Principal
Chris Charles
B.Com, LLB, M.B.A
Chris was admitted, and practiced, as a solicitor in South Africa, England and Hong Kong before being admitted in Australia in 1985. With over 53 years of experience, he has focussed primarily on commercial litigation and insolvency.
He also maintains extensive expertise in banking and finance, corporate law, insurance, construction, and property matters. He has experience in all of the Federal and Victorian State Courts and Tribunals, having appeared in them as solicitor or advocate in many hundreds of cases.
Major clients include financial institutions, insurance companies, diverse companies and firms, liquidators, bankruptcy trustees and private individuals.
Before he immigrated to Australia in 1986, Chris was a partner in the Hong Kong office of the worldwide law firm Baker & McKenzie. He was also a partner in Baker & McKenzie's Melbourne office for 4 years before joining Phillips Fox, now DLA Piper, in Melbourne as a commercial litigation and insolvency partner.
In 1998 Chris established Charles Fice, whose boutique office niche at the time was to market and operate a litigation funding product called Liquidator's Expense Insurance. Chris had developed this product in 1996 in conjunction with the Commonwealth Bank and GIO Insurance Ltd.
The product traded successfully with a win/loss ratio of 17 to 1. The litigation funding product may see a revival, as international law firms are expressing interest in it.
Chris remains a passionate and dedicated litigator who thrives on legal challenges and strategic advocacy. He also enjoys tutoring law students, one on one, for two years prior to their graduation.
