Education & Professional Career to Date

Appointments

• Second Standing Junior to the Scottish Government (2016–present)
• Standing Junior to the Scottish Government (2012–2016)
• Ad hoc Advocate Depute (2010–2016)
• Legally Qualified Chair, Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) (2017–present)

Selected Cases

• ABC v Principal Reporter [2018] CSIH 72

  Scope of a siblings's Article 8 procedural rights where a children's hearing made contact decisions about his sibling (Inner House)

• Warner v Scapa Flow Charters [2018] UKSC 52

  The timebar provisions of the Athens Convention and their relationship with domestic law (Supreme Court, Inner House and Outer House)

• David Whitehouse v Chief Constable [2018] CSOH 93

  Action of damages against police and Lord Advocate alleging wrongful prosecutions. Procedure Roll debate as to Lord Advocate's absolute immunity and Article 8

• Docherty's Exrs v Secretary of State [2018] CSIH 57

  Identification of lex loci delicti where a deceased was exposed to asbestos in both Scotland and England (Inner House)

• RSPB v Scottish Minsters [2017] CSIH 31

  Judicial review of consents for wind farms in the Forth and Tay (Inner House and Outer House including application for protected expenses orders and opposing permission to appeal to Supreme Court)

• P v Scottish Ministers [2017] CSOH 33

  Judicial review examining whether disclosure of historic criminal convictions on PVG certificate breached the petitioner's Article 8 rights
  

• Declan Hainey FAI

  Long running Fatal Accident Inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death of Declan Hainey, September 2014, Sheriff Anderson

• Rosemary Cairns v. Northern Lighthouse Board and Calypso Marine Limited [2013] CSOH 22

  Proof on liability involving questions of negligence in the operation of a boat, indemnity issues and the Athens Convention

• Pamela Swarbrick v Ministry of Defence, 19 January 2011

  Civil jury trial in which the mother of an RAF serviceman killed in Afghanistan sought damages from the MOD

• Reverend Donald Smith and another v Reverend John Morrison and others [2009] CSOH 113; [2011] CSIH 52

  Procedure roll and reclaiming motion in a property dispute arising out of a secession from a non-established church

• Elizabeth Gordon v Mark Martin Lynch [2009] CSOH 116

  Proof in a catastrophic brain injury case

• Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) v Free Church of Scotland [2005] CSOH 46

  4 week procedure roll involving an examination of adherence to the fundamental principles of a non-established church

• Gillies Ramsay Diamond v PJW Enterprises Ltd [2004] SC 430

  Reclaiming motion in adjudication case