THE first black High Court judge is to be sworn in next month. She is Linda Dobbs, QC, a leading criminal barrister, who has just stepped down as chairman of the influential Criminal Bar Association.
No other black barrister has ever reached beyond the rank of circuit judge, and even there they make up only nine, of the 623 posts in England and Wales.
Ms Dobbs, 53, will be sworn in to her £150,878-a-year post at the end of next month. One source said: “She will be a huge asset to the Bench. She is very good indeed and highly regarded.”
A colleague described her as “incredibly focused — she gets things done. She’s very practical and down to earth.”
He added: “I wouldn’t like to appear before her if I’d missed a deadline or things hadn’t been done. She expects people to keep to what they say.” But he added: “She is immensely popular and you’d be hard put to find any enemy of hers.”
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Ms Dobbs recently took a leading role in the fight to preserve the Queen’s Counsel award. She wrote to The Times, with other black QCs, arguing that the QC rank was something which many black barristers now had within their sights.
To remove it just as they were about to attain their goal would have a demoralising effect, in effect pulling the rug from under their feet.
They wrote: “The hopes of a rising cohort of black and Asian practitioners would be dashed at a stroke by the abolition of silk, and a huge opportunity to promote diversity in the legal profession and on the Bench would be missed.”
The letter is thought to have been influential in the decision to retain the QC title, although the selection system itself is being reformed.
But she has never played the “race card”, and according to colleagues has always been concerned that any promotion should be solely to do with ability. “She was very anxious that she was not appointed to, say, silk, for the wrong reason,” a colleague said.
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Ms Dobbs, who is single (a marriage was dissolved) and has no children, has a house in South Africa, where she is committed to helping the legal community.
She set up a scholarship scheme in her chambers, 18 Red Lion Court (headed by Peter Rook, QC, also a former head of the Criminal Bar Association), for South African lawyers to spend time in Britain.
Academically strong — she has a PhD from the London School of Economics (LSE) and has studied the Russian legal system — she is also what one colleague described as a “well-rounded person” who is a “foodie”, enjoying restaurants and good wine. She also lists reading, music, theatre and travel among her recreations in Who’s Who. Another colleague said:
“She also has a good singing voice and sang at the Criminal Bar Association dinner.”
Appointed a deputy High Court judge last February, she is also a bencher of Gray’s Inn after a career at the Bar spanning more than 20 years.
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After boarding at Moreton Hall, a girls’ private school in Shropshire, she went to Surrey University and then to the LSE. She taught at Oxford, going to the Bar relatively late, where she built her practice in crime, both prosecuting and defending.
Her areas of expertise span white-collar crime, disciplinary tribunals, sexual offences, road traffic cases, tax frauds, drug smuggling and money laundering.