Kaim Todner founder and longtime managing director Karen Todner confirmed on Twitter this week that the firm will 'move towards a controlled and orderly closure' next month. 'Clients and solicitors placed and cared for. New ventures ahead,' read her tweet.
'Pentagon hacker' defence
The firm is most famous for its decade-long representation of 'Pentagon hacker' Gary McKinnon, who was spared extradition to the United States from the UK in 2012. Mr McKinnon was a former computer systems administrator suffering from a depressive illness who would have faced up to 60 years imprisonment in the US if found guilty of what was described as 'the biggest military computer hack of all time.'
Legal aid battle
Kaim Todner is a member of the Big Firms Group, whose 37 members account for around 25 per cent of criminal legal aid work in the United Kingdom. The firm was at the forefront of the Fair Crime Contracts Alliance established to challenge a proposed overhaul of the procurement process for legal aid contracts put forward by Justice Secretary Michael Gove via judicial review. Though the MoJ proposal was subsequently dropped, Ms Todner told the Law Society Gazette that the judicial review and pushback campaign have been a 'huge distraction' with 'significant effect on the firm across many levels.' Ms Todner commented that the firm is looking at various options going forward.
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