Peter Lownds has a mixed practice involving defending in complex general and financial crime cases, and representing professionals in disciplinary tribunals and at inquests.
He is currently listed as a leading junior in Chambers & Partners and Legal 500 in crime, financial crime, and professional discipline.
He is deeply experienced in defending clients facing criminal allegations of fraud or high-level involvement in drugs supply. He recently successfully defended a man accused of involvement in a multi-million pounds motor insurance fraud. His other cases during 2025 have included, defending a businesswoman alleged to be involved in a major international holiday fraud, and another professional woman accused of organising a fake burglary of her own home to make a high-value fraudulent insurance claim.
A substantial part of Peter’s practice involves defending professionals in disciplinary proceedings. He acts for health professionals, teachers, and police officers. He is regularly instructed in cases involving parallel criminal proceedings, where, for example, the allegations are of dishonesty, sexual misconduct, or neglect. His recent cases in the last year have included representing a GP accused of sexually assaulting working colleagues, a hospital consultant accused of wilful neglect of a patient, and a dentist facing charges of serious clinical failings and dishonesty.
He is also regularly instructed to represent interested persons at inquests. He has acted for families, public authorities, private companies, and individual professionals. He is currently representing a senior medical professional in the inquest into the death of patients treated by the breast surgeon Ian Patterson (who was convicted in 2017 of multiple incidents of wounding patients with intent). He is also acting for a local authority in an inquest concerning a dementia patient who died following a fall from a hospital balcony. His other recent inquests include representing a GP at a very highly publicised inquest into the death of a young women who died as a consequence of very severe ME. Additionally, he acted on behalf of another GP who was involved in the care and treatment of an autistic child who committed suicide at her school.
Peter undertakes pro bono work for the Death Penalty Project and is a committed volunteer for the homeless charity Crisis.
Peter accepts Direct Access instructions.
Peter is currently listed as a leading junior in Financial Crime in both Chambers & Partners and Legal 500. He is particularly recognised for his sensitive management of clients, commitment to cases and tactical judgement.
He started his legal career as a litigator with Slaughter and May. He has great expertise and deep experience in defending serious cases involving allegations of fraud, money laundering, and corruption. His fraud experience encompasses all types of cases, including advanced fee, false identity, mortgage, benefit, and Ponzi and pyramid schemes.
His cases during 2025 have included three very substantial VHCC frauds. These have involved representing a company director accused of being involved in an alleged highly sophisticated six-year “cash for crash” insurance fraud, defending a businesswoman accused of participation in a complex international time-share fraud, and acting for a City trader alleged to have assisted in the money laundering of substantial profits from drugs supply.
R v BN (Isleworth CC)
Represented a man accused of involvement in a Grenfell Tower relief fund fraud
K v X (Southwark CC)
Acting for client accused on involvement in a multi-million-pound energy saving product fraud .
R v I (Southwark CC)
Acting for a business owner accused of involvement in a boiler room fraud concerning the selling to private investors of a US based investment product involving the lending of money to pay-day loan companies.
R v D (Southwark CC)
Representing a director charged with fraudulent trading concerning the activities of a food distribution company.
R v P (Cardiff CC)
Acting for a wholesale Northern Soul music manufacturer and seller accused of fraudulent trading and breach of copyright and trades mark offences.
R v B (Teesside CC)
Acting for magistrate accused of money laundering his son’s drugs receipts.
R v R (Central Criminal Court)
Acting for a senior banker in an immensely factually complex banking corruption case concerning allegations of bribes being accepted in regard to applications to a European bank from oil and gas companies in the old Soviet Republics.
R v P (Southwark CC)
Acting for a company owner charged with involvement in multimillion pound international banking fraud involving the theft of monies from the bank accounts of extremely wealthy individuals.
R v R (Blackfriars CC)
Representing the owner of rail engineering consultancy company charged with evading all income tax, national insurance, and VAT for 13 years.
R v H (Nottingham CC)
Acting for a business director charged, together with his wife (a retired District Judge), with the forgery of a will and other documents to facilitate the theft of two properties.
R v B (Southwark CC)
Acting for the assistant to the managing director in a high value City-based diamond trading fraud that involved the selling of overpriced coloured diamonds to investors.
Peter is currently listed as a leading junior in Criminal Law by both Chambers & Partners and The Legal 500.
Drugs Supply
He is frequently instructed in cases concerning the commercial importation or supply of drugs. He has considerable experience in pursuing disclosure disputes, identifying and running abuse-of-process applications, and challenging the prosecution’s interpretation of telephone evidence.
Notable cases include successfully acting for a woman charged with involvement in a major nationwide opium supply conspiracy and successfully appealing the sentence of the pilot of an aircraft used to import cocaine from mainland Europe. He recently successfully defended a man accused of playing a leading role in a major South-West based Class A supply network, in which the central evidence was founded on alleged novel anti-surveillance telephones.
Homicide & Serious Non-fatal Violence
He is experienced in representing clients accused of homicide or serious non-fatal violence. He has dealt with many cases involving an alleged gang or organised crime background. Notable recent cases include representing a young man with learning difficulties accused of the manslaughter of a delivery driver and acting for a businessman accused of attempting to murder his wife.
In a particularly high-profile case, he successfully represented the pilot of a helicopter charged with manslaughter following a fatality at Long Marston Airfield.
Trafficking
Peter is experienced in representing clients accused of trafficking offences. His cases have included representing a music company businessman facing charges of trafficking South American women to work in a prostitution business.
Rape & Other Sexual Offending
He has conducted many trials involving allegations of rape and serious sexual offending. His cases include defending a man charged with historical rapes as part of a major grooming investigation and representing a mental health carer alleged to have sexually abused a woman lacking the capacity to consent. His past rape cases include obtaining an acquittal for an actor who appeared in the film War Horse.
Terrorism
Peter has defended in Islamic terrorism cases. These include the House of Lords case of R v G; R v J [2009] UKHL 13 and a very high-profile case concerning al-Qaeda’s internet media operation. His experience includes representing a teenager accused of grooming a vulnerable fellow college student to construct a pipe bomb for use in a planned terrorist incident. He also acted as junior counsel for a man accused of conducting an animal-rights-motivated bombing campaign against Oxford University.
R v O
Acting for a woman accused of orchestrating a fake burglary of her own home, a substantial fraudulent insurance claim, witness intimidation and perverting the course of justice.
R v X
Represented a consultant anaesthetist alleged to have physically assaulted a child while trying to put a mask providing air and anaesthetic on to the child’s face. After a two-day trial, during which the court heard from multiple medical eyewitnesses, the District Judge found the doctor not guilty.
R v M
Representing a man alleged to have played a leading role in a major cocaine supply network. The case involved prosecution expert evidence of the alleged deployment of a novel telephone anti-surveillance technique involving the use of spoof SIM cards.
R v A
Acting for a businessman accused of attempting to murder his wife.
R v K
Acting for a man alleged to have a played a leading role in a Greater London heroin conspiracy.
R v B
Acting for a retired magistrate accused of drugs-related money laundering in a case involving evidence from a Supergrass.
Acting for a mental health care worker alleged to have sexually abused a woman lacking the capacity to consent. The case involved the questioning of two witnesses with severe learning difficulties.
R v W
The successful appeal of the 19-year prison sentence of the ‘cocaine pilot’. Andrew Wright had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to import £33.5m of cocaine in his light vessel plane.
R v K
Represented a garage owner at trial charged with involvement in a conspiracy to import and supply two hundred kilos of cocaine via Tilbury docks.
R v L
Represented a man with learning difficulties charged with manslaughter involving robbery on pizza delivery driver
R v I
Representing a teenager accused of grooming a vulnerable fellow college student to buy ingredients for a pipe bomb to be used in a terrorist attack.
Peter is regularly instructed in inquests, including Article 2 inquests. He is very well recognised for his tactical judgment and sensitive client management skills.
He has acted for families of the bereaved, public authorities, private companies, and individual professional workers. His experience includes representing interested persons into deaths caused by deliberate criminal acts, deaths in custody, deaths in healthcare settings, workplace accidents, and deaths at schools or in the community.
Peter is currently representing a senior medical professional in the inquest into the death of patients treated by the breast surgeon Ian Patterson (who was convicted in 2017 of multiple incidents of wounding patients with intent). He is also currently acting on behalf of a local authority in an inquest connected with the Lampard Inquiry, which concerns a dementia patient who died following a fall from a hospital balcony.
His other recent inquests include representing a GP at a very highly publicised inquest into the death of a young women who died as a consequence of very severe ME. Additionally, he acted on behalf of another GP who was involved in the care and treatment of an autistic child who committed suicide at her school.
Inquest touching the death of CB
Representing emergency department nurse in high-profile inquest into the death of a young man suffering from cardiogenic shock.
Inquest touching death of JC
Representing family in high-profile inquest into death of man who suffered a cardiac arrest after being physically restrained in a pub. The case had been adjourned part way through the proceedings after the coroner invited the police to re-open a criminal investigation following Peter’s cross-examination of the forensic pathologist and one of the men involved in the restraint.
Inquest touching death of LW
Representing sheltered housing company in inquest into the death of a man with mental health and learning difficulties who died as a result of a ruptured oesophagus after a period of weight loss and vomiting. My client had housed the deceased in the immediate period prior to his death.
Inquest touching the death of DN
Representing a hospital trust in an inquest in the death of man who died from a heroin overdose following his discharge into the community from a mental health unit run by my client.
Inquest touching the death of KF and others
Representing GP at in an inquest into the deaths of four people in circumstances in which a father shot and killed his partner and their children before shooting himself. My client participated in the firearms application process for the gun involved.
Inquest touching the death of HW
Representing a GP at an inquest into the death of a 12-year-old boy who was killed after a man deliberately drove his car into a group of school children. My client had conducted a Mental Health Act assessment on the man responsible.
Inquest touching the death of LB
Representing a doctor in an inquest into the death in of a woman at HMP Peterborough who died following a period of alcohol and drug withdrawal. My client had conducted an examination of the deceased at Peterborough Crown Court.
Peter is currently ranked as a leading junior in Professional Discipline in both Chambers & Partners and Legal 500.
Prior to transferring to the Bar, he worked as a clinical negligence solicitor and as the legal adviser to a leading teaching trade union. This background has equipped him with sensitive client-care skills and invaluable experience of the full range of disciplinary and workplace performance problems experienced by professionals.
He acts for health professionals, teachers, and police officers.
Peter has dealt with a wide range of cases, including allegations of sexual offending, dishonesty, professional or clinical error, health issues, inadequate service provision, bullying, serious compliance failings, and alleged disgraceful conduct outside work.
He is experienced in handling factually complex cases involving voluminous materials and multiple complaints.
He is often instructed in cases concerning allegations, such as of dishonesty, sexual misconduct, or neglect, where his clients are also facing parallel criminal proceedings. His disciplinary cases in the last year have included defending a GP accused of sexually assaulting two work colleagues and a hospital consultant accused of wilful neglect of a patient.
He has acted as the legal adviser at hearings for the Teaching Regulator and for a University School of Medicine. In addition, he has also served on the Professional Conduct Committee of the Bar Standards Board.
2025
GMC v Dr C
Representing hospital consultant accused of wilful neglect of a theatre patient (ongoing)
GMC v Dr C
Representing GP accused of sexually assaulting working colleagues at the surgery (3-week hearing)
GMC v A
Representing A&E doctor accused of stealing medicine and seeking to persuade working colleagues to provide dishonest evidence (2-week hearing)
2024
GDC v K
Acting for a dentist facing allegations concerning the diagnosis of tongue cancer and financial dishonesty (2-week hearing)
GMC v G
Acting for doctor convicted of stalking his ex-girlfriend (1-week hearing)
2023
GMC v Dr S
Representing consultant anaesthetist accused of assaulting a patient during a clinical procedure (ongoing)
GMC v Dr M
Representing GP accused of multiple acts of dishonesty regarding applications for professional positions. (4-week hearing)
GMC v Dr M
Representing emergency medicine doctor accused of sexually harassing nurses. (2-week hearing)
2022
Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons v Ms A
Representing RCVS against nurse accused of dishonest record keeping. (1-week hearing)
GMC v Dr X
Representing consultant in acute medicine accused of dishonest misrepresentation to facilitate access to a private hospital. (2-week hearing)
General Pharmaceutical Council v Mr A
Representing GPC against pharmacist convicted of supplying controlled drugs. (1-week hearing)
GMC v Dr A
Representing consultant in general medicine accused by his wife of assault and coercive control. (5-week hearing)
2021
GMC x Dr M
Representing surgeon accused of plagiarising the academic work of a colleague. (2-week hearing)
GMC v Dr B
Representing consultant anaesthetist accused of stealing and taking controlled drugs. (1-week hearing)
GMC v Dr M
Representing consultant endocrinologist accused of sexual assault. (3-week hearing)
Peter Lownds represented a man accused of involvement in a fraud in which it was…
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