Protecting Vulnerable Witnesses in Coroners Courts

R (Maguire) v Assistant Coroner West Yorkshire  [2018] EWCA Civ 6, 17.1.2018 In a sequel to our earlier blog piece the Court of Appeal have delivered their judgment upholding the decision of Mr Justice Holroyde[1] who had found that the Assistant Coroner had been correct to decline to hear oral evidence from nine children who had […]

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Coronial queue jumping, religious need, fixed policies and fairness

R (Adath Yisrosl Burial Society and anor) v HM Senior Coroner Inner North London and The Chief Coroner of England and Wales (Interested Person) EWHC 969 (Admin), 27.4.2018 This is an unhappy case all round. The silver lining is that the Divisional Court went out of its way to facilitate some public education about that […]

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The Joint Select Committee on Human Rights Enforcement – Inquest Strand

On 7 March 2018 Katie Gollop QC gave oral evidence to the Joint Select Committee on Human Rights in support of the provision of public funding for families at inquests.   http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/joint-select/human-rights-committee/ A briefing paper provided to assist the committee, which was prepared by Katie in consultation with some other barristers from Serjeants’ Inn chambers, is reproduced below All barristers at […]

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Article 2 inquest not required if only a “mere error or medical negligence”

Lopes de Sousa Fernandes v Portugal (Application no. 56080/13) ECtHR Grand Chamber, 19.12.2017 The ECHR Chamber judgment in Lopes (15 December 2015) had the potential to expand the situations where a Middleton style “Article 2 inquest” would be required. The Chamber judgment appeared to widen the scope of Article 2 protections to incorporate errors of […]

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