Carlo Taczalski

Carlo specialises in commercial, construction, insurance, and professional negligence matters. He has been recommended in the Legal 500 as a leading individual in a number of his core practice areas for a number of years and is currently ranked as a leading junior in six separate practice areas – Commercial, Civil Fraud, Construction, Insurance, Professional Negligence and Product Liability.

He is regularly in court as sole counsel and in both leading and led capacities. He has appeared before a wide range of tribunals including in the Privy Council, the Court of Appeal, High Court, arbitral tribunals and in adjudications.

The regularity of his court work means that he is very good on his feet and is praised for his meticulous and forceful cross examination and preparation.

Carlo also accepts instructions as an adjudicator and arbitrator and is a TECBAR and PNBA accredited adjudicator.

His present and recent caseload includes:

• Sanglier v Apollo – Carlo led Michael Harper in a 5-week TCC trial, following which Sanglier discontinued against Carlo’s and Michael’s clients before awaiting judgment.
• IBMG v Williams – successfully resisting a late notice freezing injunction, and now defending wide-ranging proceedings alleging conspiracy and dishonest assistance.
• Defending one of the lead intermediaries in the Ingenious Litigation (one of The Lawyer’s Top 10 cases of 2018); he (leading Frederick Simpson) successfully appealed to the Court of Appeal, overturning an Order that his client provide a cross-undertaking as the price for obtaining security for costs which would have had significant ramifications for his client’s total exposure.
• Sole counsel for the successful applicants in AIG Europe v McCormick [2020] EWHC 943 (TCC) which has re-stated the correct approach to substituting parties after the expiry of a limitation period.
• Sole counsel for the claimant insurance company in a broker’s negligence claim arising out of the fraudulent ‘placement’ of a (non-existent) reinsurance policy by a sub-broker.  Damages are in the region of £15M.
• Defending an adhesive manufacturer in wide-ranging claims that its product, which was incorporated into another product and distributed internationally, was defective causing hundreds of instances of damage across Europe (leading Michael Harper; damages circa £3M).
• Defending a recruitment consultant in relation to the placement of a large number of workers at a Belgian construction site (sole counsel against a silk and junior, damages said to be £3M).
• Defending the ex-CEO of an asset-backed financing company against allegations of dishonesty and mismanagement prior to his departure from the business, and its eventual administration (led by Daniel Shapiro KC).
• Defending a UK asset management firm in long-running litigation for conspiracy/fraud relating to the alleged asset stripping of a Polish company (led by Ben Quiney KC).
• Engaged on a dispute concerning rival branches of the Kuwaiti ruling family, where a wide-ranging conspiracy to cause loss by unlawful means is alleged.
• Defending (as sole counsel against a silk and junior) a liquidator in a section 212 application put at in excess of £2m.
• Defending a firm of architects in a dispute said to be worth £9M, brought by an Oxbridge College.
• A case put at £20 million+ in the Mercantile Court concerning the design and sale of a prototype electric vehicle.
• Defending an allegedly valuable professional negligence claim against accountants relating to the conduct of a COP9 / fraud enquiry by HMRC (Carlo acts for the accountants).
• Sole counsel for two of the Defendants in a $26 million claim in the (English) High Court concerning alleged professional negligence of Spanish and English lawyers said to have been conducting an arbitration in the US and then resisting the enforcement of its award in England.

Carlo read law at Downing College, Cambridge. Before coming to the Bar, he spent a year working for PricewaterhouseCoopers, and later developing business and service monitoring systems for a charity (of which he is now a trustee). His experience gives him the ability to communicate effectively with a wide range of people, work well either as part of a team or individually, and bring an acute commercial perspective to the issues at hand.

Carlo accepts appropriate public access clients.

News

• Carlo Taczalski successfully resists short notice freezing injunction: IBMG Ltd and others v McKeon, Williams and others
• Adjudication decision unenforceable for apparent bias

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Articles

• DIPT v Sanglier v Apollo: the importance of assessing the evidence, settling reasonably, and understanding the terms on which you contract
• Carlo Taczalski and Frederick Simpson are successful in the Court of Appeal Cross-undertakings have little place in the security for costs regime

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Events

• Carlo Taczalski to speak at London Build 2021 Expo
• Carlo Taczalski will be speaking at “Cash Is King – Payments and Changes in Tax Laws” webinar by Decipher Group

Qualifications

• Queen Mother Scholarship, Middle Temple (2010)
• Harmsworth Entrance Exhibition, Middle Temple (2010)
• Lovells Examination Prize, Downing College (2006)
• PricewaterhouseCoopers Scholarship (2005 – 2007)
• MA (Cantab.) (2008)

Memberships

• CLCBAR
• COMBAR
• TECBAR
• PNBA