Dame Linda Penelope Dobbs, DBE was born on 3 January 1951 and is a retired High Court judge in England and Wales, who served from 2004 to 2013.
16 Facts About Linda Dobbs
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Linda Penelope Dobbs was born in Freetown, Sierra Leone, to Arthur Ernest Dobbs, and his wife, Loyda Dobbs.
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Loyda Johnson was a Creole from Sierra Leone and Arthur Linda Dobbs was an English lawyer originally from Warwickshire, who went on to serve as a High Court judge in Sierra Leone.
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Linda Dobbs was educated at Moreton Hall School, a boarding independent school for girls, near the market town of Oswestry in Shropshire, followed initially by the University of Edinburgh, where she read music but left after a year.
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Linda Dobbs then attended the University of Surrey, where she studied Russian and law, graduating in 1976.
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Linda Dobbs went on to the London School of Economics, where she obtained a master's degree, followed by a doctorate in Soviet criminology and penology.
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Linda Dobbs was called to the Bar in 1981, practising from 5 King's Bench Walk, the chambers of the then Attorney-General Sir Michael Havers, QC.
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Linda Dobbs had a mixed criminal practice, in later years specialising in fraud and professional disciplinary tribunals, including the General Medical Council and the General Dental Council.
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Linda Dobbs was a member of the General Council of the Bar and chaired its Professional Standards Committee and Race Relations Committee.
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Linda Dobbs was appointed as a deputy High Court judge in February 2003, without having previously held appointment as a recorder.
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Linda Dobbs was appointed as a judge of the High Court in 2004, assigned to the Queen's Bench Division without having sat as a deputy High Court judge.
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Linda Dobbs appeared in the 2008 "Black Britannia" exhibition in London by Daily Mirror photographer John Ferguson, and was included in published lists of Britain's 10 most powerful black women and 100 Great Black Britons.
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Linda Dobbs is a patron of the African Prisons Project and an initiator of the 18 Red Lion Court Award for African advocates.
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Linda Dobbs is patron of Masicorp, an NGO promoting education in Masiphumelele, South Africa.
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On 20 April 2013, Linda Dobbs took early retirement from the High Court, aged 62 years.
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Linda Dobbs was later appointed as chair of an independent inquiry into Lloyds Banking Group's handling of the HBOS Reading branch fraud.