
Number Seven Bell Yard enjoys the somewhat dubious reputation of being the approximate location of Mrs Lovett's Pie Shop. Here in the final years of the 18th century unsuspecting members of the public supposely consumed the best meat pies in London, made from the most succulent parts of the hundreds of Sweeney Todd's victims, whose remains, after they were dispatched in the Demon Barber's infamous revolving chair at 186 Fleet Street (now Kall-Kwik), were conveyed through a secret tunnel to Bell Yard where they filled the delicious pies baked by Mrs Lovett in the basement - in what is now ou r communal study and meetings room!
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