Member Profiles

Since her qualification as a Hong Kong solicitor in 1997, Jennifer has been specializing exclusively in matrimonial practice and has a strong background in general litigation and extensive experience in complex matrimonial cases during the course of which she has represented a number of high-profile clients. Educated in Hong Kong, Australia, and the UK and with an academic background that includes a degree in Economics from the London School of Economics, Jennifer is particularly adept and experienced in matters that involve analysis of complex corporate structures and forensic discovery and tracing. In 2005, Jennifer established her own matrimonial boutique firm Jennifer Ip & Co. In creating her own firm, she intends to build a family law practice that has a multitude of clients and a matrimonial practice focused on high net worth individuals. She also seeks to take on more wide-ranging cases that fall within the category of family law and for which she has a real passion including areas such as custody cases, child welfare, and child abduction cases. Jennifer has dealt with numerous big money suits engaging in extensive tracing work. A majority of her cases have involved assets held multi-jurisdictionally and she often comes across work in countries including Australia, Canada, China, France, Indonesia, Middle East, New Zealand, United Kingdom and United States. Additionally, Jennifer often handles cases involving cross-border marriages between China and Hong Kong and works closely with Chinese lawyers in matrimonial matters. She also has a wide range of connections with forensic accountants and private detectives both in Hong Kong and in China to assist her mainland clients in conducting investigation and discovery work as to hidden personal assets, evidence of infidelity and status enquiries. She has also frequently undertaken international cases including cases where there are issues regarding the forum of jurisdiction. With around 20 years of practical legal experience and a compelling commitment to the family law practice, Jennifer is undoubtedly a reputable member in her field. She is in the Family Law Committee of the Law Society and is actively participating in advancing recommendations for changes in the current legislation. She is also a longstanding Committee Member of the Hong Kong Family Law Association. Jennifer is also a co-founder of the Hong Kong Family Law Report and a Hong Kong representative of the Family Law Symposium of China. In 2018, Jennifer became a member of the prestigious International Academy of Family Lawyers – an international group of practicising family law practitioners who are recognised by their peers as the most experienced and skilled family law specialists. Since 2007, Jennifer has maintained very close working relationships with matrimonial lawyers in China and has done many cases with the most imminent matrimonial lawyers in Shanghai and Beijing. Jennifer will also travel frequently to Shanghai and Beijing to give talks to the law societies of both Beijing and Shanghai regarding Hong Kong divorce and Mainland cross border divorce cases.

Mrs. Christine Koo is the principal partner of Christine M. Koo & Ip, Solicitors & Notaries LLP located in Hong Kong. Mrs. Koo has over 30 years of experience gained from government and private sectors in Hong Kong and overseas, as well as from working in-house for an international insurance corporation. She specializes in all types of insurance matters including life; general/property; marine; pensions; pension trust; premium financing; captive; special purpose insurance; and reinsurance as well as insurance regulatory matters and trust matters.

Angus Forsyth was admitted as a solicitor in England in 1970 and in Hong Kong in 1971. He was one of the four original founders of the well-established local Hong Kong law firm of Stevenson, Wong & Co. in 1978 and from which he retired in 2017.  Commercial and Company, Mergers and Acquisitions, Intellectual Property, Information Technology, Advertising Law and Personal Data Privacy Professional Qualifications: Solicitor of the High Court of England and Wales in 1970; Guildford Law College; Law Society; England (Part II Qualifying Examination, 1970) Solicitor of the High Court of Hong Kong in 1971; and as Notary Public of Hong Kong in 1978 Language:  English He has represented a wide range of private and corporate clients in all aspects of Commercial and Company, Mergers and Acquisitions, Regulatory Law of Insurance, Securities and Futures, Immigration, Intellectual Property and Information Technology, Advertising and Personal Data Privacy and Commercial and Residential Tenancies. Community Involvement: He is a Former Council Member and Vice President of the Hong Kong Society of Notaries and of the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal Panel. He was a member of the Competition Committee of the Law Society of Hong Kong and was a Member of the Companies Registry and Hong Kong Government Advisory Group on the rewrite of Hong Kong Company Law.  He is a Legal Committee Member of The Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce, Council Member of the Hong Kong Internet Professionals Association, Hong Kong & Mainland Software Industry Cooperation Association, Member of the Companies Registry and Hong Kong Government Advisory Group on the rewrite of Hong Kong Company Law. Former Council Member and Former Vice President of the Hong Kong Society of Notaries Former Member of Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal Panel (1992-1998) Former Member of Law Society of Hong Kong, Working Party on the Occupational Retirement Schemes Ordinance Member Legal Committee, The Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce Former Trustee and Chairman of the Hong Kong Arts Festival Trust Member and past President of The Oriental Ceramic Society of Hong Kong Former Committee Member and former Vice Chairman, The Friends of the Hong Kong Museum of Art Member of Committee of Management of the University Museum and Art Gallery, University of Hong Kong Former Chairman, China Heritage Art Foundation Limited Member of the Board, Arts & Education Limited, (Charitable Grants in aid to East/West Hong Kong Arts causes) principally for the Travel Grants of the Fine Arts students at the University of Hong Kong Chairman and Member of the Board of Governors of Musica Viva Limited – Opera and Music Production Former Governor and legal adviser to eInclusion Foundation Limited – grants for computer use education to bridge the Digital Divide Director of Global Heritage Fund Asia Limited – Hong Kong, China and regional Asian support for cultural heritage preservation projects Former Director of The Kew Asia Foundation Limited – Hong Kong centre for the focus of activities of Kew Foundation London UK Honorary Legal Adviser: Honorary Legal Adviser to New Life Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association Former Honorary Legal Adviser to the Hong Kong Festival Fringe  Honorary Legal Adviser to the Friends of the Hong Kong Museum of Art Honorary Legal Adviser to the Friends of the Art Gallery, Chinese University of Hong Kong Former Committee member and former Honorary Legal Adviser, the Royal Overseas League, Hong Kong Branch Honorary Legal Adviser to the Friends of the University Museum and Art Gallery, The University of Hong Kong Honorary Legal Adviser to the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society Limited

Jeff Lane leads the Tanner de Witt fraud and asset recovery team. He is Hong Kong’s go-to specialist in the burgeoning area of cyber fraud, and his main activities include litigating and coordinating asset recovery proceedings on behalf of the myriad victims of economic wrongdoing seeking redress through the Hong Kong courts, and developing strategies for the domestic and international search for and recovery of assets. The TDW team regularly advises on all aspects of fraud recovery, including applications for emergency injunctive and disclosure relief, both domestically and in aid of foreign proceedings, liaison with the police and regulatory authorities, business crime defence, offshore disputes, international judicial assistance, the enforcement of foreign judgments and arbitral awards, and tracing and recovering the proceeds of fraud. Jeff has practiced in Hong Kong for more than thirty years and is the sole Hong Kong representative of FraudNet, the international network of specialist fraud practitioners established by the International Chamber of Commerce, which is recognised by Chambers and Partners. FraudNet is an international network of independent lawyers who are the leading civil asset recovery specialists in each country. He is also recognised by Who’s Who Legal 2020 as a Global Elite Thought Leader, who “garners extensive praise as an ‘outstanding lawyer’ from peers around the globe”.

Fred Kan is the founder and Senior Partner of Fred Kan & Co. Kan graduated in 1964 from the University of Toronto in mechanical engineering and in 1967 in law. Immediately after graduation, he served a brief stint as an adviser to the Canadian Delegation to the United Nations (New York) on the proposal to establish the post of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Kan was called to the Bar in Ontario in 1969 and was admitted in Hong Kong as a solicitor in 1978. Kan practised law in Toronto from 1969 to 1984 and has been practising law in Hong Kong since 1984. From 1986 to 1989 Kan was the Hon. Secretary of the Hong Kong Branch of the International Law Association. In 1987 Kan participated in the publication of香港法律十八講 (18 Lectures in Hong Kong Law) by商務印書館 (The Commercial Press). The book was the first comprehensive book on Hong Kong law written in Chinese and was for some years Hong Kong’s best seller in non-fiction. It went into 7 printings. Kan was the author of a chapter in the book on 香港對外關係簡介 (An Introduction to Hong Kong’s External Relations). The chapter was an effort to analyze the bilateral and multilateral international agreements then applicable to Hong Kong. Kan was a Council Member of the Law Society of Hong Kong from 1997 to 2002. He is the past Chairman of its External Affairs Standing Committee, Annual Convention Committee, Law Week Committee, Member Benefits Committee and Teen Talk Committee. He is the Immediate Past Chairman of the Belt and Road Committee. The Member Benefits Committee, under Kan’s chairmanship, brought about free disability insurance coverage for all Law Society members. In 2010 Kan initiated Teen Talk (青Teen講場), an annual Law Society event engaging at its height participation from about 2,000 senior secondary school students, drawing them to discuss and express their views on various communal and legal topics. Teen Talk is evolving and is poised to become a training ground for future leaders of Hong Kong. Kan was the Chairman of the Banking and Finance Law Standing Committee of LAWASIA (1997 to 1998) and its Banking, Finance and Insurance Law Standing Committee (1998 to 2001). In December 1992, Kan chaired a seminar on banking law held in Hanoi by the Vietnam Ministry of Justice under UN auspices. In 1993 Kan financed the establishment of VILAF in Ho Chi Minh City, the first business law firm established in Vietnam after 1975. Kan is an accredited arbitrator and mediator. He was a Council Member of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre from 2000 to 2016. Kan is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Financial Dispute Resolution Centre (FDRC) which has been established by the Government to manage an independent and impartial dispute resolution scheme by way of “mediation first, arbitration next.” He is the Chairman of FDRC’s Appointment Committee. In 2008, Kan was the Chairman of the Public Education and Publicity Sub-Group under the Secretary for Justice’s Working Group on Mediation. The work of the Working Group on Mediation and its 3 Sub-Groups prepared for the eventual passing of the Mediation Ordinance in 2013 and the establishment of the current mediator-accreditation regime. Kan was a Member of the City of Toronto Planning Board. He was an Honorary Research Fellow of the Centre for Urban Planning and Environmental Management, University of Hong Kong. He is the Honorary Legal Advisor to the Hong Kong Institute of Planners and the Hong Kong Planners Registration Board, as well as the publisher of the Urban Planning and Environmental Law Quarterly in Hong Kong which has been in continual publication since May 1992. In 2018 Fred Kan & Co. was the winner of the by LEGAL 100 Environmental Law Firm of the Year Award for Hong Kong. Kan was a Member of the Macau Law Reform Advisory Committee from 2007 to 2016 and was a co-author of its position paper on establishing an arbitration and mediation regime in Macau. Kan was the Deputy Chairman of the Hong Kong Review Body on Bid Challenges (under the WTO Government Procurement Agreement). In March and April 2010, he was a Visiting Scholar at the Public Procurement Research Group of the School of Law, University of Nottingham, UK, reading and researching into the monitoring mechanisms established in major member-states of the GPA and the problems and challenges facing China upon its accession to the GPA. From 2016 to 2018 Kan was a member of the Executive Committee of UIA (Union Internationale des Avocats / International Association of Lawyers) and was its Director of National and Regional Activities. Kan is interested in sports. He initiated the Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau Lawyers’ Sports Meet and was the Chairman of the Organising Committee twice (2009 and 2015) when Hong Kong was the host. It was at the 2009 sports meet that the Guinness World Record for “Largest three-legged race – most pairs)” was broken. Kan was also the Chairman of the Organising Committee of the sports meet celebrating the centenary of the Law Society. Kan initiated the Rule of Law Marathon promoting public awareness of the rule of law which saw lawyer-athletes running with the Rule of Law Flag from Macau to Zhuhai, to Shenzhen and finally to Hong Kong to start the opening ceremony of the 6th Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau Lawyers’ Sports Meet on 14 November 2015. Kan’s passion is golf. He is currently the Captain of the Law Society Golf Team. In 2005 he initiated the Cross Strait Lawyers’ Golf Tournament (兩岸三地律師高球友誼賽) at a time when cross-strait relations were at a low ebb during Chen Shui-bian’s presidency. It was a good example of Hong Kong playing its traditional role of an honest middle-man. The tournament is now an annual event drawing over 200 lawyers from the Mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong. In May 2016 Kan was admitted to The Law Society of Hong Kong’s Roll of Honour in recognition of his distinguished service to the Law Society, to the Council and to the development of the practice of law in Hong Kong. Professional experience and education 2008 – CEDR Accredited Mediator 2008 – Chairman, Public Education and Publicity Sub-group, Working Group on Mediation established by the Secretary for Justice, HKSAR 2007 – Member of the Macau Law Reform Advisory Committee 2001 – Member of the Board of Review (Inland Revenue Ordinance) 2000 – 2005 Former Deputy Chairman of the Review Body on Bid Challenges (under the WTO Government Procurement Agreement) 2000 Council Member of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre 1997 – 2002 Former Council Member of the Law Society of Hong Kong 1997 – 1998 Former Chairman of the Banking and Finance Law Standing Committee of LAWASIA 1996 – Approved/Recognized arbitrator in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tianjin, Shenzhen and Shantao 1995 – China-Appointed Attesting Officer 1992 – Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators 1992 – Honorary Research Fellow of the Centre for Urban Planning and Environmental Management, University of Hong Kong 1991 – Notary Public 1978 – Solicitor, Hong Kong 1977 – Solicitor, England and Wales 1969 – Barrister & Solicitor, Ontario 1967 – Juris Doctor 1964 – Bachelor of Applied Science (Mechanical Engineering), University of Toronto Languages Cantonese English Mandarin