Benji Pell uses Cripps in Express hostilities

Pell, who is best known for selling newspapers private documents about celebrities taken from the rubbish bins of law firms and chambers, has instructed Cripps to advise him on a claim against the Sunday Express.

Pell is suing over two Sunday Express articles alleging that he stole a list of names of Bloody Sunday paratroopers from rubbish sacks outside Brick Court Chambers and sold it to the IRA.

The Bloody Sunday Inquiry's chief QC Christopher Clarke is based at Brick Court.

In a High Court hearing in July, Pell will claim he never possessed the list or gave it to the IRA.

Pell moved to Cripps with the firm's new head of intellectual property Peter Jennings, who recently joined from London firm Pettman Smith.

Top libel silk Ronald Thwaites of Ely Place Chambers is acting for Pell, who specifically asked for the barrister after Doughty Street's Geoffrey Robertson QC was unable to act.

In a fitting tribute to the offending articles, the Sunday Express has in-structed a Brick Court barrister, Lucy Moorman, to represent it.

The Sunday Express has also instructed Richards Butler.