Yvonne Murphy is a former judge of the Irish Circuit Court from 1998 to 2012. She has acted as chair of several Commissions of Investigation and an inquiry into various child abuse issues within the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

in Ireland.

Early career

Before practising law, Judge Murphy, a native of

County Donegal County Donegal ( ; ) is a Counties of Ireland, county of the Republic of Ireland. It is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Ulster and is the northernmost county of Ireland. The county mostly borders Northern Ireland, sharing only a small b ...

Ulster Ulster (; or ; or ''Ulster'') is one of the four traditional or historic provinces of Ireland, Irish provinces. It is made up of nine Counties of Ireland, counties: six of these constitute Northern Ireland (a part of the United Kingdom); t ...

, worked with the National Social Service Board and was responsible for setting up a network of citizens’ information centres throughout

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

. She practised at the Bar on the Northern and Dublin Circuits and is a member of the

Bar of England and Wales Barristers in England and Wales are one of the two main categories of lawyer in England and Wales, the other being solicitors. Barristers have traditionally had the role of handling cases for representation in court, both defence and prosecutio ...

and of the

Bar of Northern Ireland The Bar of Northern Ireland is the professional association of barristers for Northern Ireland, with over 600 members. It is based in the Bar Library, beside the Royal Courts of Justice, Belfast, Royal Courts of Justice in Belfast, together with ...

. She is a former Vice-Chair of the Employment Equality Agency and of the Employment Appeals Tribunal. While in practice at the Bar, she was co-Editor of the Irish Times Law Reports and authored several books and articles.

Personal life

Murphy was married to the late Justice Adrian Hardiman, judge of the

Supreme Court of Ireland The Supreme Court of Ireland () is the highest judicial authority in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is a court of final appeal and exercises, in conjunction with the Court of Appeal (Ireland), Court of Appeal and the High Court (Ireland), Hig ...

; the couple had three sons.

Commissions of Investigation and inquiry

In 2006, Murphy was appointed chair of the Commission of Investigation into sexual abuse by Catholic clergy from, or attached to, the

Archdiocese of Dublin The Archbishop of Dublin () is an archiepiscopal title which takes its name from Dublin, Ireland. Since the Reformation, there have been parallel apostolic successions to the title: one in the Catholic Church and the other in the Church of Ire ...

between 1 January 1975 and 1 May 2004. That Commission culminated in the production of the

Murphy Report The Murphy Report is the brief name of the report of a Commission of investigation conducted by the Irish government into the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic archdiocese of Dublin. It was released in 2009 by Judge Yvonne Murphy, only a fe ...

in 2009. Murphy then also chaired an inquiry into sexual abuse in the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Cloyne The Diocese of Cloyne () is a Latin diocese of the Catholic Church in Ireland. It is one of six suffragan dioceses in the ecclesiastical province of Cashel (also known as Munster). History The diocese has its beginnings in the monastic settlem ...

, which led to the publication of the Cloyne Report in July 2011. In 2015, Murphy was appointed chair of the

Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation The Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation (officially the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes and certain related matters) was a judicial Commission of investigation (Ireland), commission of investigation, estab ...

, following revelations about the burial of 800 children in unmarked mass graves in the

Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home The Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home (also known as St Mary's Mother and Baby Home, or locally simply as The Home), which operated between 1925 and 1961 in the town of Tuam, County Galway, Ireland, was a maternity home for unmarried mothers a ...

. The executive summary and conclusion of the report have been subject to much criticism since its publication.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Murphy, Yvonne Living people Irish barristers Circuit Court (Ireland) judges Lawyers from County Donegal Year of birth missing (living people) Irish women judges 20th-century Irish judges 21st-century Irish judges 21st-century Irish women lawyers