Tony Lenehan, Gareth Jones, Steven Borthwick, and Michael Anderson all took silk in the latest appointments. This brings the total of King’s Counsel within Black Chambers to 15.

Mr Lenehan called to the bar in 2005, and was quickly established as a well-instructed junior counsel, widely recognised as being at the senior end of the junior bar for several years now.

He was elected chairman of the Scottish Criminal Bar Association in 2020 and has remained in post throughout the particularly tumultuous two years which have followed.

Gareth Jones was already a barrister in England when he called to the Scottish bar in 2011, and while building up a busy defence practice has shown his versatility with appointments as a First Tier Tribunal judge of the Social Entitlement Chamber for Scotland, the Immigration and Asylum Chamber (a UK-wide position), and this year as a part-time sheriff.

Steven Borthwick’s experience goes back further still, calling to the bar in 2002 and after 12 years defending accused persons in the High Court on the most serious of charges he took his talents to Crown Office in 2014 where he is now a senior advocate depute.

Michael Anderson is currently serving as a full-time advocate depute. He came to the bar in 2006 after eight years practising as a criminal defence solicitor. Prior to his move to Crown Office, he was regularly instructed as lead defence counsel in complex and lengthy criminal trials.