Court of Appeal rules the 3 Sara Sharif judges can be identified next week.

Even an ‘inexperienced one’ maddyone?
Maybe that’s part of a wider problem.

Visits are made, assessments done, workloads too onerous, follow ups missed or not scheduled. Workers leave/retire/move on, caseloads are not robustly handed over. Multi-disciplinary teams don’t share information adequately.

It seems a hot crazy mess.

eazybee, according to the Guardian, an inexperienced social worker recommended that Sara be put into the care of her father. There are few judges who would go against the advice of a social worker.

Anniebach

What can be gained by naming them ?

Nothing, it's not going to change things, and they have anonymity for a reason, for there safety.

Yes there is. This judge made a very wrong decision in returning Sara to her father, against the advice of the social workers and the foster parents who cared for her. I hope there will be professional investigations into his reasoning too.

Heartbreaking summary silverlining.
Thank you for expressing this so well and sensitively.

Most children do not talk to anyone about the abuse they experience. Many reasons, fear, threats or family loyalty. It seems that the father appeared a more stable parent than the mother who had cared for Sara previously. Wrongly,of course, but if bruises etc were satisfactorily explained away and if she appeared to be ok and the family caring, there is little any social or other support worker can do.
The school described Sara as a confident girl, and certainly old enough to articulate any
problems, so if she didn’t, wouldn’t or couldn't, then a conference with agreement of education, police and any others involved with the family, decides that the the case should be closed and the worker is allocated the next case on an ever increasing waiting list.
It’s a tragedy, that home, for some unfortunate children, can be the most dangerous place to be, instead of the safe loving place it should be.

FriedGreenTomatoes2

And judges were happy to name Metropolitan Police officer Martyn Blake who pleaded not guilty to murdering Chris Kaba and was found not guilty, but they don’t want to be named themselves.

Double standards?

It does look like double standards

FriedGreenTomatoes2

What troubles me maddyone about Family Courts is that judges can be manipulated because a clever bugger like Sharif bamboozles them. Too much is at stake surely with the well being, emotionally and physically, of ALL children for this ‘hearsay’ from parents presenting a ‘spin’ on things for such judgements to be made this way?

This is true, how does naming 3 judges help with it? Should all judges in family Courts be named in your opinion? How will it help?

True maddyone.

The Chris Kaba case was dreadful, from start to finish.
But it was not heard in the Family Court.
I feel for that policeman.

FriedGreenTomatoes2

What troubles me maddyone about Family Courts is that judges can be manipulated because a clever bugger like Sharif bamboozles them. Too much is at stake surely with the well being, emotionally and physically, of ALL children for this ‘hearsay’ from parents presenting a ‘spin’ on things for such judgements to be made this way?

I agree with you on this FGT.
A manipulative person could well present himself/herself as being something they are not, as clearly Shariff did. I assume that judges try to see their way through this, but it really must be a very difficult task. The evidence presented by Social Workers and police will have helped to form the judgment, and obviously that evidence favoured Shariff. Sara had already been taken by Social Services from the care of her mother because she was thought to be an unfit parent.
It was a complex and difficult case.

And judges were happy to name Metropolitan Police officer Martyn Blake who pleaded not guilty to murdering Chris Kaba and was found not guilty, but they don’t want to be named themselves.

Double standards?

Judges and lawyers are usually one and the same. Most judges are either barristers or solicitors and are still practicing their particular field of law alongside sitting as a judge for so many days a year. The minimum number of days a judge can sit is thirty days a year. All judges have been lawyers previously even if they no longer practice law as a lawyer.

They should be bright enough to see through the bamboozling.

Barleyfields

In the days of capital punishment, was a judge sentencing someone to death allowed anonymity? No.

Nor in Court cases concerning the IRA terrorists either. I should imagine those days were pretty frightening for all concerned.

What troubles me maddyone about Family Courts is that judges can be manipulated because a clever bugger like Sharif bamboozles them. Too much is at stake surely with the well being, emotionally and physically, of ALL children for this ‘hearsay’ from parents presenting a ‘spin’ on things for such judgements to be made this way?

In the days of capital punishment, was a judge sentencing someone to death allowed anonymity? No.

maddyone, I have not said that family court proceedings should be held in public and nor has anyone else. I don’t know why you think that has been suggested, because it hasn’t. The only thing which has been reviewed is the application by the judges in the Sharif case to not be named. The Court of Appeal has overruled the decision which allowed anonymity.

If those judges had not directed that the poor child be returned to her father there is every reason to believe she would still be alive.

They may not have killed her, but they were instrumental in her killing. Why should they be allowed to hide?

Frontline staff are on a fraction of the salary of Judges and lawyers are under far more pressure than these privileged legal individuals and face severe scrutiny and consequences on a daily basis - so why not judges as well as the lawyers involved?

Sharif may have killed Sara, but the lack of care/responsibility/ support for her from all support services was terrible, if people had responded appropriately Sara could have been removed from that awful situation.
These people bear responsibility to.

The Court of Appeal are only acting in retrospect though FGT. I don’t think you would think that court proceedings regarding children should be held in public normally.
Family Courts must be private. To open up a Family Court case after such a terrible event as the murder of that lovely little girl is completely different than Family Courts being routinely open.
And I reiterate, the judges didn’t kill Sara, her father did.

Blaming the judges has been compared, by another judge, as like blaming the lookouts on the Titanic for its sinking. This is monstrous. The judge is like the captain or officer of the watch. Their decisions are so fundamentally at the heart of what went wrong. The lookouts were the social workers and mother telling the captain there was trouble ahead. That the judge ignored their evidence was fundamental.

I’m completely conflicted! Some of the “secrecy” in family courts isn’t healthy, but then again neither is exposing the judges to potential revenge

maddyone, I fully understand that family court proceedings are heard in private and are not reported, and the very good reason why that is so. I had thought I had made that entirely clear. Some other cases, particularly involving issues of national security, are also heard in private and not reported or only partially reported in the press. I have not suggested that the family courts be opened to all, nor that their proceedings should be reported. I don’t know how you have got that idea. What I have said, very clearly, is that judges should be named, and the Court of Appeal has confirmed that they have no right to anonymity. That anonymity was applied for in this case says a lot I think.

love0c

Wylow3 The judges were given information that clearly showed they were making the wrong decision. They just thought they knew best.

Family Court judges can only make a judgment based on the information that has been given to them.
I believe Shariff lied when presenting his case. He was/is a domineering and controlling man who abused all his female partners and their children, but he presented himself as the better parent to look after his daughter. We don’t know what other evidence was presented to these judges to inform their judgement. They came to the conclusion that Sara would be better off with her father, and we have never been told why they formed that conclusion. Clearly it was the wrong conclusion, but without knowing what the three judges were told, we cannot know why they made their decision.

Perhaps we would do well to remember who killed little Sara. It wasn’t the judges, it was Shariff.