Sarah Smith is the director and senior supervising solicitor. She has extensive experience of criminal and regulatory litigation. She trained at West London firm Lawrence & Co and qualified in 2000, specialising in criminal defence. Moving to Brighton East Sussex after starting a family, Sarah has worked at firms in Sussex including Kellys Solicitors who specialise in protest law. In April 2017 she set up Tildens Ltd. Sarah has represented defendants at the police station and in the courts for offences ranging from theft to murder. Sarah is a member of the Law Society Criminal Litigation Scheme and is a Higher Rights Advocate. The article in the Law Society Gazette featured in our blog gives more details.

Alison Reeby is head of the Magistrates Court department and a senior solicitor and advocate. She qualified in 1995 and has worked as a criminal defence solicitor initially based in London and then Sussex. Alison defends the majority of our Magistrate Court trials. She is a member of the Law Society Criminal Litigation Scheme. She is a committed and dedicated advocate and we are proud that we have her fighting for our clients legal rights.

David Swainston is our police station representative. He has worked in the criminal justice system for decades. He is arguably the most experienced of us all. He is greatly respected, affable, capable and efficient. We are not keen for him to retire.

At Tildens we pride ourselves in providing a bespoke service to our clients. At court, as well as our solicitors we also instruct specialist barristers and solicitors to represent you. We believe that having the freedom to instruct external advocates allows us to tailor your representation to you and your case. We also regularly instruct legal experts to challenge prosecution evidence and to enhance the defence case.

Our office is run by Joanne Cooper, she is our calm and efficient office manager.

Sam Blackwell is a law graduate. He is a paralegal. He came for work experience and never left. He is in the process of becoming an accredited police station representative.

At the police station we offer a 24 hour emergency service free of charge. We attend ourselves or instruct only hand-picked specialist and qualified representatives. When preparing your case you can either attend our offices or in some cases we can visit you. Your case will be supervised by Sarah Smith. We are able to act on a private instruction - please contact to discuss.