Judges who oversaw Sara Sharif’s care can be named next week
24 January 2025, 10:23
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.
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In December, Mr Justice Williams said that the media could not identify three judges who oversaw historical court cases related to 10-year-old Sara, as well as others including social workers and guardians, due to a "real risk" of harm to them from a "virtual lynch mob".
Several media organisations, including the PA news agency and journalists Louise Tickle and Hannah Summers, challenged the ban on naming the judges.
And in a ruling on Friday, three Court of Appeal judges said the three unnamed judges could be identified in seven days.
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Sir Geoffrey Vos said: "In the circumstances of this case, the judge had no jurisdiction to anonymise the historic judges either on 9 December 2024 or thereafter. He was wrong to do so."
The media were previously allowed to report that Surrey County Council had concerns about Sara's father, Urfan Sharif, as early as 2010 and that Sara was involved in three sets of family court proceedings before she was murdered by Sharif and her stepmother, Beinash Batool, at their home in Woking, Surrey.
Documents released to the media showed that Surrey County Council first had contact with Sharif and Sara's mother, Olga Sharif, in 2010 - more than two years before Sara was born - having received "referrals indicative of neglect" relating to her two older siblings, known only as Z and U.
The authority began care proceedings concerning Z and U in January 2013, involving Sara within a week of her birth.
Between 2013 and 2015, several allegations of abuse were made that were never tested in court, with one hearing in 2014 told that the council had "significant concerns" about the children returning to Sharif, "given the history of allegations of physical abuse of the children and domestic abuse with Mr Sharif as the perpetrator".
In 2019, a judge approved Sara moving to live with her father at the home in Woking where she later died after a campaign of abuse.
Sharif and Batool were jailed for life for Sara's murder in December, with minimum terms of 40 years and 33 years.
Her uncle, Faisal Malik, was jailed for 16 years after being convicted of causing or allowing her death.
