2nd June 2025
Dear Lord Chancellor, President, Judicial Conduct Investigations Office, and Bar Standards Board,
We write to express our deep concern regarding the case of two parents found to have caused significant harm to children [2025] EWFC 126 (9 May 2025), one of whom is a barrister-judge who currently remains anonymous by order of the court. Our concerns fall into three key areas:
- Anonymisation: The justification for anonymising the parents in this case has been fundamentally undermined by a publicly available disciplinary statement that identifies one of them. Their names are already circulating online. We believe they should now be formally identified.
- Professional Accountability: One parent is a judge and barrister who was found by a family court to have caused significant harm to their adopted children. Despite this, there is no indication they have been suspended, removed from office, or disbarred. Moreover, the current published disciplinary statement is misleading and omits the serious findings from the family court.
- Review and Public Confidence: In light of these findings and the individual’s conduct during proceedings, previous cases presided over by this judge should be reviewed. Without such a review, public confidence in the safety and credibility of the family justice system will be significantly undermined.
We outline our concerns in further detail below.
At the heart of this case are two adopted children who were found to have suffered significant harm at the hands of their adoptive parents. The abuse included deprivation of food, verbal and racial abuse, confiscation of spectacles, pushing soap into a child’s mouth, physical assaults including smacking and strangulation (termed neck restriction in the judgment), and being left alone overnight.
In her judgment, Mrs Justice Theis concluded that identifying the parents would not further the welfare of the children, despite a strong public interest in doing so due to their professional standing. She acknowledged the “extraordinarily difficult balancing exercise” involved [7], and accepted that “there is a real risk that the parents may be identified following the conclusion of any regulatory process,” which might later shift the balance in favour of naming them [187(9)]. She also noted this would likely happen “at a time when the children would be older.” However, such identification has already occurred. The Judicial Conduct Investigations Office (JCIO) has published a disciplinary statement identifying the parent judge by name in relation to their failure to notify their leadership judge of proceedings. It is easily identifiable online, and, due to their previous public roles, the parents have been named on social media as xxxxxxxx and xxxxxxx, a teacher. The balance has therefore already shifted in favour of naming them. Naming by the court would be the honest and principled course of action.
We are also concerned by the limited and misleading nature of the JCIO’s published statement. During proceedings, the local authority warned about this statement saying: “There is a risk… that without the full context, a reader could be forgiven for thinking that the decision of the regulatory body deals with all suggestions of wrongdoing and a misleading impression could be inadvertently created” [81]. We share this concern. The disciplinary statement appears to refer only to a failure to notify a leadership judge of ongoing proceedings, stating these were “ultimately discontinued”. Although it is not specified, we can only assume that this refers to the fact that no criminal charges were brought, even though investigations took place. Nevertheless, the family court found that significant emotional and physical harm had been caused to children by this judge, on the balance of probabilities. This serious finding is not mentioned at all in the public statement and may therefore embolden the parents to continue to portray themselves as victims and “to revile and malign [the children] publicly and privately” [24]. This is not a speculative concern. In a later judgment, [2025] EWFC 140, Mrs Justice Theis found that the parents continued to harm their children during the proceedings “through the misuse of the litigation machinery” [22].
We are frankly astonished that the outcome of the misconduct investigation was merely a formal warning. Given the findings of abuse and misuse of court processes, we strongly believe that this individual should be removed from judicial office and disbarred. The absence of any indication that they have even been suspended from sitting as a judge or as an unregistered barrister is deeply troubling. A return to practice would raise serious safeguarding concerns and pose a direct risk of harm to victims of child abuse and domestic violence. This outcome brings the integrity of the judiciary and the Bar Standards Board into disrepute.
Finally, we urge the President of the Family Division to initiate a review of all children’s cases previously overseen by this judge. The findings against them include serious abuse of process and repeated harm to vulnerable children. It is not credible to maintain confidence in past judgments delivered by this judge without further oversight of these findings. Without such a review, the validity of decision-making in those cases will remain in question, and irreparable harm may be done to the reputation of the family court.
We thank you in advance for your careful consideration of this matter and look forward to hearing from you.
Yours sincerely,
Right to Equality