CM Murray LLP Launches Regulatory Unit with Nick Leale Appointment

He joins Partners Andrew Pavlovic, Corinne Staves, and Beth Hale, further strengthening the firm’s expertise in regulatory and professional discipline matters across the legal, accountancy, and other professional sectors.

Nick Leale brings nearly two decades of senior leadership experience in regulatory and professional conduct law, advising regulators and professionals across sectors including legal, healthcare, accountancy, education, engineering, charities, and sports.

Clare Murray, Managing Partner of CM Murray LLP, said “Nick’s appointment, and the launch of our formal Regulatory Unit, reflects the integral role of this specialisation within our firm and places it at the heart of what we do for our clients. We are confident that Nick’s expertise gives us a great opportunity to expand our offering to continue to provide clients with a market-leading, integrated service for all things regulatory.

“We have found that most of our partnership investigations, mergers, international structuring, and partnership disputes work, for both firms and individuals, involves a professional conduct or regulatory aspect. As a result, we started to develop our own in-house capability a few years ago, which has been a huge success. We can now provide seamless and integrated specialist partnership, employment and regulatory advice, as well as a suite of regulatory and partner training, thanks to the outstanding work by partners Andrew Pavlovic and Corinne Staves, working closely with our employment and partnership law partner Beth Hale and our Senior Partner, Sarah Chilton.

“Having established those foundations so successfully, it felt like the right time to take the next step with the launch of a specialist Regulatory Unit. Nick has a phenomenal track record leading one of the largest and most successful regulatory teams in the UK. His experience and leadership will play a pivotal role in helping us address the increasingly complex challenges faced by law and accountancy firms.”

Nick is a dual-qualified solicitor and barrister and an experienced professional regulatory advocate, having represented numerous regulators and professionals in complex interim and substantive hearings in the legal, healthcare, and accountancy sectors. For several years, he acted as a prosecutor and advocate for the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

Previously, Nick spent 18 years at Blake Morgan, where he led the firm’s Tier 1 Professional Conduct team from 2010 and its 60-strong regulatory group from 2021. In 2012, he was personally appointed by the SRA to prosecute disciplinary cases before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal. In 2023, he joined the London office of AmLaw 200 firm Armstrong Teasdale as its European General Counsel and Head of Legal Practice, later becoming its London Managing Partner.

Beyond his legal industry roles, Nick has held significant appointments in the regulatory field. Since 2016, he has served as a Legal Chair on the Football Association’s National Serious Case Panel, adjudicating on cases involving discrimination, serious misconduct, and the Football Association’s first ground closure sanctions. In 2024, he was appointed as a Legal Assessor for the conduct panels of the General Pharmaceutical Council and the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy.