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18 July 2014 – On 25 June, 2014, the French Cour de cassation strengthened external legal counsel’s rights during dawn raids in the course of competition investigations. The court annulled numerous dawn raids that had taken place at a bank’s premises in early 2008. It substantiated the aforementioned decision in that investigators had “created obstacles” to external legal counsel. Consequently, the Supreme Court upheld the fundamental right of assistance by external legal council from the beginning of a competition investigation. Given principle has been acknowledged by the European Court of Justice in its judgment ‘Dow Iberia vs. Commission’  (case numbers 97/87, 98/87, and 99/87) on 17 October 1989. In legal terms, the French Supreme Court confirmed its own judgment dating 13 March 2013, according to which corporate entities have the right to external legal assistance at all stages of competition investigations, including the course of preliminary investigations. Click here for the decision of the cour the cassation dating 25 June 2014. Click here for the judment of the ECJ Click here for the decision of the cour the cassation dating 13 march 2014. By Dr. Nicolai Behr and Alexander Friedrich

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Nicolai is a partner in the Dispute Resolution group of Baker McKenzie, a member of the Global Investigations, Compliance and Ethics Steering Committee and co-heads the Investigations, Compliance and Ethics practice in Germany. Nicolai is a regular speaker and author on compliance, white collar crime, innovation and legal tech topics. He is the inventor of the automated risk assessment and risk monitoring platform Compliance Cockpit and the founder of Global Compliance News. Nicolai is the editor of the knowledge platforms Compliance Lexikon and Litigation Lexikon.

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