Gareth Peirce (born Jean Margaret Webb; March 1940) is a British

solicitor A solicitor is a lawyer who traditionally deals with most of the legal matters in some jurisdictions. A person must have legally defined qualifications, which vary from one jurisdiction to another, to be described as a solicitor and enabled to p ...

and human rights activist. She has worked on a number of high-profile cases involving allegations of human rights injustices. Her work with Gerry Conlon and the

Guildford Four The Guildford Four and Maguire Seven were two groups of people, mostly Northern Irish, who were wrongly convicted in English courts in 1975 and 1976 of the Guildford pub bombings of 5 October 1974 and the Woolwich pub bombing of 7 November 1974 ...

– wrongly convicted of bombings carried out by the

Provisional Irish Republican Army The Provisional Irish Republican Army (Provisional IRA), officially known as the Irish Republican Army (IRA; ) and informally known as the Provos, was an Irish republican paramilitary force that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland ...

– was chronicled in the film ''

In the Name of the Father ''In the Name of the Father'' is a 1993 biographical crime drama film co-written and directed by Jim Sheridan. It is based on the true story of the Guildford Four, four people falsely convicted of the 1974 Guildford pub bombings that killed fo ...

'' (1993), in which she was portrayed by

Emma Thompson Dame Emma Thompson (born 15 April 1959) is a British actress and screenwriter. Emma Thompson on screen and stage, Her work spans over four decades of screen and stage, and List of awards and nominations received by Emma Thompson, her accola ...

Early life

Peirce was born in March 1940 in

Cheltenham Cheltenham () is a historic spa town and borough adjacent to the Cotswolds in Gloucestershire, England. Cheltenham became known as a health and holiday spa town resort following the discovery of mineral springs in 1716, and claims to be the mo ...

, Gloucestershire, the daughter of Margaret (née Twidell) and John Le Plastrier Webb. She changed her name from Jean to Gareth during her formative years but never divulged to anyone the reason for doing so. Her parents ran

Bentham Grammar School Bentham Grammar School was an independent school A private school or independent school is a school not administered or funded by the government, unlike a State school, public school. Private schools are schools that are not dependent up ...

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in Northern England.The Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority areas of City of York, York and North Yorkshire (district), North Yorkshire are in Yorkshire and t ...

, which she attended until she took her O-levels. She was subsequently educated at the

Cheltenham Ladies' College Cheltenham Ladies' College (CLC) is a private schools in the United Kingdom, private boarding and day school for girls aged 11 or older in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. The school was established in 1853 to provide "a sound academic edu ...

, the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

and the

London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...

Career

In the 1960s she worked as a journalist in the United States, following the campaign of Rev.

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, civil and political rights, civil rights activist and political philosopher who was a leader of the civil rights move ...

She married, returned to Britain in 1970 with her husband and son and undertook her postgraduate law degree at the

. Her younger son was born in London after her permanent return to England. In 1974 she joined the law firm of the solicitor Benedict Birnberg as a trainee, being admitted to the Roll of Solicitors on 15 December 1978. Following Birnberg's retirement in 1999, she continued to work as a senior partner of Birnberg Peirce and Partners. In the mid-1970s she supported specific campaigns for legal reforms of police procedures that permitted the prosecution and conviction of persons based solely on identification evidence. Individual cases then very much in the news led to the establishment of Justice Against the Identification Laws (JAIL), an organisation Peirce supports. During her career she represented Judith Ward, who had been wrongfully convicted in 1974 of several IRA-related bombings, the

, the

Birmingham Six The Birmingham Six were six men from Northern Ireland who were each sentenced to life imprisonment in 1975 following their false convictions for the 1974 Birmingham pub bombings. Their convictions were declared unsafe and unsatisfactory and q ...

, several mineworkers after the

Battle of Orgreave The Battle of Orgreave was a violent confrontation on 18 June 1984 between pickets and officers of the South Yorkshire Police (SYP) and other police forces, including the Metropolitan Police, at a British Steel Corporation (BSC) coking plan ...

, the family of Jean Charles de Menezes and Moazzam Begg, a man held in

extrajudicial detention Administrative detention is arrest and detention of individuals by the state without trial. A number of jurisdictions claim that it is done for security reasons. Many countries claim to use administrative detention as a means to combat terrorism ...

by the American government. Of her defence of

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

suspects accused of terrorism Peirce has said:

We have lost our way in this country. We have entered a new dark age of injustice and it is frightening that we are overwhelmed by it. I know I am representing innocent people; innocent people who know that a jury they face will inevitably be predisposed to find them guilty.

Julian Assange Julian Paul Assange ( ; Hawkins; born 3 July 1971) is an Australian editor, publisher, and activist who founded WikiLeaks in 2006. He came to international attention in 2010 after WikiLeaks published a series of News leak, leaks from Chels ...

, the founder of

WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is a non-profit media organisation and publisher of leaked documents. It is funded by donations and media partnerships. It has published classified documents and other media provided by anonymous sources. It was founded in 2006 by ...

, appointed Peirce as his solicitor in '' Assange v Swedish Prosecution Authority''. She was among the doctors and lawyers who were spied on by UC Global while visiting Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy. Santiago Pedraz, the Audiencia Nacional judge who is overseeing the case against UC Global's David Morales, issued court orders requesting permission of UK authorities to take witness testimony from Peirce and others.

Recognition and reception

Peirce's role in the defence of the Guildford Four was dramatised in the 1993 film ''

'', with Peirce portrayed by

. She was appointed

Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

(CBE) in the 1999 New Year Honours for services to justice, but later wrote to Downing Street asking for it to be withdrawn and tendering an apology for any misunderstanding. Sir Ludovic Kennedy, a campaigner against miscarriages of justice, dedicated a book to Peirce, calling her "the doyenne of British defence lawyers" who "refuses to be defeated in any case no matter how unfavourable it looks". Benedict Birnberg, who first employed her as a solicitor, believes she has "transformed the criminal justice scene in this country almost single-handedly". Peirce was one of the initial eight individuals inducted in March 2007 into '' Justice Denied'' magazine's Hall of Honor for her lifetime achievement in aiding the wrongly convicted. In 1999 she was awarded an honorary doctorate by

NUI Galway The University of Galway () is a public research university located in the city of Galway, Ireland. The university was founded in 1845 as "Queen's College, Galway". It was known as "University College, Galway" (UCG) () from 1908 to 1997 and as ...

. In 2015 she was awarded the Presidential Distinguished Service Award by Michael D. Higgins, the President of Ireland.

Personal life

Peirce has been described as a very private person who shuns the limelight and refuses media interviews. She lives in

Kentish Town Kentish Town is an area of northwest London, England, in the London Borough of Camden, immediately north of Camden Town, close to Hampstead Heath. Kentish Town likely derives its name from Ken-ditch or Caen-ditch, meaning the "bed of a waterw ...

North London North London is the northern part of London, England, north of the River Thames and the City of London. It extends from Clerkenwell and Finsbury, on the edge of the City of London financial district, to Greater London's boundary with Hertfordshi ...

, with her husband, Mellen Chamberlain "Bill" Peirce, a writer and photographer, son of American painter Waldo Peirce. They have two sons.

Bibliography

As author

As contributor

References

External links

Birnberg Peirce & Partners

February 2000. Retrieved 6 August 2014.

''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'', 4 February 2004. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
"Was it like this for the Irish? Gareth Peirce on the position of Muslims in Britain"
''

London Review of Books The ''London Review of Books'' (''LRB'') is a British literary magazine published bimonthly that features articles and essays on fiction and non-fiction subjects, which are usually structured as book reviews. History The ''London Review of Book ...

'', 10 April 2008. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
"The Framing of al-Megrahi"
''

'', 24 September 2009. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
''Vanity Fair'' article on Mouloud Sihali
(February 2008, No. 570). Retrieved 6 August 2014.
"A Law unto Themselves"
BBC Radio 4, Peirce interview with Baroness Kennedy, 4 August 2014. Retrieved 6 August 2014. {{DEFAULTSORT:Peirce, Gareth 1940 births living people people from Cheltenham Alumni of the London School of Economics Alumni of the University of Oxford English human rights activists English solicitors English legal professionals English legal writers Guantanamo Bay attorneys People educated at Cheltenham Ladies' College Human rights lawyers Lawyers from London 20th-century English lawyers 21st-century English lawyers International criminal law scholars International law scholars