England: Judge reprimanded over ‘serious misconduct’ in three cases

Robert Stephen Dodds, a judge in the family court in Liverpool, was investigated by the Judicial Conduct Investigations Office (JCIO) after judges in the Court of Appeal rebuked him twice and said he should be embarrassed by his behaviour.

In February the JCIO opened an investigation into the judge after a number of families complained about their children being taken into care after he made orders.

Liverpool firm QualitySolicitors Jackson Canter made a formal complaint against Mr Dodds.

The JCIO said he has been reprimanded in three cases, in which his behaviour amounted to “serious misconduct”.

He used “unrestrained and immoderate language” when he told a girl, 13, that her DNA test on her father was “codswallop”.

Dismissing the application, he told the court: “The lunatics had truly taken over the asylum, and that just because the lunatics had said that they wanted something did not mean that they should be spoon-fed.”

He told the girl she should pay for the DNA test herself instead of through legal aid.

Senior judges described this as a “serious procedural irregularity” and said his language was deplorable.

They said: “Appointment as a judge was not a licence to be gratuitously rude to those appearing before him.”

In another case he forced a family apart at a hearing that was only meant to decide the future path for the case.

Appeal judges said this was “unprincipled” and “unfair”.

Sir James Munby, head of the family division, said: “No dispassionate observer of the proceedings could think that justice was done, let alone that it was seen to be done. It was not.”

He added: “A parent facing the removal of their child must be entitled to put their case to the court, however seemingly forlorn.

“It is one of the oldest principles of our law – it goes back over 400 years, to the earliest years of the seventeenth century – that no-one is to be condemned unheard.”

A spokesperson for the JCIO said: “His Honour Judge Robert Stephen Dodds, a family court circuit judge, was criticised by the Court of Appeal in relation to his conduct and case management of four court cases – Re A, Re P, Re S and Re S-W.

“The Lord Chancellor and Lord Chief Justice have considered the matter in accordance with the Judicial Discipline (Prescribed Procedures) Regulations 2014, and have issued HHJ Dodds a reprimand after finding that his actions in relation to Re A, Re S-W and Re P amounted to serious misconduct.”