If a stroppy competitor puts one on a judge in the bar at Crufts because his dog misses out on the gongs, the chances are he will be defended at a Kennel Club disciplinary tribunal by 40-year-old Cheltenham sole practitioner Howard Ogden.Mr Ogden, who practises, appropriately enough, from a ramshackle former petshop in the rough end of the spa town's high street, has been a registered breeder of pedigree Griffons since 1972.'I enjoy doing the Kennel Club hearings because dogs are my escapism.

It's a totally different world.

It doesn't matter who you are, how much money you've got, where you come from.

Either you can produce the best looking dog in the country or you can't,' he says.This canine meritocracy suits the Lancashire exile: he is a pragmatist from the school of grit who quit Cheltenham's leading criminal firm, Robinsons, after six years as a partner to build his own firm from scratch.'I've had to go through the experience of how do you actually found a criminal practice,' he explains.

He signed up to no less than seven duty solicitor schemes, for a while referring cases on to other firms at £20 a time.'I initially operated from home, until my marriage foundered, and then I rented a small new property for me and the dogs near the centre of town and operated my business from there.' In December 1992, he secured his current premises.Mr Ogden also built a reputation for a personal service with clients - he put out a flyer with the copyline 'If you're nicked ask for Oggy.''You have to deal with people in their language if you are going to get on with them.

So I use the words punter, nick, banged to rights and so on.'One person who did ask for Oggy was the 52-year-old Gloucester builder Frederick West, who is currently charged with the murder of nine people whose remains have been found buried at his Cromwell Street home.

Seven out of the nine have so far been identified by police.

The search for other bodies is carrying on at his former addresses and in nearby fields.The immediate effect of the West case on Mr Ogden's practice has been to make more pressing his plans to expand.

A second branch is now firmly on the cards.'I'm also looking for a keen young solicitor - who is prepared to get stuck in, to give of themselves 24 hours a day to a criminal law practice, acknowledging that that is the way to make the restraints of legal aid work - together with an experienced caseworker, so that I can concentrate on Frederick West, and that is going to require a lot of me in the next 18 to 24 months.'Mr Ogden has taken a proactive approach to managing the immediate demands of the case.

He instructed leading counsel within 48 hours of taking it on, and on top of that he has been able to get hold of a good deal of documentation from the police to help his preparations.'Forty hours of tape recorded interviews have just been delivered to my offices for transcribing, none of it easy listening.

So naturally I've made arrangements for me and my staff to receive counselling.'One of the main problems for Mr Ogden's client has been the mass of prejudicial comment in the press.While the official solicitor has warned the media to 'keep off' the West children (see [1994] Gazette, 16 March, 10), Mr Ogden has enjoyed less success in persuading a Matrix Churchill-preoccupied Attorney-General to injunct tabloid newspapers publishing allegations about Mr West's sexual behaviour - factors which could be central to any murder trial.Earlier in the month, he staged a press conference at which he accused sections of the media of 'lurid speculation' in its 'copious and unrelenting publicity' over the so-called 'house of horror' case.It was a bold step - but one which underscored the core presumption of innocence.But, as Mr Ogden points out: 'There is a dilemma here: some might say it is in my client's interests to allow the press to stick their noses into this matter as far as their desire for increased circulation figures will allow and, in so doing, make this case untriable.

At the same time, I recognise I have a dut y as a solicitor of the Supreme Court to make sure this does not happen.'In spite of his vehement criticism of some newspapers, Mr Ogden's involvement in what will become the biggest trial since the Bulger murder has alerted usually solicitor-unfriendly elements in the media to the plight of the small practitioner.As he told the Mail on Sunday: 'It might, just might, highlight the fact that there are many struggling solicitors out there working against the odds without decent rates of remuneration for legal aid work.'The West trial is not expected until spring 1995 at the earliest.

It could be moved to Bristol or even to the Old Bailey.

That has still to be decided.What is certain is that the defence solicitor at the centre of the case is an unflinching but pragmatic advocate of the rights of a client to be properly and vigorously defended.'My clients get a one-to-one service, something fairly unusual, the solicitor in person as opposed to an unqualified clerk.

My reputation locally is of actually getting off my arse and turning up in person,' and you cannot say fairer than that.