Clare Hayes

Solicitor

Clare specialises in civil liberties, human rights and anti-discrimination.

"I would like to say on the behalf of myself and my family what excellent service we got from Clare. She was very approachable and listened to my points of the case. I couldn’t have asked for better."

Client

"Very professional and I would recommend this company in future."

Client

Background

Clare joined the firm in 2017. Her background is in the non-profit sector and she sees the law as one piece of the jigsaw for pursuing access to justice. She is keen to work with others to support people and communities subjected to abuses of power to make their voices heard and pursue practical change.

Clare trained at Bhatt Murphy Solicitors. Prior to her training, she worked in an advocacy role at Detention Action and she has a strong commitment to strategic litigation. She holds an LLM from the School of Oriental and African Studies in Human Rights, Conflict and Justice.

Expertise

Clare specialises in claims and challenges against public authorities, in particular the police, the CPS, the prison service and the Home Office, and inquests on behalf of families who have suffered bereavement as a result of failings by the state. She also acts for clients to challenge their immigration detention.

Clare has expertise in claims arising from failures to protect and investigate, for example in connection with modern slavery and violence against women and girls. Her work includes representing families who have been bereaved as a result of homicide and domestic abuse, and she supports her clients with the full spectrum of investigations, including inquests and claims in the civil courts.

Alongside that practice, Clare has a lot of experience working with people who have autism or experience other forms of neurodiversity and also people who do not have litigation capacity. A significant amount of her work has been on behalf of d/Deaf and disabled people who have been subjected to discrimination and Clare is learning British Sign Language (“BSL”).

In addition, Clare’s work has a focus on mistreatment in places of detention and prisons.

In every case, Clare is led by the objectives and needs of her clients. She is a member of Police Lawyers Action Group and Inquest Lawyers Group, and a trustee of Statewatch.

Sample cases

A series of claims and judicial reviews on behalf of people who have suffered catastrophic injury in prison.

Acting for the families across several inquests investigating state failures to prevent domestic homicide in cases concerning repeat perpetrators and more recently domestic abuse related deaths, such as on behalf of the family of Georgia Barter.

Acting for the families of prisoners who have died following fires in prison cells in relation to inquests and other investigations into the adequacy of systems for fire detection.

Acted for a protected party and survivor of modern slavery to bring a claim against the police and CPS in relation to his arrest, detention and prolonged prosecution when he was a 17 year old child.

Supporting survivors to exercise their Victim’s Right of Review or challenge prosecution decisions including in relation to hate crime, human trafficking, sexual violence and manslaughter (including the liability of corporates).

Claims for failure to make reasonable adjustments for disabled people against the police and other detaining authorities, and in other contexts.

Acted for the Claimant in two sequential judicial review challenges to the roll out of pepper spray in prisons.