Who? Laura Higgs, 28-year-old assistant at Bindman & Partners in London, who specialises in criminal law.


Why is she in the news? Represented William Dunlop, the first person to be tried twice for the same offence after the 800-year-old double jeopardy rule was scrapped. Dunlop received a life sentence, with a minimum tariff of 17 years, last week at the Old Bailey after he pleaded guilty to the murder of Julie Hogg in 1989. He had been tried for the murder in 1991 but, after two juries failed to reach a verdict, a formal not-guilty verdict was recorded. While in prison for an unrelated offence, Dunlop confessed to a prison warden in 1999 that he had killed Ms Hogg. At the time, he could not be tried again for her murder, but was prosecuted with two charges of perjury for lying at his earlier trials, and received six years in jail. Ms Hogg's family campaigned for a change in the law and, in April 2005, the Criminal Justice Act 2003 gave the Court of Appeal power to order a retrial for serious crimes where there is new and compelling evidence and it is in the interests of justice to do so.



Background: History degree at Pembroke College, Oxford, followed by a post-graduate diploma in law and the legal practice course at Nottingham Law School. She trained at a national firm, qualified in 2004 and joined her current firm in September 2005.



Route to the case: 'Mr Dunlop was an existing client of our mental health team, and when the law changed, his case was referred to the criminal law department.'



Thoughts on the case: 'This was an unusual case for the prosecution to choose to be the first prosecuted under the new law because its facts are restricted and it could be easily distinguished from other cases - so the floodgates are unlikely to open. When the law was drafted, it was envisaged that the new and compelling evidence would be due to advances in technology rather than written and oral confession evidence. This case has set a high standard of what amounts to the new and compelling evidence. It was chosen because the evidence was incontrovertible due to his confessions, but I have serious worries about the impact of the legislation in other more borderline cases, as it could allow the prosecution a second bite of the cherry. The new legislation should be used sparingly and applied with caution.'



Dealing with the media: 'Because this was the first of its kind, there was a lot of interest in the new procedure. The coverage has largely focused on the double jeopardy element. There have been misinterpretations of both the facts and the law, so a large amount of my dealings with the media involved correcting these misunderstandings.'



Catherine Baksi