Appeal won to name Sara Sharif's family court judges

An appeals court has ruled that the names of the three judges who oversaw Sarah Sharif's family court case prior to her murder will be released next week. This comes after Judge Williams ruled in December that the names of the judges, social workers, and guardians involved in the 10-year-old girl's historical family court cases should not be made public due to a "real risk" from "online mobs."

However, several media organizations, including the BBC, successfully appealed this ruling. They had previously argued at a hearing that the judges' names should be made public for the sake of transparency. Sarah’s father, Urfan Sharif, 43, and stepmother, Beinash Batool, 30, were sentenced to life imprisonment for Sarah’s murder in Woking in 2023.

The appeals court stated in its Friday ruling that the three unnamed judges could be identified within seven days. Sir Geoffrey Vos stated, “In the circumstances of this case, the judge had no jurisdiction to anonymize the historical judges on or after 9 December 2024. He was wrong to do so.” It was revealed at a previous hearing that two of the three judges involved have since retired.

Matthew Purchas KC, representing the judges, stated in a written submission that the judges had concerns given that “public and media commentary tends to be inflammatory.” Details of Sarah's care before her death in previous family court proceedings could be made public after the sentencing at the Old Bailey in December last year. This included “serious concerns” raised on multiple occasions by Surrey County Council (SCC) about the children returning to Sharif, due to a “history of allegations of physical abuse to the children and domestic abuse by Mr. Sharif as a perpetrator.”

Documents released to the media show that SCC first made contact with Sharif and Sarah’s mother, Olga Sharif, in 2010, when it received a “referral of signs of neglect” regarding her two older siblings, more than two years before Sarah was born. The agency began care proceedings for those two children in January 2013, and included Sarah within a week of her birth. Several allegations of abuse were made between 2013 and 2015, but were never tested in court. In 2019, a judge approved Sarah moving to Woking to live with her father, where she suffered years of abuse, including being hooded, burned, and beaten, before her death. SCC stated that the appeal should be allowed. Sharif was sentenced to a minimum of 40 years for murder, while Batool received a minimum of 33 years. Sarah’s uncle, Faisal Malik, 29, was sentenced to 16 years for causing or allowing her death.