Garrido J has granted permission for the media to publish information about private law children proceedings, in which a family court judge had made findings that a father, serving in the armed forces, had used ‘extreme emotional and psychological abuse of the mother over many years’, before going on to order unsupervised contact, contrary to the recommendations of the Cafcass Officer.
Although domestic abuse is sadly common, and such allegations often arise in private law disputes about children, this particular case involved very serious abuse, which the mother (a civilian) reported feeling unable to disclose in full due to the father’s employment. Even more unusually, the journalistic interest in reporting information about the military context was met with applications for reporting restriction orders by both the father and the Secretary of State for Defence, the deployment of national security arguments and a Closed Material Procedure.
Lucy Reed KC acted pro bono for journalist, Louise Tickle who successfully sought permission to report and access to documents. Lucy successfully argued for the appointment of a Special Advocate within the closed procedure that was put in place to enable secure scrutiny of the evidence in support of the MOD’s national security arguments.
In the course of attempting to restrict reporting of information about the father’s identity and his employment, the father obtained a letter from the Ministry of Defence in support of his application for reporting restrictions, and in which national security concerns were asserted.
The journalist suggested that this correspondence tended to corroborate the journalist’s contention that the father was a member of the special forces, and appeared to breach the Government’s policy of ‘Neither Confirm Nor Deny’. Nonetheless, the raising of national security issues meant a closed procedure was directed as necessary.
Lucy successfully argued for the appointment of a Special Advocate within the closed procedure that was put in place to enable secure scrutiny of the evidence in support of the MOD’s national security arguments.
Extraordinarily, although it had been served on the media at large, as required by the rules in respect of such applications, the MOD were later to suggest in a closed hearing that this letter was mistakenly issued and that it should now be destroyed. Those attempts to obtain an order requiring destruction of all copies of the letter by all recipients, were rebuffed by Mr Justice Garrido.
The MoD then conceded that the journalist should be able to report on all matters she sought to report, including with reference to the Special Forces. Reporting was permitted on condition of anonymity and the non-publication of other limited sensitive material, exactly as proposed by the journalist in response to the national security issues being raised.
Lucy was able to secure both permission to report – and crucially, permission to make reference to the father’s alleged membership of the Special Forces. The application for disclosure to her client of the primary evidence underlying the judges’ findings of domestic abuse, in order to enable fact checking and in depth reporting of the family court process, was also granted – notwithstanding the father’s objection.
The judgment can be read here.
Louise Tickle’s report in the Observer, Sunday 3 May 2026 can be read here:
‘How the MoD tried to cover up domestic abuse by a special forces soldier‘
Further information
For more information from the family team, contact clerks@36family.co.uk
Involving Lucy Reed KC
