Western Circuit
St John’s Chambers has ‘a strong personal injury offering’, with a solid track record in advising on high-value catastrophic injury claims, fatal accidents, industrial disease cases and accidents at work, to name a few areas of instruction. Practice head Andrew McLaughlin has been kept busy acting for defendants in high-value brain injury claims arising from workplace and road traffic accidents. Richard Stead specialises in Animals Act claims, and is also active in cases involving fatal accidents and brain injuries. Matthew White is regularly involved in cases involving highway claims, occupational illness litigation and accidents at work. Rachel Segal is ‘very technically minded’ with a solid track record in advising on catastrophic injury claims, and James Marwick is adept at handling claims arising from spinal injuries and industrial disease. Christopher Sharp KC retired from practice in March 2025.
Legal 500 Editorial commentary
Profile
Work Department
Clinical Negligence, Personal Injury =, Employers' Liability =, Public Liability, Personal Injury Costs, Inquests & Public Inquiries
Career
Call : 2013
Rachel is ranked as a leading junior in The Legal 500 for both personal injury and clinical negligence.
She enjoys working across the spectrum of clinical negligence and has a particular interest in cases involving delayed diagnosis of cancers of the breast, bone and bladder, alleged negligence in gastro-intestinal and colorectal surgery, cosmetic surgery and ophthalmology. She is regularly instructed in inquests involving healthcare.
Rachel advises and represents claimants and defendants in a range of RTA, Highways Act, employers’ liability and public liability matters. She advises on professional negligence matters in both clinical negligence and personal injury, and is currently working on cases of up to £7m in value.
Rachel also advises and represents parties on both sides of relief from sanctions applications across the spectrum of civil litigation, publishes The Denton Resource annually and delivers training on the topic.
Before coming to the Bar, Rachel was an academic musicologist and then worked in Higher Education Policy, advising institutional and national policy makers. Rachel was for many years a professional classical cellist and singer. She is an expert on the composer Franz Waxman, on whom she has published scholarly articles and a series for BBC Radio 3’s Composer of the Week.
Memberships
- Personal Injury Bar Association
- Employment Law Bar Association
- Women Lawyers’ Division
- Member of the Western Circuit
- Member of the Western Circuit’s Women’s Forum
Education
- BPTC (Nottingham Law School) – very competent (top in year in commercial litigation and employment litigation)
- Grad LLB (Nottingham Law School) – first class
- GDL (University of Plymouth) – distinction
- PhD (Newcastle University)
- PGCertHE (Open University)
- MA by research (University of Leeds)
- BA (Hons) in Music with English Literature (University of Leeds)
Content supplied by St John’s Chambers
Testimonials
Collated independently by Legal 500 research team.
- 'Fantastic clerks. Adam Marston and Hugh Maguire are a joy to work with.'
- 'Hugh Maguire and Adam Marston are fantastic - very friendly and approachable and very organised.'
- 'Adam Marston is always on hand to deal with any queries and is very helpful, friendly and efficient.'
- 'The personal injury clerks are fantastic - very responsive and helpful.'
- 'The personal injury department at St John's always have high-quality counsel available.'
- 'An excellent set.'
- 'Well trusted and reliable set.'
- 'Very strong set.'