The Bar Standards Board has fined a barrister, Jane Charlton, for threatening police officers with a kitchen knife. 

In June 2016, Charlton's partner called police to their home after the barrister had been hurling glasses at a wall. When officers arrived, they found Charlton to be "extremely drunk and unable to speak coherently". She pushed, slapped and taunted officers to arrest her. She only calmed down after being restrained. Officers finally left the house after Charlton promised to go to bed.

However, later that evening, Charlton's concerned partner called police back to the house, saying that she was out of control, throwing things around and targeting him. Officers returned to the scene to find Charlton in the kitchen brandishing a large kitchen knife. But not for cooking. Charlton's partner, who was desperately holding on to the kitchen door on the other side to prevent his belle from escaping, had a cut on his arm from an earlier attempt to wrestle the knife away. An officer grabbed the door to keep Charlton contained in the kitchen. 

One of the officers went to the kitchen window and told Charlton to put down the knife. But the barrister walked towards the window, pointed the knife at the officer and shouted "fuck off". She also wielded the knife at the officer on the other side of the glass kitchen door, charged towards the door and repeatedly kicked it.

The barrister only dropped the knife after officers armed with tasers arrived at the scene. Charlton was arrested. In court, Charlton pleaded guilty to charges of common assault and was sentenced to a community order. 


Charlton also got into an altercation with staff in a nightclub just one month later, and kicked a member of staff in the shins when she was being ejected from the club. She also admitted common assault for that incident.

Charlton, who was called to the bar by Lincoln's Inn in 2009 and completed her pupillage in 2012, said that she had stopped working as a barrister at the time of the incidents as she wasn't capable of doing the work. She also told police that she had been under immense stress at the time.

The Bar Standards Board reprimanded Charlton and fined her £500 for the knife wielding incident. Charlton told the regulator that she deeply regretted the incidents and that her behaviour was "entirely out of character". 

She is not the first in the legal world to go a bit stabby on a beau.

Tip Off ROF

Comments

Anonymous 16 August 19 10:03

The police officers failed to arrest her after "She pushed, slapped and taunted officers to arrest her. "!?

 

Am I the only one who thinks that if she was working class that she would have been immediately locked up?

Lord Helpas 16 August 19 10:16

I really don’t approve of such sobriquets but I believe that Ms Charlton would have considered herself ‘working class’. The Bar is no longer confined to we members of the aristocracy.

Anonymous 16 August 19 10:57

@10:16 Well such considerations of Ms Charlton would be wrong. I did not suggest that she is aristocracy but I have yet to meet a barrister who is actually working class, rather than middle class.

Anonymous 16 August 19 15:02

Nothing to do with her class, had she been a man should would have been locked up. And had she been a solicitor, the fine would have been £5,000 and the costs £50,000!

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