Sam moved to the Bar in 1996 after practising as a litigation solicitor at Freshfields involved in commercial and public law litigation.

When the Attorney General set up the Panel of Counsel for Government work in 1999, Sam was in the first group of appointments to the C Panel. He was then promoted to the B Panel at the earliest opportunity, in 2002. In February 2007 Sam was appointed to the A Panel (for juniors 10 years plus call), again at the first opportunity.

In public law Sam regularly acts for a range of central and local government clients and other public bodies; and on behalf of claimants. He regularly appears as an advocate in the Administrative Court and Appellate Courts, and in a range of tribunals. 

Sam is ranked as a leading junior in the most recent edition of Chambers and Partners in 4 areas: Administrative & Public Law, Human Rights, Local Government and Education (for more details, click on “What others say”). 

A flavour of Sam’s balanced claimant/defendant practice is given by some of the cases in which he has been instructed recently. He is acting in the European Court of Human Rights (now before the Grand Chamber) for two sisters who have lived and cared for each other for many years, and who are challenging the fact that while married couples and same-sex couples (under the new Civil Partnership Act) are exempt from inheritance tax on their estates, they will not be (Burden v UK).

He is acting in several multi-million pound cases in a range of tax areas (VAT, income tax, corporation tax and excise duty), both for and against HMRC, the cases often involving points of public law and human rights.

He recently acted for a group of prisoners in a Judicial Review challenging the independence of the Parole Board from the Home Office/Ministry of Justice (Brooke v Secretary of State for Justice).

He acted for the Government of Cyprus in the European Court of Human Rights (Grand Chamber) in a case concerning retrospective punishment and life sentences for murder (Kafkaris v Cyprus).

He is regularly instructed by the Foreign Office to represent the UK Government in cases before the European Court of Human Rights (e.g. Wainwright v United Kingdom (2007) privacy rights). 

He acted for the Metropolitan Police in proceedings concerning the power to take children home in dispersal areas (M v Metropolitan Police) [2007] QB 399.

He regularly acts for Claimants in education law cases: he recently represented a child in a Judicial Review of an Independent Appeal Panel in a case raising issues under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (T v Devon CC [2007] EWHC 763 (Admin)).

Sam is a founding Committee Member of the Human Rights Lawyers Association and a member of the Administrative Law Bar Association.

For details of Sam Grodzinski's case law practice, please see Notable Cases.

For a printable version (.pdf) of Sam Grodzinski's CV, please download from here.

If you would like any further information regarding Sam Grodzinski's practice, please contact his Practice Team, or call +44 (0)20 7404 3447.