Marlena practices across all of Chambers’ main areas of work, with a particular emphasis on commercial disputes, public law, financial services, international law, and employment law. She has appeared in the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, High Court, County Court, Upper Tribunal and the employment tribunal.

Her clients include individuals, companies, charities, and sporting bodies. Recent highlights of Marlena's practice include:

  • acting for the Duke of Sussex in a judicial review over the decision to remove his State security
  • acting for an asset management company resisting winding up petitions and allegations of serious misconduct in relation to a USD500 million investment, with concurrent proceedings in the Cayman Islands, the BVI, the English High Court, and the LCIA
  • acting for a couple challenging a NHS body's policy that lesbian couples must self-fund 12 rounds of artificial insemination before they can receive IVF
  • acting for a hedge fund in a challenge to the Financial Conduct Authority's decision to impose a £40.8 million fine and a redress scheme

Before coming to the Bar, Marlena worked for a variety of legal charities and taught public law at the University of Oxford. She also spent a year as the judicial assistant to the Master of the Rolls, Sir Terence Etherton, where she worked on a range of commercial, public, and EU law appeals.

Experience

Shortlist

Commercial

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of commercial law. 

While working as the judicial assistant to the Master of the Rolls Marlena worked on a number of commercial and chancery appeals, including Barings (UK) Ltd v Deutsche Trustee Co Ltd [2020] EWCA Civ 521, which concerned interpretation of a commercial contract relating to a collateralised loan transaction. 

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Public & Regulatory

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of public and regulatory law. 

Prior to joining Blackstone, Marlena taught administrative law at the University of Oxford. 

As a judicial assistant in the Court of Appeal, Marlena worked on public and constitutional law appeals including: R (Bridges) v Chief Constable of South Wales Police [2020] 1 WLR 5037 (a challenge to the lawfulness of the use of automated facial recognition technology concerning Art 8, data protection issues, and the PSED); R (British Telecommunications Plc) v HM Treasury [2020] Pens. LR 12 (concerning HM Treasury's decision to implement full indexation of the guaranteed minimum pension of certain members of public sector pension schemes); and R (Badmus) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2020] 1 WLR 4609 (about lawfulness of rates of pay set for work in immigration removal centres and judicial review time limits).

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Civil Fraud, Asset Recovery & Injunctive Relief

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of civil fraud, asset recovery, and injunctive relief.

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Civil Liberties & Human Rights

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of civil liberties and human rights. 

Before coming to the bar, Marlena worked for legal charities acting within the fields of LGBT rights, asylum law, and national security law. 

Marlena has a particular interest in children's rights. She won the Oxford Law Faculty Prize for Children, Families, and the State and completed an MPhil on the interaction between the welfare principle and the autonomy rights of teenagers.


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Financial Services & Banking

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of financial services law. 

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Discrimination

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of discrimination law. 

Marlena was awarded the Oxford Law Faculty Prize for Comparative Equality Law. 

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Employment

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of employment law. She has a particular interest in discrimination law and issues of worker status. 

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EU & Competition

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of EU law. 

While working as a judicial assistant to the Master of the Rolls, Marlena worked on appeals in the area of EU law, including R (Friends of Antique Cultural Treasures Ltd) v Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [2020] 1 WLR 3876, which determined whether the Ivory Act 2018 violated EU rules on free movement of goods or the right to respect for property under the Charter or the ECHR.

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Public International Law

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of public international law.

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Sport

Marlena accepts instructions in all areas of sports law.

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Data Protection, Freedom of Information & Privacy

Marlena accepts instructions in all matters relating to data protection, freedom of information, and privacy. 

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Achievements

Education

  • MPhil in Law (Distinction), University of Oxford
  • BCL (Distinction, top of year), University of Oxford
  • LLB Hons (First Class, 2nd in year), University of Edinburgh

Prizes & Scholarships

  • Bedingfield Scholarship (Gray's Inn)
  • Clarendon Scholarship (Oxford)
  • Vinerian Scholarship for best performance on the BCL (Oxford) 
  • Law Faculty Prize for Comparative Equality Law (Oxford)
  • Law Faculty Prize for Children, Families, and the State (Oxford)
  • Jesus College BCL Prize (Oxford)
  • Best performance in final year law exams (Edinburgh)
  • Best performance in Criminal Law, EU Law, and Jurisprudence (Edinburgh)

Other relevant experience

Before coming to the bar, Marlena taught public law at the University of Oxford and worked for a variety of human rights organisations, including the Human Dignity Trust and Rights Watch UK. Marlena also spent six months in Greece working pro bono for Refugee Legal Support-Athens, Khora Community Centre, and Refugee Law Clinic-Samos.

Marlena was a keen competitive debater at university and has taught debating and public speaking around the world. She was the winner and best speaker of a number of debating competitions and was a two-time Grand Finalist of the European Universities Debating Championships.





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