When Her Honour Judge Valerie Pearlman broke her leg in the middle of a major fraud trial in 1999, she delivered her summing up to the jury while sitting in a wheelchair in St Bartholomew’s Hospital. She sent the jury out and went for surgery at another hospital. When the jury needed questions answered she did so by video link form her hospital bed – making history in the process.
Her forward-thinking saved the taxpayer £2.5 million in retrial costs. It was typical of a pragmatic, no-nonsense - yet extremely kind and sociable - pioneer among women at the bar and bench, whose death has been announced at the age of 89.
Pearlman broke barriers and set precedents throughout her career. She read for the bar in late 1950s with only 10 other women. When sworn in as a judge at the age of 48, she was among only 13 women on the Circuit Bench.
'Valerie and I were friends for many years,' recalled Baroness Elizabeth Butler-Sloss, the first woman appointed to the Court of Appeal. 'She was a very good judge and much in demand at the Old Bailey to try child abuse cases. She once said, a bit sadly, that she did nothing but child abuse cases in the family court and then the same in criminal trials.'
Pearlman did however make history with other types of cases. In 2002, she passed the first ever sentence for mobile phone theft: jailing a young man for four years for attacking a teenager and stealing his £130 handset.
A former colleague on the Family Circuit, Her Honour Gillian Brasse, said, 'Valerie was very supportive of younger women - as a recorder she got me to sit on her corridor at the Royal Courts of Justice which was fantastic. She then encouraged me to apply to be a full time Circuit Judge.'
Her Honour Vera Mayer said, 'As a judge, Valerie was pragmatic and did not suffer fools lightly, especially warring parents over contact with children after divorce. Valerie wanted to make sitting at the Royal Courts of Justice feel collegiate and welcoming, and organised a weekly Wednesday lunch for all judges, where both temporary and full-time judges would meet over their sandwiches and chat.'
Valerie Pearlman was born on 6 August 1936, on the kitchen table at home in Hendon, London. Her father, Sidney Pearlman, was a distinguished solicitor, her mother Marjorie a housewife. Encouraged by her father to find a career, after leaving school post O-levels she decided to read for the bar. That involved going to night school to get the required A-levels.
In 1958, when she was called to the bar at Lincoln’s Inn, she was one of only 30 women barristers; there were no women judges. Despite her professional qualification, when she bought a cottage in West Sussex in 1968 her father had to guarantee the mortgage.
From 1958 to 1985 she practised in a mixture of crime and family work from Lincoln's Inn. She was appointed a recorder in 1982 and a circuit judge in 1985.
As designated family judge for Greater London 1991-2008 she was responsible for the running of over 40 courts dealing with family cases, and in accordance with the Children Act of 1989. In 2001, she made a strong statement to the annual conference of magistrates in London about domestic violence cases, and the need to give an immediate custodial sentence to men who hit women.
In 2008 she was awarded the CBE for services to the administration of justice.
Pearlman married Professor Michael Besser in 1972; after their divorce they remained close friends. He survives her, along with two children, Jonathan Besser, an education managing consultant and Dr Rachel Besser, a consultant paediatrician.
At her funeral service, Rabbi Julia Neuberger said: 'Family, friends and colleagues will remember her strength, courage, kindness, warmth, wit, brilliant intellect, and fierce independence.'
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