Call: 1985
Qualifications: BA Law
Practice Teams
Family
Joan Connell Print CV
Profile
Joan Connell is a barrister specialising in Family Law with particular experience in Public and Private law, Ancillary Relief and Domestic Violence. In 2007 she returned to full-time practice at the Bar following a career break to look after her four children. She has a considerable experience of financial relief cases ranging from analysis of company accounts to an understanding of the benefits system in low-income cases. In the field of public law she has been involved in care proceedings involving expert psychiatric evidence, allegations of non-accidental injury and serious sexual abuse including abuse of children by a paedophile ring. In private law she has conducted cases involving disputes over contact including contact by parents undergoing gender reassignment.
Joan has recently completed a Master’s Degree in Child Studies at King’s College, London obtaining the highest mark in the year group. She studied under Professor Jane Fortin, a leading academic in the field of Children’s Rights. Areas of study included children’s rights, children and medical ethics, child development, education law, private and public law and domestic violence and her dissertation considered the effects of domestic violence on children and its treatment by the courts. She is a part-time supervisor for the Child Studies MA, covering all aspects of the law relating to children including Children’s Rights, Public and Private Law, Education Law, Child Protection and Domestic Violence.
Joan is married with four children. She is a trustee of a preparatory school advising on matters including Charitable Status and Child Protection. In her Bar Finals she scored in the top 20 candidates in the year and undertook pupillage with Sir James Holman and Sir Hugh Bennett, now judges of the High Court, Family Division.
Joan has been a member of the Family Law Bar Association since 1986.