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Here
a collection of newspapers articles which report how she dealt with
the exposure of her disclosing and forwarding secret Family Court
papers. |
| Unraveling the Harman case Telegraph.co.uk, UK - 24 Mar 2004 Did a mother deliberately put her daughter's life at risk two years ago by injecting her with an infected fluid? Or did the mother ... Harman apology over 'leak' Solicitor General admits she broke law Harman defends role in contempt case Harman Denies Breach of Court Papers Rules Harman quizzed over contempt of court Harman defends document decision Harman Summoned to Face Commons Harman and her sister in case papers blunder Harman to face MPs on 'contempt' Harman to face MPs over contempt Harman quizzed over contempt of court -------------------------------------Here the articles in full---------> Unravelling the Harman case The Court of Appeal must decide if a mother risked her child's life or was a victim of miscarriage of justice, writes Joshua Rozenberg Did a mother deliberately put her daughter's life at risk two years ago by injecting her with an infected fluid? Or did the mother become the victim of an appalling miscarriage of justice when Kent social services took her little girl into care? These are the questions at the heart of an extraordinary judgment handed down by Mr Justice Munby in the High Court Family Division last Friday, and reported for the first time in yesterday's Telegraph. As the judgment revealed, the mother's solicitor, Sarah Harman, sent the case papers to her sister, the Solicitor General Harriet Harman, who in turn forwarded them to the Children's Minister, Margaret Hodge. Each publication was unlawful, and Sarah Harman apologised after accepting the judge's finding that she had been in contempt of court. Worse still, perhaps, Sarah Harman and her client were found to have misled the judge who dealt with the case last month "by a mixture of suppressio veri and suggestio falsi" - suppressing truth and suggesting falsehoods. As far as the mother was concerned, that should have surprised nobody. Mrs Justice Bracewell found last year that the mother "is undoubtedly a skilled and persistent liar who, over the years, has sought to and succeeded in conning doctors, teachers and family in respect of illnesses which she claimed to be genuine but which were self-induced". So, is there any justification for the mother's complaints against the doctors who diagnosed her as suffering from Munchausen's Syndrome by Proxy - an attention-seeking condition first identified by Prof Sir Roy Meadow. At the end of a lengthy ruling in the High Court, Mr Justice Munby said he did not have "the slightest idea". "It may be that the mother is indeed the victim of a miscarriage of justice. If she is, then she has a powerful argument for saying that she should not be gagged." But, for all the judge knew, she might not be. "In that event, there may be a powerful public interest in exposing her for what she is found to be: a woman who falsely cast herself in the role of victim and sought, by use of the media, to persuade the public that she was something which, in truth, she turns out not to have been." Deciding which of these pen-portraits was true was not a matter for Mr Justice Munby, a well-regarded family judge who is tipped for promotion to the Court of Appeal. All he had been asked to rule upon was whether the mother should be allowed to debate her case in public. Some facts are undisputed. Her youngest daughter was born in 1999, and when the child was two, Kent social services department began High Court care proceedings. Mrs Justice Bracewell found in January 2003 that a cannula, or tube, that had been attached to the child in hospital "was deliberately interfered with - removed - by the mother". She also found that the mother had deliberately administered "some unidentified infected substance" to the baby, which caused rigors - or fits - that were "potentially life-threatening". After a further hearing before Mr Justice Holman last autumn, the child was taken into the care of Kent County Council and placed with family members. In January, her mother decided to challenge the care order in the Court of Appeal. Judgment is awaited after a hearing this month. At the same time, the mother lodged a complaint with the General Medical Council against two of the doctors who had given evidence against her in the care proceedings. Her legal action followed successful criminal appeals brought by three other mothers - Sally Clark, Trupti Patel and Angela Cannings. All had been convicted of murdering their children after Prof Sir Roy Meadow - the paediatrician who has been subsequently discredited - had given "expert" evidence for the Crown. One of the mother's concerns in this case was that a doctor who gave evidence in the care proceedings was said to have based his diagnosis of Munchausen's Syndrome by Proxy on research he had carried out with Sir Roy. The mother sought permission on Jan 29 to disclose court papers to the GMC in support of her complaint. She also asked if she could hand the papers to Harriet Harman, Mrs Hodge, and to her MP, because she wanted them to be considered as part of a possible Government review of care proceedings following the Cannings case. In fact, the papers had already been disclosed. A High Court hearing on 5 Feb, at which she sought permission, was a "charade", said Mr Justice Munby. The first that Kent council knew about what was going on was when Sarah Harman told social workers outside court that she would talk to her sister, the Solicitor General, about the case. If necessary, she told them, the social services department would have to make a contempt of court application against her. This week, Sarah Harman and her supporters argued that publicity was an essential weapon in fighting miscarriages of justice. And Harriet Harman said in the Commons yesterday that constituents should be not be at risk of contempt proceedings if they discussed their own cases with their MPs. Finally, a Kent MP argued that he could not take up cases with ministers unless he had access to court papers. But all this misses the point. The judge certainly made an order "against the world", preventing the child and her carers from being approached by the media. He also refused the mother permission to name the doctor who diagnosed Munchausen's Syndrome in her case - not so much out of concern for the doctor as for other specialists who might, in future, be discouraged from helping the courts in "vitally important child protection cases". But Mr Justice Munby, who has done more than any other judge to introduce openness in the Family Division, decided that the balance came down in favour of permitting the mother to disclose relevant court papers to the GMC and make her allegations in public. And the Court of Appeal, Harriet Harman revealed yesterday, was perfectly happy for Margaret Hodge to see the court papers. So, if only Sarah Harman and her client had waited until permission had been granted, they would not have been in contempt of court. The curious thing is that, by yesterday, we had heard nothing from the mother - even though she knew more than two weeks ago that she would be allowed to talk to her many media contacts. Although she cannot be named, she is fully entitled, as Mr Justice Munby said, "to participate in the ongoing public debate and to do so essentially in the way she wishes". She can tell us, for example, that the doctor who worked with Sir Roy Meadow had no experience of fabricated disease, that other experts could find no cause for the child's fits, and that hospital staff thought it unlikely that she would have had an opportunity to administer the unidentified infected substance to her child. But Mrs Justice Bracewell's findings are that the mother did administer the substance and that she lied about a number of matters. Who is right? The Court of Appeal reserved judgment three weeks ago. Let's hope it knows the answer. 24 March 2004: Harman and her sister in case papers blunder 13 December 2003: Munchausen's by proxy Source:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ ============================================= Harriet Harman The solicitor general, Harriet Harman, denied she breached confidentiality rules in passing to the children's minister, Margaret Hodge, court papers relating to a case in which a mother was found to have deliberately harmed her child. She stressed this in reply to the shadow attorney general, Dominic Grieve, who demanded a statement on the "wrongful" disclosure of papers to Ms Hodge. Source: http://politics.guardian.co.uk/commons/story/0,9061,1177588,00.html ============================================= Harman apology over 'leak' Michael White Thursday March 25, 2004 The Guardian Harriet Harman, the solicitor general, apologised yesterday to the Commons for the mishandling of sensitive court papers forwarded to her by a fellow lawyer, her sister. Ms Harman, whose sister is a campaigning solicitor in Canterbury, told MPs she had been misadvised about passing to the children's minister, Margaret Hodge, details of a case where a mother had been found deliberately to have harmed her baby. Sarah Harman was found in contempt of court after she admitted passing the papers to Ms Hodge via her sister. Harriet Harman told the Commons: "I take responsibility for my actions in this case." http://politics.guardian.co.uk/commons/story/0,9061,1177400,00.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Solicitor General admits she broke law By Joshua Rozenberg, Legal Editor (Filed: 25/03/2004) Harriet Harman, the Solicitor General, accepted responsibility yesterday for breaking the law that restricts publication of private court proceedings relating to children. Miss Harman said she could have defended in court her decision to send her Government colleague Margaret Hodge a High Court ruling dealing with a child who had been taken into care. Harriet Harman She told the House of Commons that this might not have amounted to "publication" within the meaning of the Administration of Justice Act 1960. "That's a point which I could have taken but did not take," she said. "So I am happy to accept responsibility for that." Miss Harman had been called to the House to answer an emergency question in response to a report in The Telegraph yesterday revealing that she had sent the court judgment to the Minister for Children. The Solicitor General had received it from her sister, the solicitor Sarah Harman, who accepted that she had been in contempt of court by disclosing legal documents. But Harriet Harman told MPs that the judgment she had forwarded did not identify the child concerned. For that reason, the law officer said she had not been in breach of separate restrictions in the Children Act. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/03/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1.45pm update -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Harman defends role in contempt case Matthew Tempest and agencies Wednesday March 24, 2004 The solicitor general, Harriet Harman, today defended herself against accusations of impropriety after it was revealed that her sister had been found in contempt of court for handing the government minister confidential family court papers. Ms Harman admitted passing the papers on to Margaret Hodge, the minister for children, but stressed that this was on the legal advice of her department, and at no time was she aware of the relevant child's identity. However, in an emergency response to questioning by the Conservatives in the Commons, she revealed that her legal advisor subsequently admitted his advice to be wrong. Ms Harman forwarded the papers to Ms Hodge because she thought they had implications for other care cases involving mothers accused of Munchausen's Syndrome by proxy. Ms Harman said the Commons officials advised her that it would be fine to forward sensitive family court papers to a colleague, but later changed that advice when her actions were challenged by the local authority involved. Dominic Grieve, for Tories, said: "It is an extremely unfortunate state of affairs where the Law Officers Department ... is unable to know the rules." Ms Harman stressed she had never known or revealed the identity of the child involved, and that the appeal court had in any case decided to forward the papers to Ms Hodge. Sarah Harman, the solicitor general's sister and a campaigning lawyer, has apologised to a judge who ruled that her actions amounted to contempt, the Daily Telegraph reported. In her appearance before MPs, Ms Harman was flanked by senior cabinet ministers Peter Hain and Patricia Hewitt, although the details of the alleged misdemeanour appeared to hang on quite obscure legal niceties. For the Tories, Mr Grieve told her it was "not acceptable to pass responsibility on to those who give legal advice". But Ms Harman insisted: "I am not trying to shed responsibility. I acted in good faith, I acted with due diligence. The interests of the child were not harmed, but other issues will be considered." The Tories stopped short, however, of calling for her resignation. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/commons/story/0,9061,1176943,00.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wed 24 Mar 2004 1:28pm (UK) Harman Denies Breach of Court Papers Rules By Chris Moncrieff and Vivienne Morgan, Political Staff, PA News Solicitor General Harriet Harman today denied that she had breached the rules of confidentiality in passing to Children’s Minister Margaret Hodge court papers relating to a case in which a mother was found to have deliberately harmed her child. She stressed this in reply to an emergency Commons question by the shadow Attorney General, Dominic Grieve, who demanded a statement on the “wrongful” disclosure of court papers to Ms Hodge. She said this was the case of a minor who was subject to a care order on the grounds that the child had been harmed by the mother who was suffering from Munchausen’s syndrome by proxy. “I was told by a solicitor, who happened to be my sister Sarah] that she was considering what action to take in respect of a client of hers who was seeking to challenge an order of the High Court taking the child into care. Mr Justice Munby has said it was, on the face of it, contempt of court for Sarah Harman, to have given the documents to her sister]. The Solicitor General said the solicitor sent her a copy of the judgment of the High Court. “I read it. The names had been blanked out. I did not and do not know the name of the child or the family.” She said she thought the Minister for Children should be aware of the judgment. “Before I sent the judgment, without the names, to the Minister for Children, I sought legal advice from my office and was advised there was no prohibition on my doing so because the names had been blanked out. “Having checked with the solicitor I sent the judgment to the Minister for Children. When the local authority responsible for the care proceedings challenged my sending the judgment to the Minister, the lawyer in my office who advised me reconsidered the question and decided that he probably was wrong and that I should not have sent the judgment to the Minister without a court order.” But she stressed that she acted on legal advice and in any event the Court of Appeal subsequently asked Ms Hodge whether she wanted to intervene in this case and gave leave for the disclosure to her of all the papers in the case. http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2691414 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wed 24 Mar 2004 Harman defends document decision Harman passed the papers to Children's Minister Margaret Hodge Solicitor General Harriet Harman has defended her decision to pass on papers from a Family Court case that were handed to her by her solicitor sister. Sarah Harman apologised after a judge said she was in contempt of court for disclosing the sensitive documents. The papers, giving details of her client, reportedly a mother challenging a finding she harmed her child, were then passed to the children's minister. Harriet Harman told MPs she had acted on legal advice that was later changed. 'No prohibition' The solicitor general was prompted to make a House of Commons statement on the case following an urgent question by her Tory shadow, Dominic Grieve. She said she had sent the court papers to Minister for Children Margaret Hodge after taking advice from her officials.
"Before I sent the judgement, without the names, to the minister for children, I sought legal advice from my office and was advised that there was no prohibition on my doing so because the names had all been blanked out," said Ms Harman. This advice was "subject to me checking with the solicitor that there was no specific ruling in this case prohibiting the disclosure", she added. "Having checked with the solicitor, I then sent the judgement to the minister for children." 'Identity unknown' Ms Harman said she was back in touch with her legal advisor when the local authority responsible for the care proceedings challenged her sending the judgement to Mrs Hodge. "The lawyer in my office who advised me reconsidered the question and decided that he probably was wrong and that I should not have sent the judgement to the minister for children without a court order," she said. "I can reassure the House I acted on legal advice. I did not identify the child - I could not in any event because I did not know the child's identity." Ms Harman told MPs that the Court of Appeal later asked Mrs Hodge to consider whether she wanted to intervene in the case. It then gave leave for all the papers in the case to be disclosed to her on 23 February, she said. Responsibility Mr Grieve said it was "an extremely unfortunate state of affairs where the law officers' department ... is unable to know the rules". He said it was the role and function of the solicitor general "to take responsibility for their own actions in relation to documents that come into their possession". Ms Harman replied that it was not a question of her not knowing the rules. "I'm very clear that I took responsibility for my actions in this case," she said. Ms Harman added that by not identifying the child involved she had not breached the rules of the Children's Act. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3564229.stm Quotes: "It is an extremely unfortunate state of affairs where the law officers' department ... is unable to know the rules" Dominic Grieve " The lawyer in my office ...decided that he probably was wrong and that I should not have sent the judgement to the minister for children without a court order " Harriet Harman ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wed 24 Mar 2004 11:58am (UK) Harman Summoned to Face Commons By James Lyons, Political Correspondent, PA News Solicitor General Harriet Harman was today forced to face MPs over her reported involvement in a contempt of court. Ms Harman was said to have received sensitive family court papers from her sister Sarah, a campaigning solicitor. Sarah Harman has apologised to a judge who ruled her actions amounted to contempt, the Daily Telegraph reported. Now her sister has been summoned to the Commons to answer an emergency question from Conservatives. Ms Harman forwarded the papers to ministerial colleague Margaret Hodge after a Government lawyer provided “wrong” advice, the newspaper said. She was due to speak in the Commons after Prime Minister’s Questions at around 12.30pm. http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2690950 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wed 24 Mar 2004 Harman and her sister in case papers blunder By Joshua Rozenberg, Legal Editor (Filed: 24/03/2004) A campaigning solicitor who handed sensitive family court papers to her sister, the Solicitor General Harriet Harman, has apologised after a judge said she was in contempt of court. Sarah Harman misled a judge over her disclosure of the court papers, which gave details of her client, a mother found to have deliberately harmed her child.
Harriet Harman The documents were forwarded by Harriet Harman to the children's minister, Margaret Hodge, after a Government lawyer provided "wrong" legal advice. Mr Justice Munby said it was, on the face of it, contempt of court for Sarah Harman, a solicitor based in Canterbury, to have given the documents to her sister in January. The judge said: "A Government department has no right to see a family court file and needs leave from a judge to do so." He added: "I do not see how any competent lawyer who had considered [recent case law] could come to any other view."
Sarah Harman The papers name Sarah Harman's client, a mother whose baby daughter was taken into care by Kent social services after a court found she had deliberately put her child's life at risk. Under the Administration of Justice Act 1960 neither mother nor child can be publicly identified. Mr Justice Munby said the failure of Sarah Harman and her client to make full disclosure about the distribution of documents to the court was "neither a pretty nor an edifying picture". He said both Sarah Harman and her client had displayed a "remarkable and disquieting lack of candour". Sarah Harman's witness statement had been "disingenuous to say the least" and she and her client had misled a judge last month by a mixture of suppressing truth and suggesting falsehoods. The mother is challenging a diagnosis of Munchausen's Syndrome by Proxy, an attention-seeking condition first identified by the controversial paediatrician Sir Roy Meadow. Papers relating to her case were passed to Mrs Hodge, whose department was gathering information about possible miscarriages of justice in care proceedings, by Harriet Harman after taking advice from a lawyer in the law officers' department. Sarah Harman had told her sister she believed this would be permissible. After returning the papers to her sister last month, the Solicitor General - herself a lawyer - told the court in written evidence that the Government lawyer "now believes he was probably wrong on the advice he gave me". A spokesman for the Attorney General said yesterday: "The Solicitor General has acted in good faith and there is no criticism whatsoever by the court of her actions." But Dominic Grieve, the shadow attorney general, said the episode called into question the competence of the law officers' department. It was an obvious error that no lawyer should make. "I would have thought that the law was very clear on this," he added. "The documents are confidential, it's as simple as that." Last month, Sarah Harman disclosed for the first time that she had sent case summaries to her sister and Mrs Hodge. She said she wished to "apologise profusely" for the breach of the rules for which she took "full responsibility". Sarah Harman has already accepted a financial penalty. At a hearing last Friday, when the judgment was handed down, she agreed to pay nearly three quarters of Kent county council's legal costs and half those of the Children's Guardian, who represented the child's interests in court. Yesterday, she said accounts of care proceedings were often published by news organisations. "There was no question of our identifying the child. But just talking about the case, even anonymised, brings you in contempt." Miss Harman said families in care proceedings could not discuss them with their MPs. "As soon as I started talking to my client's MP, or to journalists, I was in contempt as well."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wed 24 Mar 2004 Harman to face MPs on 'contempt' By Ben Leapman, Evening Standard Political Reporter 24 March 2004 Solicitor General Harriet Harman was today forced to face MPs about her involvement in a contempt of court. Ms Harman was said to have received sensitive family court papers from her sister Sarah, a campaigning solicitor. Sarah Harman has apologised to a judge who ruled her actions amounted to contempt. Now her sister has been summoned to the Commons to answer an emergency question from Tories today. Ms Harman forwarded the papers to Children's Minister Margaret Hodge who is gathering evidence about possible miscarriages of justice in care proceedings. The papers related to a mother whose baby daughter was taken into care after she was found by a court to have put the child's life at risk. The mother is challenging a diagnosis of M¸nchausen's Syndrome by Proxy. http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/9840716?source=Evening%20Standard ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wed 24 Mar 2004 Harman quizzed over contempt of court 24th March 2004 olicitor General Harriet Harman has appeared before MPs to defend her involvement in a contempt of court. The minister's sister Sarah, a campaigning lawyer, sent her papers relating to a sensitive family court case. She forwarded them to Children's Minister Margaret Hodge because she thought they had implications for other care cases involving mothers accused of Munchausen's Syndrome by proxy. Mr Justice Munby said she was in contempt of court for doing this, adding: "A Government department has no right to see a family court file and needs leave from a judge to do so." But Ms Harman never knew and never revealed the name of the child involved, she told MPs. The appeal court sent the papers to Ms Hodge in any case, the minister said. Ms Harman said officials advised she was free to pass them on but that advice changed when her actions were challenged by the local authority involved. She was hauled before the Commons to answer questions from Conservatives following reports in the Daily Telegraph. Her Tory shadow Dominic Grieve said: "It is an extremely unfortunate state of affairs when the Law Officers Department - which is, after all, supposed to be advising the Government on the law - is unable to know the rules in relation of contempt of court." Daily Mail http://www.femail.co.uk/pages/standard/article.html?in_article_id=210338&in_page_id=2 ---------------------------------------------------- |
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