Lawyer In The News

Who? Penny Muir, 57-year-old criminal law partner at six-partner north London firm Lewis Nedas & Co.

Why is she in the news? Represented Alin Turcu, one of the five men cleared last week of attempting to kidnap former Spice Girl Victoria Beckham.

The News of the World claimed in a story last November that its reporters had infiltrated the plot.

However, the Crown Prosecution Service dropped the case last week, telling the judge that the newspaper had paid 10,000 to parking attendant Florim Gashi for his story, which made his evidence unreliable.

The newspaper's role is now being investigated by the Attorney-General.

Background: LLB at Otago University in New Zealand 1964-67 and qualified as solicitor there.

Having moved to New Zealand as a child, she returned to the UK in 1983, and qualified as an English solicitor with Marcus Barnett in 1985.

She joined Lewis Nedas in 1993.

Route to the case: 'I was contacted by Mr Turcu's employer, a property company, with which I had had previous dealings.'

Thoughts on the case: 'The News of the World's role went far beyond investigative journalism - in my opinion they caused the story.

They took on a very dodgy participant informer with none of the safeguards or controls usually employed by the police.

The source of the story, Florim Gashi, had been involved in a previous failed prosecution.

My client is very young, and naturally sought out the company of fellow Romanian countrymen such as Gashi.

He got a lot of free dinners paid for by Gashi, and was involved in a few silly conversations, but now he simply wants to get back to his normal life.'

Dealing with the media: 'In general, the coverage has been pretty positive, with most of the media focusing on the role of the News of the World and its undue influence with the prosecution and the police.

I've had some previous experience doing television work in New Zealand, but this has been extremely high profile.'

Victoria MacCallum