ALC’s Hershman Outstanding Newcomer

in the Field of Children Law Award 2015

Nominee: RACHEL BENETT, SOLICITOR, QUALIFIED 2012

Fisher Meredith LLP

Blue Sky House, 405 Kennington Road, SE11 4PT

020 7091 2779

(nominee)

NOMINATED BY: KATE MAKEPEACE GRIEVE, COUNSEL (2006)

36 Bedford Row WC1X 0ET

m. 07957600986

Note: This nomination is made on the basis an outstanding ability in supporting clients

I have had the pleasure of working with Rachel Benett over the past 3 years; she has instructed me in pubic law cases.

It is abundantly clear that Miss Benett is a truly excellent lawyer. She is bright, dedicated, diligent, with good humour and sensitivity.

As an example of a case we have done together, we represented a particularly vulnerable young mother, a child herself, in proceedings in relation to her young son. Mother was learning disabled, had been sexually exploited for profit by her own father, and had experienced a thoroughly impoverished childhood. Despite her difficulties, Mother was positively assessed to care for her young son in a residential assessment unit and placed in the community together with her child. Whilst living in the community, a neighbor attacked her in her own home and she felt fear for herself and her son. She stabbed the man with a kitchen knife in the chest later the same evening and he died. Mother was convicted of manslaughter on the basis that she did not have the capacity to form the intent to murder.

During the course of the criminal proceedings, Motherwas assessed by two psychiatrists; both deemed her to pose no risk to the child or anyone else; the event would not be repeated.

The family court concluded that the child could not ‘wait’ for his mother to serve her sentence and he was freed for adoption.

Mother’s predicament was such that the outcome to proceedings was inevitable but her love for her son was both compelling and unrelenting; her situation was one of the saddest I had ever encountered.

This young Mother needed attentive, sensitive care, which Miss Benett was able to provide to her in abundance. I feel strongly that this Mother could very easily have been lost between the criminal and family proceedings making her excruciating existence unbearable. This young mother, this child, was given a voice by Miss Benett.

I whole-heartedly recommend Miss Benett as the Hershman Outstanding Newcomer for her contributions to the field of child law. I am sure that she will continue to play an active role in shaping the future of children’s law.

04.10.15

Kate Makepeace Grieve

Counsel, Family Law Specialist

36 Bedford Row WC1R 4JH

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