Bio

Bryan De Verneuil-Smith is a partner in Ogier's Dispute Resolution team based in Guernsey, specialising in commercial litigation, contentious trusts, insolvency, fund disputes, shareholder disputes, fraud and asset tracing, commercial and residential property disputes, regulatory and all types of insurance and reinsurance related disputes. After gaining wide experience of commercial litigation at the City of London office of one of Scotland’s leading law firms, practising English law, Bryan has practised offshore since 2013, acting for and advising directors, shareholders and other corporate stakeholders, fund managers, trustees, beneficiaries and other parties to trusts. Bryan joined Ogier in January 2019. Bryan qualified as an advocate of the Royal Court of Guernsey in February 2016. Since qualifying he has represented clients in the Royal Court on various commercial matters. In particular he was part of the team of advocates who represented and successfully defended the executive directors of Carlyle Capital Corporation (“CCC”), an investment fund, against a claim for nearly $2 billion, in Guernsey’s biggest ever civil trial (lasting nearly 6 months in 2016). He continued to act for the executive directors in the appeal of the Royal Court decision heard in October 2018 and was involved in the matter until it settled in May 2020. Bryan regularly delivers webinars on contentious trusts issues and directors' duties to trust and corporate clients. Bryan has written articles on a variety of subjects including on Guernsey trust cases, pre-action disclosure, the collapse of funds, the solvency test and the Carlyle case. Bryan is also a contributor to the Guernsey chapter of International Trusts Laws (LexisNexis).He is a member of the Institute of Directors, the Guernsey International Legal Association, INSOL and ARIES (Association of Restructuring and Insolvency Experts (Channel Islands).