Sir Louis Jacques Blom-Cooper (27 March 1926 – 19 September 2018) was an English author and lawyer specialising in public and administrative law.

Early life

Born in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, his parents were the grocer Alfred Blom-Cooper and Ellen Flesseman. Blom-Cooper and his family were

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. He did

national service National service is the system of voluntary government service, usually military service. Conscription is mandatory national service. The term ''national service'' comes from the United Kingdom's National Service (Armed Forces) Act 1939. The ...

as a Captain in the

East Yorkshire Regiment The East Yorkshire Regiment was a line infantry regiment of the British Army, first raised in 1685 as Sir William Clifton's Regiment of Foot and later renamed the 15th Regiment of Foot. It saw service for three centuries, before eventually being ...

from 1944 to 1947. Louis Blom-Cooper was educated at

Port Regis School Port Regis School is a co-educational preparatory school located in 140 acres of parkland on the Dorset-Wiltshire border in southern England, situated between the towns of Shaftesbury and Gillingham. In 2009 ''Which school?'' said of Port Regi ...

, Seaford College,

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public university, public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks a ...

King's College London King's College London (informally King's or KCL) is a public research university located in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of King George IV and the Duke of Wellington. In 1836, King's ...

(LLB,1952), the

University of Amsterdam The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, nl, Universiteit van Amsterdam) is a public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The UvA is one of two large, publicly funded research universities in the city, the other being ...

, and at

Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge Fitzwilliam College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college traces its origins back to 1869 and the foundation of the Non-Collegiate Students Board, a venture intended to offer academically excellent students of all ...

. He was called to the Bar at

Middle Temple The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn an ...

in 1952.

Career

He was an academic at the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

from 1962 to 1984. Prior to this he was a columnist for ''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the w ...

''. He was Chair of the Mental Health Act Commission from 1987 to 1994 and a Judge in the Court of Appeal of Jersey and of Guernsey from 1988 to 1996. He has chaired more than a dozen inquiries over the last decade including the

Guns for Antigua The Guns for Antigua scandal was a political scandal involving the shipment of Israeli-made weapons through Antigua to the Medellin drug cartel in Colombia. The affair was exposed by the Louis Blom-Cooper Royal Commission, following the discover ...

scandal, and the Jasmine Beckford and Ashworth Inquiries. He sat as a Deputy High Court Judge on housing and judicial review cases until 1996. Blom-Cooper is well known for his regulatory work, particularly as Chair of the Press Council now the

Press Complaints Commission The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) was a voluntary regulatory body for British printed newspapers and magazines, consisting of representatives of the major publishers. The PCC closed on Monday 8 September 2014, and was replaced by the Indep ...

and later as the founding chair of the premium rate telephony regulator, ICSTIS, later PhonepayPlus and now the

Phone-paid Services Authority The Phone-paid Services Authority (PSA), known as PhonepayPlus until 1 November 2016, is the regulatory body for all premium rate phone-paid services in the United Kingdom. These are the content, goods and services that consumers can buy by ch ...

. In 1992 he was appointed by the

Secretary of State for Northern Ireland A secretary, administrative professional, administrative assistant, executive assistant, administrative officer, administrative support specialist, clerk, military assistant, management assistant, office secretary, or personal assistant is a w ...

as the first Independent Commissioner for the Holding Centres. He held this appointment until April 1999. He was recently called to the Bar of Northern Ireland and granted Silk in Northern Ireland. He was also counsel to the

Saville Inquiry The Bloody Sunday Inquiry, also known as the Saville Inquiry or the Saville Report after its chairman, Lord Saville of Newdigate, was established in 1998 by British Prime Minister Tony Blair after campaigns for a second inquiry by families of ...

acting for the

Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association ) was an organisation that campaigned for civil rights in Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Formed in Belfast on 9 April 1967,

The A6 murder, Regina v. James Hanratty

In 1963 Blom-Cooper argued that

James Hanratty James Hanratty (4 October 1936 – 4 April 1962), also known as the A6 Murderer, was a British criminal who was one of the final eight people in the UK to be executed before capital punishment was effectively abolished. He was hanged at Bedfo ...

was probably guilty. In 2002 modern testing of DNA from Hanratty's exhumed corpse convinced Court of Appeal judges that his guilt was proved "beyond doubt".

Hunter & Callaghan v Duckworth & Company and Blom-Cooper

The 1997 book ''The Birmingham Six and Other Cases'' considered recent miscarriages of justice. It prompted an unsuccessful libel action in the Irish courts from Gerry Hunter and Hugh Callaghan. Initially Blom-Cooper argued that the publication of the book in Ireland was outside of his control. When this failed, he relied on European Convention on Human Rights#Article 10—right to freedom of expression and the newly formulated defence of

Qualified privilege The defence of qualified privilege permits a person in a position of authority or trust to make statements or relay or report statements that would be considered slander and libel if made by anyone else. In New Zealand and Ontario, for instance, ...

—provided good practice was followed it was acceptable to get things wrong. Previously inaccuracy would have led to financial penalty. Despite this, solicitor

Gareth Peirce Gareth Peirce (born Jean Margaret Webb; March 1940) is a British solicitor and human rights activist. She has worked on a number of high-profile cases involving allegations of human rights injustices. Her work with Gerry Conlon and the Guildf ...

accused Blom-Cooper of "shoddy research" and "total nonsense" in respect of the book.The Guardian profile: Gareth Peirce , The Guardian , Guardian Unlimited
/ref>

Campaigner

Blom-Cooper was involved in the foundation of

Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...

in 1961, supporting

Peter Benenson Peter Benenson (born Peter James Henry Solomon; 31 July 1921 – 25 February 2005) was a British barrister, human rights activist and the founder of the human rights group Amnesty International (AI). He refused all honours for most of his life ...

's idea for an appeal for amnesty for political prisoners. It was at Blom-Cooper's suggestion that Benenson wrote to

David Astor Francis David Langhorne Astor, CH (5 March 1912 – 7 December 2001) was an English newspaper publisher, editor of ''The Observer'' at the height of its circulation and influence, and member of the Astor family, "the landlords of New York". Ea ...

, proprietor of the Observer to publicise the campaign. Blom-Cooper also took part in a small committee of individuals who helped carry through the appeal which led to Amnesty International. He was also a Patron of

Prisoners Abroad Prisoners Abroad is a UK-registered human rights and welfare charity which supports British citizens who are imprisoned overseas. It also works with ex-prisoners returning to the UK and family members and friends of those detained. The organisat ...

a registered charity which supports Britons who are held overseas, and was a trustee of the

Howard League for Penal Reform The Howard League for Penal Reform is a registered charity in the United Kingdom. It is the oldest penal reform organisation in the world, named after John Howard. It was founded as the Howard Association in 1866 and changed its name in 1921, ...

Clubs

He was a member of the Athenaeum Club.

Author

Blom-Cooper's published works include *''Bankruptcy in private international law'' (1955) *''The Law as Literature: An Anthology of Great Writing in and about the Law'' (1961) (as editor) *''The A6 murder, Regina v. James Hanratty: The semblance of truth'' (1963) *''The language of the law: An anthology of legal prose'' (1965) *''The Hanging Question: Essays on the Death Penalty'' (1969) *''Law and Morality'' (1976) *''The Case of Jason Mitchell- Report of the Independent Panel of Inquiry''; Edited by Louis Blom-Cooper *''Occupational Therapy -An Emerging Profession in Health Care'' (1989) *''The Falling Shadow: One Patient's Mental Health Care 1978–1993'' (1995) co-editors Elaine Murphy; Helen Hally *''The Birmingham Six and Other Cases'' (1997) () *''Law and the Spirit of Inquiry : Essays in Honour of Sir Louis Blom-Cooper QC'' (1999) co-editors Charles Blake, Gavin Drewry *''With Malice Aforethought: A Study of the Crime and Punishment for Homicide'' *''The Court of Appeal'' (2007) co-editors Suzanne Fullbrook;Charles Blake *''The Penalty of Imprisonment: Why 60 Per Cent of the Prison Population Should Not Be There'' (2008), *''Power of Persuasion: Essays by a Very Public Lawyer'' (2015) *''Public Inquiries: Wrong Route on Bloody Sunday'' (2017) *''Unreasoned Verdict: The Jury's Out'' (2019)

References

External links

Louis Blom-Cooper QC
at

Doughty Street Chambers Doughty Street Chambers is a British set of barristers' chambers situated in Bristol, Manchester and London's Doughty Street, undertaking criminal justice, public law, immigration, employment, human rights and civil liberties work. Doughty Str ...

Column archive
at ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' *
'Fine Lines and Distinctions' by Sir Louis Blom-Cooper and Terence Morris reviewed by journalist Will Robinson.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Blom-Cooper, Louis 1926 births 2018 deaths Academics of the University of London Alumni of Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge Alumni of King's College London British Jews 20th-century English judges English barristers Fellows of King's College London Members of the Bar of Northern Ireland People educated at Seaford College People educated at Port Regis School University of Amsterdam alumni Jersey judges Guernsey judges Knights Bachelor Lawyers awarded knighthoods English King's Counsel Members of the Middle Temple English people of Jewish descent East Yorkshire Regiment officers British Army personnel of World War II Writers from London 20th-century English lawyers