A Solicitor claiming to have experience in Civil Litigation and Criminal Defence The Complaints Handling Partner at Norton Peskett

When a client of Norton Peskett finally realizes that they have been cheated, lied to, misled etc. and complains, it is Julian Gibbons who takes over the file. The instant a complaint is made, even to the internal complaints procedure that all law firms are require to have in place, any staff that were previously assigned to the client instantly refuse all further communication with their client. This is to prevent any inadvertent disclosure, or leaking of evidence, that might be useful to that client. The firm will also attempt to hold any client assets as hostages at this time to pressure the former client to take their losses and go away quietly. Hence a client must arrange for the turnover of documents, take all client account money due to themselves, and collect as much evidence as possible, before giving the firm any inkling that one has wised up to their dishonest practices.

If given the chance, Julian Gibbons will charge the client account £200 or more per hour of his time to answer any correspondence relating to the client's legitimate complaints, and for fighting against any client that is trying to take over whatever business they had hired Norton Peskett for in the first place. And of course the client has to accept Mr. Gibbons word as to how many hours he actually spends on the file: I am aware that he has billed 5 hours of his time for filling out a form which I was able to complete in 30 minutes. And I am a mere layman living in a foreign country 6000 miles away with no access to advice or other resources on British Law. In my opinion he is either remarkably incompetent, or else he pads his billable hours. Bottom line: rescue all hostages before you make any complaint.

Mr. Gibbons claims to be an expert on litigation in the British courts. He brags that he does not hire barristers to represent him in court because he likes to do his own litigation. Well, he hired a barrister to act against me in a Multi-Track (Upper Trial Court in the UK) case when I, a mere layman, was acting pro se. 

The tactics that Mr. Gibbons employs to fight disgruntled former clients include the following:

• Using arcane legal jargon to confuse the client, or impress the client that he has a superior knowledge of the law.
• Telling a former customer that he has blocked their email address in his server so that their emails will be discarded unseen. This is a particularly childish tactic: It is the electronic equivalent of putting his fingers in his ears and singing la-la-la at the top of his voice.
  
• Refusing to correspond at all with a former client.
• Deliberately misunderstanding a client's letter in a frivolous and obviously contrived manner.
• Outright lying about facts that  both he and the client are well aware of.
• Refusing to surrender his Grant of Probate. Thus he continues to have control over his client's assets even though his client has fired him.
  

In summary, Mr. Gibbons does not view his job as reaching a fair and reasonable settlement with a former customer. Rather he sees his job as getting rid of anyone who dares to complain with the minimum cost to his firm. It takes a great deal of persistence to fight against such a dishonourable opponent. One must clearly demonstrate to him that one is too well informed to believe his misleading statements on points of law, and sufficiently determined to take the fight as far as ones needs to go. Creating a web site to warn other future potential victims is just one small battle in a long war. I am in this for the long haul.

Indeed, Mr. Gibbons has made several attempts to suppress this very website to prevent readers like yourself from having the benefit of this information. He first tried to intimidate the hosting company claiming that my site was defamatory. That failed because a hosting company is immune from any liability arising from the material published on websites that it hosts. Next, Mr. Gibbons tried to hijack the domain name “nortonpeskett.com” by filing a UDRP dispute with the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center. He even resorted to perjury in his complaint to WIPO: He deliberately and willfully lied to the court about previous disciplinary actions against him by SRA/LCS. His attempt failed, the court ruled in favour of free speech allowing you to continue to have access to this website. These links will take you to Norton Peskett's complaint, my response, and the court's ruling. Rather than engage in open discussion Mr. Gibbons instead seeks to suppress free speech. Like many con‑artists and predators he wishes to cloak the activities of his firm from public scrutiny. They cannot operate in the light of day, they cannot victimize the well informed.

If you have entered the Web Site at this page and are wondering what all this is about, then please feel free to explore the entire site to see for yourself the full story.