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French was appointed as a High Court judge in 1979, and was initially assigned to the Family
Division. However he would switch to the Queen's Bench Division three years later. In one of his obituaries, he was described as "being invariably calm, decent, unflustered and not liable to be provoked."
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in 1966 and acting as leading counsel in the
Thalidomide litigation. Whilst still at the bar he served as deputy chairman of Buckinghamshire Quarter Sessions from 1966 to 1971 and as Recorder of Coventry from 1972 to 1979.
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cancer litigation, described as "one of the longest, most complicated and most expensive civil actions ever heard before a
British court."
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that its members were "drunk, dissolute, unruly and irresponsible". Other defamation cases that he presided over included those between
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2 QB 697. Although his decision was overturned by the Court of Appeal, it would subsequently be restored by the House of Lords.
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noted acidly that as French was dead he was now free to write openly about his conduct of the libel claim brought by
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He married once, in 1957, Philippa Price, and she predeceased him in 2001. They had a son and a daughter.
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for rescuing wounded soldiers under enemy fire, and was later named honorary chaplain to the Queen.
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to finish his legal studies. Whilst at Oxford he rowed bow for the
Brasenose eight.
111:(14 October 1925 – 25 March 2003) was a British barrister and judge who sat on the
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Apart from the
Sellafield litigation he presided over a number of high-profile
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Not all commentary on French as a judge was quite so flattering. In his book,
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French was born in 1925, the son of
Reverend Reginald French, who had won a
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saw the force in the criticisms made of French's conduct of the trial.
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Hon Mr
Justice French also sat as the judge at first instance in
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French was called to the Bar in 1950 as a member of the
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109:Sir Christopher James Saunders French
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264:Hazell v Hammersmith and Fulham LBC
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42:Christopher James Saunders French
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32:Sir Christopher French
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232:Imran Khan
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123:Early life
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48:1925-10-14
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346:(2004).
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