Developments in Prosecutions of Crimes of Sexual Violence: perspectives from international criminal law
Justice Teresa Doherty, former Judge of the Special Court of Sierra Leone
- 05 Feb 2014
Justice Teresa Doherty, former Judge of the Special Court of Sierra Leone
‘Developments in Prosecutions of Crimes of Sexual Violence: perspectives from international criminal law’
Monday, Feb 10th 2014, 4-6pm, Moot Court room
(first floor Áras na Laoi, to the left of the Law Dept reception office)
All WELCOME (advance booking not required)
Justice Teresa Doherty is from Northern Ireland. She returned to study law in Belfast after working as a civil servant and as a volunteer in Zambia. She worked in legal aid clinics in Belfast as a student in the early 1970s. From 1976 to 1987, she worked in Papua New Guinea, first in the Public Solicitor’s (public defender) office, then as provincial legal officer for Morobe Province. For some years she was the only woman lawyer in that part of Papua New Guinea and was the first woman to be elected as a councillor of the Papua New Guinea Law Society. She was appointed as the Principal Magistrate for the Momase region of Papua New Guinea in 1987 and as National and later Supreme Court judge in 1988, the first woman to hold any high judicial office in the Pacific Islands Region. Her work took her throughout Papua New Guinea and she particularly focussed on prisoners’ and women’s issues. She returned to Northern Ireland and to the bar in late 1997. She was appointed a judge of the High Court of Sierra Leone in 2003 following the civil war in that country and also sat in the Court of Appeal. She was appointed by the United Nations in January 2005 as a judge of the Special Court of Sierra Leone (the international war crimes tribunal for Sierra Leone) and was elected the first presiding judge of Trial Chamber 11.
She is a Parole Commissioner for Northern Ireland, a part time chairman of Appeal Services, a member of the Commonwealth Reference Group for the promotion of the Rights of Women and the Girl Child. She has received recognition for her work including a CBE and an Honorary Doctor of Laws.
Conversations on Gender, Law and Sexuality (Gender, Law and Sexuality (GLAS), Faculty of Law, UCC).
2 x CPD group points available
