Chair Criminal Cases Review Commission. Member Women’s Justice Bd.
Ex Victims’ Commissioner, Solicitor Gen & PCC. Fellow St Hilda’s Oxford. Writer. Labour Party
Welcome and thank you for taking the time to look at my personal website. Here you will find a range of information on the work I do and my many other interests, such as VAWG, my role as Patron of Respect and Operation Encompass to name but a few.
Vera is a member of the Fabian Society
Charlotte Nichols MP spoke so well about her rape She waited 1088 days in a queue for a jury, behind many lesser cases in which the defendant had demanded jury trial.
The Jury acquitted her attacker
She sued him & a Judge, on his own, believed her & gave her damages
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🌍 Iran conflict w Admiral Lord West @Tobias_Ellwood
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Editor @edwardchivers
Thank you to the charities who joined our training session this week 👏
Alana House Women’s Community Project, Hestia, Unlocking the Potential Home, J4All and Social Benefits Consortium.
Our training sessions are free and available to any UK #charity
16-year-old boy was a human trafficking victim when convicted – defence under the Modern … – #GoogleAlerts
Jess Phillips reveals she is a victim of courts backlog with restraining order case delayed unt – #GoogleAlerts
No. this small, vital tweak is one of many over years, to safeguard juries to where the public interest needs them.
Defendants in small cases should not push into the jury queue, so rapes; murders; serious assault cases can’t be heard for yrs, to the great harm of victims
The leader of all barristers across south-east England has said the deputy prime minister’s plan to reduce jury trials risks “losing some legitimacy of our justice system”.
More here: https://bbc.in/40WJKEO
It certainly was
Invented in Northumbria, when I was PCC. Hurrah!!
Rape victims will get free legal advice throughout the criminal justice process as part of plans to make the experience less traumatic. https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/rape-victims-to-get-free-legal-advice-throughout-criminal-justice-process-5HjdW7P_2/
By 2035 it’s predicated there will be 200,000 criminal cases waiting to be heard in the Crown Court.
We’ve funded unlimited sitting days, record funding for victim support, and legal aid. But investment alone is not enough. We must reform to deliver swifter justice for victims.
Over 30 female MPs give verdict on Lammy court plan – ‘cannot come soon enough’
Clumsy drafting of the Sentencing Bill may increase the number of women sent to prison Earlier this year, David Gauke’s Independent Sentencing Review was published making a range of recommendations aimed at reducing the size of the prison population, which has caused alarming overcrowding. However, there is a big problem for women with its interpretation
Rianna Cleary, an 18-year-old care leaver, was pregnant when she was remanded to prison, on a charge of robbery. She went into labour when locked in her cell, and, though she rang desperately for help, nobody came. When she rang a second time, the officers turned her bell off. She gave birth to baby Aisha,
Prosecuting perpetrators for manslaughter when domestic abuse leads to suicide In January, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) failed in the manslaughter prosecution of Ryan Wellings, a domestic abuser, whose victim, Kiena Dawes, killed herself. It was only thethird prosecution of this kind that the CPS had ever attempted, and they have lost two. That is
Our criminal justice system imprisons twice as many women now, as it did in the nineties. No increase in the quantity or gravity of female crime has happened, to justify this. Harsh penal policy, directed at tougher sentencing for men – who are 96% of the prison population – seems simply to have carried women
