Call: 2016
Scholarships
- Young Legal Aid Lawyers
- FLBA
- Gray’s Inn
- Advocate
Samara actively contributes to life at Gray’s Inn, particularly in relation to music and performance having achieved Grade 8 Singing, Grade 8 Acting and Grade 8 Musical Theatre.
She is a member of the Gray’s Inn Chapel Choir, the Gray’s Inn Songbirds and performs in the Gray’s Inn Miscellany.
Samara assists with advocacy training at taster days aimed at university students and judges moots for BPTC students.
Samara enjoys art, history and politics. Samara is highly proficient in French and Italian, having spent time abroad during her degree in Geneva and Bologna respectively.
Instructing Samara Brackley
If you require help or advice please contact our clerking team.
Call +44 (0)20 7353 0711 or email clerks@pumpcourtchambers.com.
Samara has a busy practice comprising of family finance (including Schedule 1), private children, contested divorce and jurisdictional disputes. She is frequently instructed by the same client for both their finance and children disputes and understands the importance of continuity of counsel. Samara is mindful that settlement will often be in a client’s best interests and she provides robust advice where required. She welcomes a collaborative approach with her instructing solicitors and clients and is happy to advise at any stage of litigation.
Samara is recognised for her expertise in the Spear’s 500 Family Law Barristers Index 2023, where she features as a ‘Recommended’ barrister.
Samara sits as the Bar Representative on the Hampshire YRes committee and is a member of the Resolution Cohabitation Committee, which aims to promote knowledge and reform on the law for cohabiting couples. She is a regular guest on chambers’ podcast, The Family Law Podcast and frequently gives seminars on relevant family law topics.
Samara represents parents, other family members and Guardians at all stages of private children law disputes, from FHDRA to fact-finding hearings and final hearings. Samara has experience of cases concerning allegations of serious domestic abuse, including coercive and controlling behaviour). She has acted in cases with Guardian appointments, including having appeared for the Guardian, and is familiar with the additional layers such an appointment presents.
Samara is experienced in parental alienation cases, including where Part 25 experts are instructed and has successfully challenged SJE reports by ISWs and psychologists.
Of particular interest to Samara is international children work. She has been instructed on cases involving both the Family Law Act 1986 and the Hague Convention in relation to jurisdiction and Habitual Residence disputes.
Junior counsel for the Appellant where the appellant won on both grounds, addressing whether the appellant was the legal parent of the children under s.42 HFEA 2008 and whether the English court had jurisdiction under FLA 1986, in circumstances where if the English court did not accept jurisdiction, there was no other jurisdiction available to the appellant to bring her case. Re S is now the leading authority on both points of law considered.
Final hearing where Samara had represented the mother throughout proceedings concerning her child with the father. The mother had a diagnosis of a ‘major depressive episode’, which had been assessed by an SJE psychiatrist who attended the final hearing to give evidence.
Ongoing proceedings where Samara is representing the father, who is accused by the mother of ‘inappropriate touching’ of their child when a baby.
Ongoing proceedings (second set of proceedings) representing the respondent where the applicant has been found to have struck the child’s car seat with a knife whilst the child was in it, struck the respondent with a knife and made threats to kill the child, the respondent and other non-subject step-children. There are also mental health deliberations involved, including whether the applicant’s actions were as a result of potentially undiagnosed post-natal depression.
Samara assists clients in all financial remedies disciplines and has a busy matrimonial finance practice. She regularly attends first appointments, FDRs and trials, and other stages of proceedings, including preliminary issue hearings, MPS applications, enforcement applications and appeals.
Samara’s cases increasingly involve factual disputes, which have recently included third party interests in matrimonial property, inherited wealth and conduct including findings of material non-disclosure. She has experience of dealing with agreements (PNAs and separation agreements) and the litigation strategy required to deal with challenging or upholding agreements.
Samara is instructed in contested divorce cases and has advised specifically on the validity of single and triple Talaqs and other non-proceedings foreign divorces. She has also advised on forum arguments.
Junior counsel for H in an 8-day final hearing. Issues involved separating the parties’ property portfolio of c. 115 properties (with highly mortgaged properties including some in negative equity), the parties’ multiple businesses (some SPV’s), and issues arising from H’s tangential bankruptcy proceedings.
Samara represented H for four years, culminating in a 5-day final hearing, where there were several factual issues including disputed loans, disputed beneficial ownership of investment properties, contributions arguments and most notably, W’s non-disclosure of several properties which had been subject to tangential TLATA proceedings involving her ex-partner (subsequent to the marriage). Samara secured a finding at trial that W had deliberately hidden assets from the Family Court and had produced sham loan agreements to cover up monies transferred to her ex-partner to purchase the non-disclosed properties. Samara also secured a costs order against W for 50% of H’s costs.
Representing H throughout proceedings until settlement, Samara represented H at the 2-day preliminary issue trial to determine the date of separation where the parties were apart by 25 years. Samara achieved 19 findings on behalf of H, including that his date of separation was correct and W had been financially independent from that time. H was awarded 100% of his costs.
Ongoing proceedings in the High Court, acting for W in a case concerning significant company and offshore assets, and a factual dispute about a separation agreement.
Samara accepts instructions from clients pursuing or defending claims under TLATA and financial remedies for children under Schedule 1. She is familiar with the issues that present in the cross-over between the two applications if being made simultaneously.
Scholarships
- Young Legal Aid Lawyers
- FLBA
- Gray’s Inn
- Advocate
Samara actively contributes to life at Gray’s Inn, particularly in relation to music and performance having achieved Grade 8 Singing, Grade 8 Acting and Grade 8 Musical Theatre.
She is a member of the Gray’s Inn Chapel Choir, the Gray’s Inn Songbirds and performs in the Gray’s Inn Miscellany.
Samara assists with advocacy training at taster days aimed at university students and judges moots for BPTC students.
Samara enjoys art, history and politics. Samara is highly proficient in French and Italian, having spent time abroad during her degree in Geneva and Bologna respectively.
Instructing Samara Brackley
If you require help or advice please contact our clerking team.
Call +44 (0)20 7353 0711 or email clerks@pumpcourtchambers.com.