Pupils

Tatyana Eatwell

Before pupillage Tatyana worked as a protection officer and caseworker for Mapendo International, Kenya. Her clients were urban refugees, many of whom fled persecution and armed conflict in the Horn of Africa, Sudan and Uganda.

In 2007 Tatyana interned at the Department of Legal Aid, Malawi through the Centre for Capital Punishment Studies Internship Programme. Her work focused on securing legal representation for persons indicted for capital offences and working on bail applications for persons who had been detained for several years without trial. She continued this work independently in 2008 with the support of the Reprieve Fellowship Programme.

Returning to Malawi in 2008, Tatyana set up an initiative committed to providing free legal representation to death row inmates in collaboration with Juris Chambers, Malawi and The Death Penalty Project.

Tatyana is the editor of "A Compilation of Immigration and Asylum Policies of the Home Office" published by HJT Training and ILPA in August 2009.

Prior to coming to the Bar Tatyana trained as a documentary filmmaker and worked in television production. She holds an MA in Visual Anthropology and BA (Econ) Social Anthropology (1st class) from Manchester University.

Tatyana is a member of Amnesty International, the Bar Human Rights Committee and Liberty. She is a trustee of The Changarawe Project, which provides education and welfare to orphaned children in Tanzania.

Gwawr Thomas

Prior to commencing pupillage, Gwawr was Legal Officer at the Centre for Legal Assistance in Lilongwe, Malawi, where her responsibilities included conducting training workshops to empower prisoners to represent themselves and facilitating a walk-in legal clinic. She also worked in close conjunction with the UN Democracy Consolidation Programme, the Department for International Development (DFID) and Amnesty International on test cases and advocacy projects addressing a broad range of human rights issues, including child labour, the provision of antiretroviral drugs to HIV positive prisoners, and the plight of Zimbabwean nationals deported to Malawi from the UK.

Gwawr had previously undertaken an internship at the Legal Aid Office of the Malawi Ministry of Justice, supported by the Criminal Bar Association and the Centre for Capital Punishment Studies. Her role involved making bail and habeas corpus applications on behalf of vulnerable remandees, and assisting in the preparation of homicide trials and capital appeals.

Having first read History (1st class honours, University of Cambridge), Gwawr won an Inner Temple Exhibition and Duke of Edinburgh Scholarship to enable her to fund her legal studies. Alongside her studies, she volunteered as an Appropriate Adult with her local Youth Offending Team, representing the interests of young people detained at police stations; she also worked as a paralegal in a firm of solicitors specialising in prison law and criminal defence.

Gwawr has also completed an internship at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, and contributed to the work of the prosecution in the cases of The Prosecutor v Germain Katanga and Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui (Democratic Republic of Congo) and The Prosecutor v Joseph Kony, Vincent Otti, Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ongwen (Uganda). She completed a major piece of comparative research on the admissibility of hearsay evidence, and was tasked with reviewing video evidence for disclosure, drafting submissions on the participation of victims in the proceedings, and producing a summary analysis of evidence on the use of child soldiers.

Gwawr is undertaking a mixed civil and criminal pupillage. She is a member of the Legal Action Group, the Haldane Society and Young Legal Aid Lawyers, and continues to take on occasional casework for Amicus.

Terry McGuinness

Prior to coming to the Bar, Terry worked as director of a youth mentoring charity in Belfast. Before commencing the BVC he volunteered with the Committee for the Administration of Justice as an independent observer at the Northern Ireland Court of Appeal and was a volunteer researcher at the Children's Law Centre, focusing on human rights education in schools.

Terry has an LLM (Distinction) in Public International Law from the University of Durham and was a researcher at the Global Policy Forum at the United Nations in summer 2006, assigned to work on the UN Security Council portfolio. He attended and assisted in organising weekly meetings between Human Rights NGOs and Security Council ambassadors, researched on child soldiers in east Africa, and attended the Security Council conference on strengthening international law.

During his law studies Terry was the recipient of the Edgar Graham Memorial Scholarship for research in public law. He was a runner-up in the inaugural Times/ Herbert Smith advocacy competition and more recently won the Middle Temple 2009 Lechmere essay prize.

Terry is a member of the Free Representation Unit, the Human Rights Lawyers Association and Young Legal Aid Lawyers. He was elected to the council of Liberty in June 2009.

Sarah Stephanou

Sarah recently joined chambers as a third-six pupil having completed a 12-month pupillage at Thomas More Chambers where she was supervised by both criminal and civil practitioners. As a result Sarah gained broad experience of both criminal and civil advocacy and drafting.

Sarah is continuing to develop a wide-ranging criminal defence practice and has considerable experience in the Crown, Magistrates and Youth Court, as well as being instructed on appeal. In addition, Sarah receives instructions in immigration and family law cases, and is keen to develop these areas of practice further.

Before pursuing a career at the Bar Sarah was a caseworker at Reprieve, where she worked on the cases of British residents detained at Guantánamo Bay. In addition, she organised various events in support of their plight, including in conjunction with Amnesty International and the House of Commons.

Sarah interned for five months at the Gulf Region Advocacy Center in Texas where she worked on capital cases. This included research and case preparation for trials and appeals, and in particular she was involved with cases raising mental health issues.

As an undergraduate Sarah worked at Liberty in the Human Rights Litigation Unit where she provided advice to members of the public on a range of human rights issues.

Sarah received an Inner Temple Exhibition and Duke of Edinburgh Scholarship for the Bar Vocational Course. She has an LLM in Public International Law (distinction) from King's College London, as well as an LLB in Law with German Law from the same, for which she received the Freshfields Prize for the highest achievement in her year.

Sarah continues to be interested in public international law and human rights and has contributed to Amnesty International's Fair Trials Manual.

Sarah is a member of Reprieve, Amnesty International, the Haldane Society and the Human Rights Lawyers Association. She is also a pro bono legal representative for Bail for Immigration Detainees.