Dr Dominic Thomas-James

Dominic is a Global Justice Fellow at Yale University and a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge. He serves as a Course Director and Tutor in international development and international relations at the University of Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education, and is a member of the Cambridge Centre for Criminal Justice at the Faculty of Law. As an academic, Dominic’s research interests and areas of expertise include economic crime (including corruption, money laundering, terrorism financing, tax crimes, market abuse and fraud), financial regulation, legal and institutional development, and particularly the role of offshore and international financial centres. He is the author of the book Offshore Financial Centres and the Law: Suspect Wealth in British Overseas Territories (Routledge, 2021) and his writings are frequently published in academic journals, including as a regular contributor to The Company Lawyer (Sweet & Maxwell).

Dominic earned his Ph.D. and M.Phil. from Queens’ College, University of Cambridge and read law at King’s College London. His doctoral research, supervised by Professor Barry Rider OBE, culminated in a thesis entitled: Suspect Wealth: A Risk to Stability, Development and Sustainability – the case of Bermuda, the Turks and Caicos Islands, and Anguilla.

Dominic is regularly invited to speak and present his research at conferences and symposia in the UK and overseas. Recent talks include the UK Government Cabinet Office, the Bermuda Development Agency, Yale University Global Justice Conference, the Inter-Governmental Action Group Against Money Laundering in West Africa, the Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy, Stanford University, the annual Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime, Sebelas Maret University and the Supreme Audit Board of the Republic of Indonesia. He is often asked for comment by the media on matters relating to his research areas.

Dominic has consulted to various inter-governmental and international organisations. He is presently a consultant to ICC FraudNet, the specialist fraud and asset-recovery division of the International Chamber of Commerce, where he serves as Editor of the Global Annual Report – a practitioner publication examining contemporary global developments and case law in financial crime.

He regularly provides trainings and workshops internationally on compliance with FATF anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing regulations, corporate beneficial ownership registers, and regulating the legal profession. Examples include delivering an integrity programme to officials from the Ministry of Finance of the Philippines, and facilitating regional consultative forums convened by the Economic Community of West African States GIABA.

As well as his research, Dominic lectures law and international development widely. He teaches on justice and development at the University of Cambridge Department of Politics and International Studies, and on international relations and development courses at the University of Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education. He lectures law on several LLM modules at BPP University Law School, including fraud and financial crime, transnational criminal justice, commercial law, financial regulation and compliance, and the law of investigations. He has also taught as a Guest lecturer at the University of Reading, University of Lincoln, Nile University Nigeria, and is a Visiting Lecturer at BML Munjal University, India.

Since 2015, Dominic has been a Secretariat Member of the annual Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime at Jesus College, Cambridge – the world’s foremost discussion forum for financial crime and integrity-related issues.

In 2017, Dominic was appointed by Jonathan Fisher QC to serve as a Research Associate at the White Collar Crime Centre and co-author a report examining the unexplained wealth order provisions of the Criminal Finance Bill. The report was twice cited in the UK House of Lords.

Dominic was called to the Bar of England and Wales in 2016 by the Inner Temple. Alongside his academic work, he continues to practise with a mixed crime and civil focus. He has appeared in a range of criminal cases for the Prosecution and Defence before the Magistrates and Crown Courts. Examples of cases he has been instructed in include violence and domestic violence, drugs, racially-aggravated crimes, stalking and harassment, motoring offences, breaches of court orders, theft, offences against emergency workers, and property offences. He has experience in a range of civil cases and has appeared in the County Court on behalf of Claimants and Defendants in matters including Stage 3 disposal hearings, small claims hearings, and credit hire cases. Dominic is also an accredited civil and commercial mediator with the ADR Group.

BOOKS

• Thomas-James, Offshore Financial Centres and the Law: Suspect Wealth in British Overseas Territories (Abingdon: Routledge, 2021).

BOOK CHAPTERS

• Thomas-James, ‘Suspect Wealth: The Compliance Willingness of Small Island States’ in Global Anti-Money Laundering Regulation: The Realities of Developing Countries, N. Ryder, E. Esoimeme & N. Azinge (eds) (Abingdon: Routledge, 2022 in development).

JOURNAL ARTICLES

• Thomas-James, ‘The United States Corporate Transparency Act – a review’, The Company Lawyer (forthcoming 2021).
• Thomas-James (2020) ‘The Cost of “Going Public”: Examining Recent Public Beneficial Ownership Register Commitments”, Journal of Financial Crime, 27(4).
• Thomas-James (2020) ‘‘Open Books’: is the offshore world now safe?’ The Company Lawyer, 41(12).
• Thomas-James & N. Azinge (2020) ‘Financial Inclusion/Exclusion & Covid-19: Implications for Anti-Money Laundering Regulation, with Reference to Nigeria’, Financial Regulation International, 23(5).
• Thomas-James (2020) ‘Crisis and the Morality of ‘Offshore’: Examining legislative calls to exclude COVID-19 financial relief to ‘tax haven’ companies’, The Company Lawyer, 41(8).
• D. Thomas-James & D.A. Petersen (2020) ‘A Global Pandemic and China’s Foreign Direct Investment in Europe: Examining Protectionist Regulation in Times of Dangerous Opportunity’, The Company Lawyer, 41(8).
• D. Thomas-James (2020) ‘Reviewing International Standards on Beneficial Ownership Information of Companies’, The Company Lawyer, 41(5).
• D. Thomas-James (2020) ‘Legal Safeguards Under Threat? Revisiting the Panama and Paradise Papers and other Transparency Initiatives’, The Company Lawyer, 41(2).
• D. Thomas-James (2019) ‘Beneficial Ownership and the UK Overseas Territories: More Haste, Less Speed?’, The Company Lawyer, 40(8).
• D. Thomas-James (2017) ‘Unexplained Wealth Orders in the Criminal Finances Bill: A Suitable Measure to Tackle Unaccountable Wealth in the UK?’, Journal of Financial Crime, 24(2).

EDITED & PRACTITIONER PUBLICATIONS

• Thomas-James (editor) ICC FraudNet Global Annual Report 2021: International Developments and Perspectives in the field of Fraud, Financial Crime and Asset Recovery, International Chamber of Commerce FraudNet.
• D Thomas-James (2021) ‘The International Corporate Transparency Landscape: A Not So Silver Bullet?’, in ICC FraudNet Global Annual Report 2021.
• Thomas-James (2021) ‘Covid-19 and its Impact on the Global Fight Against Fraud and Financial Crime’, ICC FraudNet Global Annual Report 2021.
• D. Thomas-James, ‘Does the UK need to Create a Criminal Offence of Illicit Enrichment – or is the Unexplained Wealth Order provision of the Criminal Finances Bill 2016 a welcome compromise?’, in Unexplained Wealth Orders: Thoughts on Scope and Effect in the UK, The White Collar Crime Centre, 2017.

EVIDENCE TO LEGISLATURES

• Thomas-James. Written evidence, UK Foreign Affairs Committee ‘Inquiry on the Future of the UK Overseas Territories’, House of Commons, 31st August 2018, in Global Britain and the British Overseas Territories: Resetting the Relationship, 15th Report, Session 2017-19, House of Commons 1464, 2018.