Focused entirely on criminal law
The need to specialise has increasingly been felt in the field of legal services for several decades. All clients, from individuals to companies, expect competent legal advice from expert lawyers specialised in the field of law pertaining to the particular issue at hand. Specialising in criminal law entails more today than, for example, during the time of Max Alsberg, i.e., beyond dealing solely with “classic” crimes, criminal law today relates in many ways to other legal areas and non-judicial disciplines.
There is a close relation, for instance:
- to commercial law, tax law, corporate law, securities law, accounting and business in general;
- to environmental criminal law, environmental administrative law and general administrative law, but also to environmental technology and the sciences;
- to criminal product liability and physicians’ liability, as well as to medical issues;
- to international legal aid and the criminal laws of other countries;
- to foreign trade law and administrative law related to European and international trade.
Finally, dealing with appeals of verdicts of the regional courts and the higher regional courts requires knowledge of both the older and latest jurisdiction of the Federal Court of Justice.
Thus, the field of criminal law is far more comprehensive today than in times when criminals did not belong to (“fine”) society and accused members of society only needed a lawyer to attain credibly that they were not criminals. As law enforcement agencies and criminal law legislators are increasingly using criminal law as a means to control and correct negative developments in society and shortfalls of the political process, there is an increasing need for legal advice and representation regarding the risks arising from criminal law and judicial proceedings, even among law-abiding individuals and institutions.
This development has led to two different approaches by law firms to providing specialized criminal law legal services. At certain large law firms, which generally focus on business consultancy, criminal law departments were created in an effort to service the increasing demand for specialised criminal law services. Our law firm, on the other hand, decided at a very early point to specialise exclusively in the field of criminal law and seek cooperation with other colleagues and law firms competent in other fields of law whenever the particular case requires.
Although a lot may speak for an "all-in-one" service by one law firm, we are convinced that legal advice in the areas of civil law, commercial law, tax law or administrative law should be strictly separated from criminal law assessments of appropriate actions and such assessments should be performed by specialists who have not previously rendered advisory services to the particular client.