About the Joint Defense Team

The Joint Defense Team (JDT) is a network of independent criminal defence lawyers in Germany, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Belgium, Switzerland and Montenegro. Each member takes on cases in their own country; when a case reaches several states, the members coordinate the defence across them.

 

The members had been writing case analyses together for several years before they began working under the name Joint Defense Team, or JDT, in 2024. In British spelling the name is sometimes written Joint Defence Team.

 

How the network works

The JDT is not a law firm. Each member practises in their own firm and is admitted to the bar of their own country. A client instructs the member in the country where the proceedings are conducted, and that member's professional rules and fee arrangements apply.

 

Many of our cases do not stop at one border. A suspect is arrested in one state on a warrant from another; the evidence comes from a joint investigation team in a third. In such cases the members involved agree on the defence line with the client's consent, exchange information on the foreign proceedings and bring the case law of the other jurisdictions into their own courts.

 

What we work on

• Evidence from encrypted communication services: EncroChat, SkyECC and ANOM (Operation Trojan Shield)

• Extradition, European Arrest Warrants and Interpol Red Notices

• Europol and Eurojust, including data processed in joint investigation teams

• Cross-border confiscation

• Applications to the European Court of Human Rights and references to the Court of Justice of the EU

 

Cases and publications

• CJEU, C-625/25 (Prudniez). In this SkyECC reference Christian Lödden represents a client from Germany; Justus Reisinger and Guillaume Martine are also involved. The reference concerns the remedy against evidence obtained through a European Investigation Order (Article 14 of Directive 2014/41/EU read with Article 47 of the Charter). The Advocate General's Opinion is scheduled for 19 November 2026. Our report on the reference.

• General Court of the EU, actions against Europol and Eurojust. Justus Reisinger brought actions against both agencies on behalf of a client prosecuted in the Netherlands on the basis of SkyECC data. Our report on the proceedings.

• ANOM. An article co-written by Christian Lödden shows how courts were misled about the decryption of ANOM messages in requests for mutual legal assistance: StV 2026, 441–448. Our analysis of the ANOM files.

• ECtHR, cryptophone cases. Christian Lödden contributed to the third-party interventions by Fair Trials, in part together with the European Criminal Bar Association, in Silgir v Germany (No. 2), Isha and Emmen v Norway (nos. 7905/25 and 9417/25) and Raal and Reudolph v Estonia (nos. 14711/25 and 14712/25). Justus Reisinger also acts in Isha v Norway.

• Fair Trials, LEAP 2025. Justus Reisinger presented the European legal challenges of EncroChat and SkyECC at the annual meeting of Fair Trials' Legal Experts Advisory Panel in Milan. Report from Milan.

 

Our Case Law Database collects court decisions on encrypted communication evidence, extradition and cross-border investigations, each with a summary. The overview pages on EncroChat, SkyECC and ANOM are updated every quarter and after each relevant decision. Current analysis is published in our news section.

 

Last updated: 15 November 2026, Christian Lödden