Published Friday 7 August 2026 · By the JustEng team
A heavy week for accountability in the built environment: a New York regulator closed the first phase of a citywide inspection blitz, an Italian court handed down sentences over a fatal viaduct collapse, and the English courts continued to expand the reach of the Building Safety Act. Here is what happened, and what each development means for forensic engineering recruitment and expert witness hiring.
New York wraps first phase of collapse-related inspection sweep
The New York City Department of Buildings has concluded the first phase of its safety sweep following the partial structural failure at 235 East 42nd Street, the former Pfizer headquarters, where columns buckled on 7 July. The agency inspected 180 jobsites connected to the project team, 24 of them office-to-residential conversions, issuing 65 OATH violations across 38 sites and 19 stop-work orders. None were for immediately hazardous structural issues, and the DOB found no evidence that the failure was inherent to conversion projects. Its investigation into the East 42nd Street building itself remains open (Construction Dive).
Hiring angle: Incidents of this profile generate years of downstream investigation and litigation work, and firms on both sides scramble for structural forensic engineers with genuine collapse-investigation experience. The same pattern plays out in the UK whenever a high-profile failure occurs, which is why forensic engineering recruitment demand tends to lag the event by six to twelve months.
Hong Kong inquiry closes as manslaughter charges proceed
Closing submissions have begun in the independent inquiry into the Wang Fuk Court fire in Tai Po, which killed 168 people in November 2025. Hong Kong’s Competition Commission used the hearings to call for bid-rigging in building renovation to be criminalised, describing such conduct as widespread and systematic; a focus of the inquiry has been the HK$336m maintenance contract under way when the fire started. Seven individuals and two firms that oversaw the works have been charged with manslaughter and further offences (Hong Kong Free Press).
Hiring angle: Investigations that combine fire dynamics, procurement fraud and criminal liability need forensic fire engineers who can also withstand cross-examination, and that combination is genuinely scarce. Expect continued global candidate demand for fire investigation specialists, mirroring the fire engineering shortage in the UK market.
Genoa viaduct verdicts sentence 32 defendants
The Genoa court convicted 32 defendants over the 2018 Morandi bridge collapse, which killed 43 people, sentencing former Autostrade per l’Italia chief executive Giovanni Castellucci to 12 years. Of the 57 originally on trial — executives, engineers and transport ministry officials — 25 were acquitted or cleared on limitation grounds, and appeals are expected (Al Jazeera).
Hiring angle: Cases turning on inspection regimes and asset-management records place a premium on bridge and infrastructure asset engineers who can reconstruct a maintenance history to evidential standard — a niche where recruitment is almost entirely by referral and targeted headhunting rather than advertising.
Building Liability Orders reach further up the group structure
In Crest Nicholson Regeneration Ltd v Ardmore Construction Ltd (in administration) [2026] EWHC 789 (TCC), the High Court confirmed that a Building Liability Order under sections 130–131 of the Building Safety Act 2022 can be made before any finding of liability at trial, and that an adjudicator’s decision can establish a relevant liability. The claim followed an adjudication award of roughly £14.9m over external wall defects at a Portsmouth development. Permission to appeal was subsequently refused ([2026] EWHC 1069 (TCC)) (Pump Court Chambers).
Hiring angle: As liability reaches beyond the original contracting entity, developers and insurers are building in-house technical teams to assess exposure across whole portfolios, and that is driving steady expert witness recruitment and building pathology hiring. Our forensic engineering salary guide sets out what these roles currently pay.
Court quantifies a contractor’s contribution claim against a cladding supplier
In Mulalley & Co Ltd v Sto Ltd [2026] EWHC 1552 (TCC), the court assessed for the first time how to quantify a contractor’s contribution claim against the supplier of a defective external wall system, following refurbishment works at a residential tower in Essex. Applying a causation analysis, the court attributed a proportion of the works to the render system and reduced the recoverable sum to just over £2.02m (Mayer Brown).
Hiring angle: Apportionment turns on detailed facade build-up analysis, so demand keeps rising for facade engineers who can move between design review and dispute support.
Grenfell files head to the CPS
The Metropolitan Police remains on course to submit its remaining files to the Crown Prosecution Service by September 2026, with charging decisions expected before the tenth anniversary of the fire in June 2027. Fifty-seven individuals and 20 organisations are under investigation, with offences under consideration including corporate manslaughter and gross negligence manslaughter (Construction Enquirer).
Hiring angle: The approach of charging decisions is already sharpening demand for independent technical experts and document-review engineers, and firms are recruiting well ahead of any proceedings.
JustEng is a specialist engineering recruitment agency headhunting forensic engineers, expert witnesses and building pathology specialists across the UK and internationally. Candidates considering a move into disputes work can submit your CV confidentially. Practices building a forensic or expert witness team can register your vacancy and we will map the market for you.