Lady Butler-Sloss has been appointed as Deputy Coroner of the Queen’s Household and Assistant Deputy Coroner for Surrey for the purposes of hearing the inquests into the deaths of Diana, Princess of Wales and Mr Dodi Fayed on 31 August 1997. The appointments have been approved as required by the Coroners Act 1988.
Lady Butler-Sloss will be taking up the appointments in October 2006, and it is anticipated that the first preliminary hearings will take place early in the New Year.
Lady Butler-Sloss was appointed in May this year as a non-political peer by the House of Lords Appointments Commission. She retired as President of the Family Division, one of the most senior judicial positions in the country, in 2005.
Notes for Editors
- Lady Elizabeth Butler-Sloss was President of the Family Division of the High Court between 1999 and 2005. Prior to this she had been a Lady Justice of Appeal (1988-99) and a High Court Judge in the Family Division (1979-88). In addition, Lady Butler-Sloss was Chairman of the Commission for the Appointment of the Archbishop of Canterbury in 2002. She retired last year as Chairman of the Security Commission and is currently Chancellor of the University of the West of England. Between 1987-88 she chaired the Cleveland child abuse inquiry.
- Lady Butler-Sloss has made it clear that she will not be doing any media interviews regarding her appointment as Deputy Coroner or in relation to the inquests.
- Previous appointments of a similar kind include - His Honour Gerald Butler, a retired senior circuit judge, held the resumed inquest into the Deptford Fire, Sir Richard Rougier, a retired High Court judge, conducted an inquest into a death in a mental hospital for the Derby Coroner, Sir Jeremy Sullivan, a serving High Court judge, has been appointed to hear the inquests into the deaths of those who died in the Potters Bar train crash and Sir Richard Curtis has been appointed a deputy Coroner in Oxford to assist with the inquests into the Iraqi military deaths
- Some factual notes on the inquest process are set out on the following page.
About the inquest process
An inquest takes place to establish the cause of death of someone who did not die as a result of natural causes. The inquest is undertaken by a Coroner, and s/he hears evidence relating to the body and the circumstances of the death of a deceased person.
There is no prosecution or defence case in an inquest, simply a search for the truth. The evidence is considered, and from that evidence the cause of death is established.
It is not a public inquiry with set terms of reference, and the verdict does not allow for expressions of opinion. There may or may not be a jury – that is determined by the coroner in a particular case.
Why is an inquest into these deaths required?
The law states that when a death occurs outside of England and Wales, a Coroner will become involved if the body is brought into his district and he “… has reason to suspect that the deceased has died a violent or unnatural death [or] has died a sudden death of which the cause is unknown.”
Why have these inquests taken so long?
Inquests involving Britons who have died abroad often take longer than for domestic fatalities, because there may be practical difficulties in gaining the evidence of witnesses, and the coroner relies on the investigation of an external police force supplemented by any evidence from witnesses in England and Wales.
In this particular case, there was an extremely lengthy and detailed French judicial investigation which took some time due to the complexities of the case and various appeals. In addition to the papers from the extensive French investigation the coroner will also have to study around 6000 pages of evidence before commencing the inquest.
What will the inquests cover?
It has not yet been decided whether a single Inquest hearing will cover the deaths of both Diana , Princess of Wales, and Mr Dodi Fayed or whether these will be held separately.
How does the Stevens report affect the inquests?
Mr Michael Burgess, Coroner of The Queen’s Household asked Lord Stevens (former Metropolitan Police Commissioner) to conduct an investigation into the vehicle crash that resulted in the deaths of Diana, Princess of Wales, Mr Dodi Fayed and their driver, M Henri Paul. Known as "Operation Paget", this inquiry team has taken numerous witness statements and is compiling a detailed dossier that will be made into a formal report to the coroner.
The Coroner’s independence
Lady Butler-Sloss has been appointed as a Deputy Coroner of the Queen’s Household and an Assistant Deputy Coroner for Surrey for the purposes of hearing these Inquests. She will act as an independent judicial officer – in practice this means that she will take instructions from no-one in the conduct of her duties.
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