3PB

Family.

Overview

Lucy Hendry KC is a highly experienced and extremely capable child law specialist.

Lucy is renowned for being a strategic and robust advocate with incisive judgment and a clear passion for her work. She appears in all level of courts and is well respected by the judiciary, her opponents and her clients (both lay and professional).

Lucy has a particular expertise in understanding and examining complex medical and ethical issues. She is masterful at undertaking cross examination of eminent experts and she does so in a manner and language that her clients understand.

Lucy is client focussed and, as a consequence, she delivers exemplary client care. She makes it a priority to understand accurately the dynamics behind each case. In so doing she gains the trust of her clients and works tirelessly to advance their case.

Family

Public Law

Lucy Hendry KC accepts instructions on behalf of parents, children, intervenors and wider family members.

Lucy is known for her formidable cross examination, informed by her ability to analyse lay professional and expert evidence in the most complex and unwieldy of cases. She is rigorous in her research, especially with regard to evolving medical and scientific / genetic issues, which tend to be prevalent in her caseload.

She has particular interest and expertise in the following:

• Allegations of child death and catastrophic brain injury
• Extremely serious physical injury, including poisoning, bites, burns and lesions
• Allegations of sexual abuse
• Fabricated and induced illness - in parents and their children
• Medical best interest decisions for subject children
• Human Trafficking
• Issues of cultural diversity and whether state intervention is justified
• Vulnerable witnesses: children, young people and parents with cognitive and sensory impairments
• Personality disorders, mental health and addiction issues affecting parenting capacity

Private Law

Lucy is renowned for dealing with sensitive and seemingly intractable cases. First and foremost, a highly effective advocate in the courtroom, Lucy is also renowned for taking a collaborative child focused approach to try to achieve agreed and enduring arrangements for children, thereby reducing the risk of (further) polarisation between parents and averting the need for a trial.

She has a particular interest and expertise in the following:

• Allegations of 'alienation', often including applications for a transfer of residence
• Serious allegations of abuse of subject children: sexual, physical and emotional
• Allegations of rape by spouse or partner
• Domestic Abuse, coercive and controlling behaviour: the application of PD12J
• Complex cases requiring intervention by the local authority
• Separate representation of competent children
• Internal and/or international relocation

Reported cases:

Birmingham City Council v Mother v Ors [2023] EWHC 905 (Fam): My teenage client was exonerated in respect of allegations that he had repeatedly raped and digitally penetrated his sister. During cross examination, I demonstrated how several professionals, through their unquestioning belief in the complainant’s narrative, had contaminated her account of abuse. Furthermore, I exposed a wholesale failure by professionals to review primary evidence rendering them ignorant about the nature and extent of the complainant’s online activity with peers and others.

Lancashire County Council -v- M (1) F (2) and C (3 By his Children’s Guardian) [2020] EWFC 43: Our client, who had significant mental health issues, faced allegations of causing cerebral injuries and fractures to his baby’s limbs and digits. A creative approach, endorsed by the court, safeguarded his right to a fair trial and ensured that he was able to participate fully throughout.

C v D [2020] EWFC 83: Representing a father who was seeking contact with his son in circumstances where the court had found that he had raped and otherwise abused the mother.

Oxfordshire County Council v a mother, a father and W, X, Y and Z (Children: welfare) [2020] EWFC 29: Representing the children, I differentiated between cultural issues (Arabic and Russian) and deficient parental care - particularly in respect of the youngest of 4 children who had unmet specialist health needs.

PR v JS & TR (Appeal: Sexual Abuse, Fact Finding) [2019] EWHC 791 (Fam): A successful appeal followed by a rehearing: [2019] EWFC 69. My client was exonerated in respect of allegations that he had sexually abused his 4 year old daughter. After expert intervention, contact between himself and his daughter resumed.

Re T (A Child) [2018] EWCA Civ 650, [2018] 2 FLR 926: Acting pro bono on behalf of the mother, I was instrumental in the appeal being allowed. Describing the case as "unprecedented", the Court of Appeal held that the judge was wrong when she made care / placement orders after the local authority refused to act on her judgment that the child be brought up within the family and not placed for adoption

Kent County Council v A, B, C and D (Children) [2017] EWFC B72: Weight to be attached to evidence after flawed ABE interviews.

Notable cases:

Re G (2024): A case concerning extremely serious allegations of sexual abuse which required me to cross examine a number of vulnerable young witnesses.  My client's fragile mental health was such that considerable skill was required to facilitate his full participation during the three week trial last.

Re T (2024): A cut throat defence culminated in my client being exonerated and her ex-partner being found culpable of causing cerebral injuries to their 5-month old baby daughter.

Re E (2023): Shortly before trial, the local authority abandoned extremely serious allegations that my client had fabricated and induced illness in both children. Furthermore the court found that my client had not caused fractures and bruising to one of the subject children – she was immediately able to resume unsupervised care of both children.

Re B (2023): It was common ground that my teenage client, who was selectively mute, had been sexually abused. However, he also faced allegations that he had sexually abused his sisters. In the course of compromising proceedings, I maintained that my client should be viewed as a victim rather than as a perpetrator of sexual abuse and further that he should receive much needed therapeutic help in a residential setting.

Re H (2023): Key issues for trial were the integrity of the 4-year-old child’s alleged account of sexual abuse by my client, the reliability of a single positive test result and, if sexually transmitted infection was established, who was responsible for transmitting it. At the conclusion of the trial, no adverse findings were made against my client and he was subsequently able to resume care of his daughter.

Re B (2022): Both parents had been in the house when their new-born baby suffered catastrophic head injuries and subsequently died. After cross-examining an array of experts, I was able to establish that my client’s account was entirely consistent with the injuries being inflicted by the father whilst she was out of the room. At the conclusion of the trial the court exonerated my client.

Re T (2022): I represented a vulnerable mother who denied that she had been assaulted by her violent partner, causing her to lose her unborn baby when she was heavily pregnant. During the trial I cross-examined several medical experts as to complex issues associated with the cause of the baby’s death.

Re B (2022): 6 years-worth of litigation regarding post separation arrangements for the subject child had been exacerbated by conflicting expert opinion from three different psychologists as to which parent was responsible for causing significant emotional harm to her.

Re H (2021): I successfully demonstrated that accounts by the alleged victim and another sibling, of sexual abuse perpetrated over the course of several years, were wholly inconsistent and inherently unreliable. As a consequence, the court made no adverse findings against my 15 year old client.

Re W (2021): My client, the father, and his wife were completely exonerated in respect of allegations that either or both had caused fractures to their 5 week old baby.

Re L (2021): I represented a mother who faced allegations of human trafficking and of exposing her son to risky persons and to organised crime.

Re H (2021): I represented a mother whose teenage son had been cleared of terrorism charges. At final hearing, I achieved findings of coercive and controlling behaviour against the father as well as successfully supporting the child’s allegations against his father - of physical and emotional harm.

Re O (2021): My client, the father faced allegations of causing significant harm to his baby (near drowning and several fractures). Cross examination of the expert elicited evidence of a single fracture, caused accidentally when he rescued his baby. Successful reunification of baby and both parents.

Re B (2020): I represented a young mother with significant learning difficulties and sensory impairment (deafness). Through cross examination I successfully demonstrated that the children's accounts of sexual abuse allegedly perpetrated by the mother, her partner and other third parties over several years were inherently unreliable. As a consequence, the court refused to make findings of sexual abuse against my client and others.

Re H (2020): Representing a father whose ex-wife, in the aftermath of an acrimonious divorce, was found by the court to have fabricated and exaggerated illness in their teenage daughter.  The court further determined that as a consequence of the mother's conduct, the daughter had somatised her own clinical signs and presentation.

Re L (2019): Representing a father whose youngest child had died as a consequence of 'overlaying'.  Despite this and further injuries (fractures) that predated the child's death, the court ultimately approved a plan for reunification of the older two children with my client and the mother.

Re T & T (2019): Representing a vulnerable teenage mother, I achieved findings that her partner, rather than she, had been responsible for causing 19 fractures to their 8-week old baby.

Some other noteworthy cases:

Re O: Representing a mother whose child, in the context of intractable and complex marital breakdown, had become mute and was refusing to attend school.

Re W: Representing a mother who tried to drown her 5 year old son whilst suffering with a serious psychotic / mental illness. The central issue at final hearing was whether it was in the child's best interest for him to be rehabilitated to his mother’s care.

Re C: Representing a 14 year old child, who required detention, assessment and treatment under the Mental Health Act in a secure psychiatric unit.

Re S&G: Representing the parents of three children whose adoptive placements had broken down.

Re K: Seeking and obtaining leave from the Court of Appeal for a mother to defend adoption proceedings in respect of her two children.

Re S: Representing the guardian. The subject child was made a ward of court so that a best interests medical plan could be achieved in the face of persistent obstruction by both parents.

Re L: Representing the children whose mother had been murdered by their father. Achieving placement of both children with their grandmother.

Year of call 1998, Silk 2021

Family Law Bar Association Western Circuit

Accredited Mediation Advocate