Nicola Padfield KC (Hon) appointed to Government independent sentencing review panel

The Faculty is delighted at the announcement that Nicky Padfield, Emeritus Professor of Criminal and Penal Justice at the Law Faculty, has been appointed as one of a panel of experts appointed to support a new Government criminal sentencing review, which was announced yesterday.

The review, chaired by former Conservative justice secretary David Gauke, aims to end the crisis in our prisons and make sure the country always has the prisons space needed to keep people safe, will consider how other jurisdictions who have faced similar capacity challenges have been able to tackle rising prison populations and reducing reoffending.

Nicola was formerly Director of the Cambridge Centre for Criminal Justice (CCCJ) and Master of Fitzwilliam College from 2013-2019.

After her first degree at St Anne's College, Oxford Nicky studied for the Diploma in Criminology at Darwin College. Called to the Bar in 1978, she then spent a year at the University of Aix-Marseille and married Christopher (who read Engineering at Fitzwilliam and graduated in 1971). Her teaching and research has covered a broad canvas in criminal law and evidence, sentencing and criminal justice more generally. She sat as a Recorder (part-time judge) in the Crown Court from 2002-2014, is a Bencher of the Middle Temple and served as the University Advocate for several years. She was appointed as Honorary Queen's Counsel in 2018.

Her books include The Criminal Justice Process: Text and Materials (5th edition, 2016); Criminal Law (10th edition, 2016), and Beyond the Tariff: Human rights and the release of life sentence prisoners (2002). She has edited and contributed to a number of more recent collections of essays on parole and early release (which has involved research in a number of European countries). Whilst maintaining a wide academic lens, her recent research has explored how the law on release from, and recall to, prison works in practice, and how it is perceived by offenders and those who work in the system.

Other members of the panel of experts are Lord Burnett (Previous Lord Chief Justice (2017-2023)), Catherine Larsen KPM (retired inspector from Avon and Somerset whose work included transforming the way rape and serious sexual offences are investigated by the police), Sir Peter Lewis (Former Chief Executive of Crown Prosecution Service (2007-2016), Former Registrar of the International Criminal Court (2023)), Michael Spurr (Former Chief Executive of HMPPS (2010-2019)) and Andrea Simon (Executive Director at End Violence Against Women Coalition (EVAW)).

You can read more detail about the review in the Ministry of Justice press release.