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

Three judges who oversaw family court proceedings related to the care of Sara Sharif can be named next week, the Court of Appeal has ruled.

In December, Mr Justice Williams said that the media could not identify three judges who oversaw historical court cases related to Sara, as well as others including social workers and guardians, because of a “real risk” of harm to them from a “virtual lynch mob”.

But in a ruling on Friday, three Court of Appeal judges said the three unnamed judges could be identified in seven days.

Sir Geoffrey Vos said: “In the circumstances of this case, the judge had no jurisdiction to anonymise the historic judges either on Dec 9 2024 or thereafter. He was wrong to do so.”

He added: “It is the role of the judge to sit in public and, even if sitting in private, to be identified... Judges will sit on many types of case in which feelings run high, and where there may be risks to their personal safety.

“I have in mind cases involving national security, criminal gangs and terrorism. It is up to the authorities with responsibility for the courts to put appropriate measures in place to meet these risks, depending on the situation presented by any particular case.

“The first port of call is not, and cannot properly be, the anonymisation of the judge’s name.”

‘Got carried away’
Sir Geoffrey said that the High Court judge “got carried away” in his ruling, finding that Mr Justice Williams had “behaved unfairly” towards two journalists.

The senior judge also said Mr Justice Williams had made an “unwarranted” sarcastic remark about a 2021 Channel 4 Dispatches programme.

Sir Geoffrey added: “Such sarcasm has no proper place in a court judgment.”