Practice Summary
Sarah is regularly instructed in both public and private family (children) cases, and has experience representing local authorities, parents and the children’s guardian. Sarah is also experienced in relation to family (domestic abuse) cases and is regularly instructed to represent police forces in the Family Courts in applications relating to disclosure.
In relation to her family practice, Sarah has been described as ‘calm and measured’, ‘confident and eloquent on her feet’ with a ‘very good sense of client empathy’.
In the 2026 Legal 500 directory, Sarah was ranked as a ‘Tier 4 Leading Junior’ in the category of Family – Children & Domestic Abuse. It was said that “Sarah has a very attractive advocacy style that is persuasive and reasoned, while remaining true to her client’s instructions. She is always clear and concise, makes good points and fights her client’s corner”.
Notable Cases
Re F (2024): Acting as a led junior representing the Local Authority, Sarah successfully represented the Local Authority in highly contentious care proceedings which began as private law proceedings in 2021 during which repeated attempts to reinstate the child’s relationship with the mother were unsuccessful. Following a 10-day final hearing, the court granted the LA’s application for removal of the child from the father’s care into the care of the maternal aunt. The father made an application to the CofA for permission to appeal which was successfully argued against.
A v A (2025): Just 4 weeks after a final order was made by the court which afforded the father a significant amount of unsupervised, overnight contact, the mother emailed the judge who had dealt with those proceedings to say she will be stopping contact, claiming she and the children had been harmed by the father. The father immediately applied to the court to enforce the order. Sarah secured a finding that the allegations were malicious and that the mother was not a reliable witness, and the court’s judgment was that the mother had invented allegations of violence to justify stopping contact.
Re W (2024): Sarah represented the Local Authority in lengthy proceedings which were initiated at birth, partly due to concerns that the mother’s older child was murdered by his father at the age of 5 months. A major concern was that both parents had been assessed to need intensive psychological intervention in order to safely parent the child. Positively, the Local Authority agreed to fund the required work and the court eventually granted the LA’s application for a 12-month supervision order following a successful transition back into parental care.
R v P (2024): Sarah represented the mother in proceedings which began when one child (age 2) was admitted to hospital having suffered a seizure and blood test results revealed a positive result for numerous substances. Sarah made a lengthy application to adjourn the hearing and undertook detailed cross-examination of several professionals resulting in important concessions. Although the main thrust of the parents’ case was that they sought reunification, given the recent shift in attitudes towards open adoption, Sarah addressed the judge extensively on post-adoption contact.
R v B (2025): Sarah represented an extremely vulnerable mother who required an intermediary throughout and had the benefit of a personal assistant and a support worker. These proceedings began at birth, with the main concerns the cognitive abilities of the parents and their poor mental health. At the final hearing, the court acceded to the application made by Sarah to adjourn to allow a further assessment to take place with the child being returned to parental care.