Author: Bridget Dolan QC

R(AH) and R(IS) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2025] EWHC 3269 Admin,  judgment (15 December 2025) here Article 2 ECHR encompasses a ‘systems duty’ which requires public bodies to protect all citizens by having both appropriate state regulation and functional procedures and policies in place to offer protection where life might otherwise […]

Read More… from One faulty cog or a malfunctioning machine? the ECHR systems duty in practice

Drake’s Application for Judicial Review [2025] NIKB 70, 12 December 2025, judgment here. It is clear that litigation privilege cannot arise in respect of reports commissioned for a coroner’s inquisitorial proceedings: the Northern Ireland Court of Appeal (NICA) have already soundly dealt with that point.[1] Bound by House of Lords authority, the NICA held that […]

Read More… from When might a Coroner require an IP to hand over an expert report?

Toogood v HM Senior Coroner for Somerset  [2026] EWHC 634 (Admin) 17 March 2026,  judgment here Suicide is usually a covert act. In the absence of a final letter or a recent and clear declaration of suicidal feelings, there will often be no direct evidence of what the deceased intended by an action that sadly […]

Read More… from Suicide conclusions: A coroner may draw inferences and need not eliminate every other possibility

In the matter of an application by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland for Judicial Review [2025] UKSC 47. Judgment 17 December 2025 here More than 20 years ago 25-year-old Liam Thompson was shot and killed near a gap in a peace line separating nationalist and unionist neighbourhoods in Belfast. No one has ever […]

Read More… from Public Interest Immunity and Inquests: balancing the public interest