Kama Melly KC > Park Square Barristers > Leeds, England > Barrister Profile

Kama Melly KC

0113 2459763

Work Department

Criminal and Children Law

Position

Crime
Kama Melly QC is widely recognised as one of the foremost female advocates in the North East, known for her technical ability and as a powerful advocate. She is in constant demand from both the defence and the prosecution, receiving an increasing number of private instructions. She has a reputation for achieving positive results in cases which others have assessed as hopeless.

For the past 10 of her 18 years as a barrister, Kama has specialised in criminal law. She is known for dealing with serious heavyweight crime including drug conspiracy, murder and fraud, and has considerable experience of cell-site evidence, forensic evidence and abuse-of-process applications. She specialises in sexual offences including historical cases, challenging DNA evidence, child cases, marital rape, and stranger attacks. Her practice includes quasi-crimes such as issues of judicial review, habeas corpus and extradition.

As part of her ‘no stone unturned’ approach Kama has succeeded in preventing prosecutions on several occasions through mounting applications of abuse of process, including in cases of drugs conspiracies and historical sexual offences.

Kama specialises in cases involving child defendants as young as 10, including 11-year-olds charged with rape and a 12-year-old charged with double stabbings. Her voluntary work with young defendants provides unrivalled knowledge of youth crime, and this was recognised when the Court of Appeal described her practice with young defendants as ‘a model’.

Children Law

Kama practised in criminal and family law for many years as a junior barrister, including the representation of Local Authorities, before specialising in cases of rape and serious sexual offences.

Her family law practice included Public Law cases including those in High Court.  Kama has dealt with cases involving significant physical and sexual abuse of children and cases of the most serious non-accidental injuries including the death of children.

Kama’s criminal practice has centred on issues that have a criminal/family law crossover and have focussed on child sexual and physical abuse.

Kama is the highest grade of prosecutor and a member of the CPS Rape and Sexual Offences Panel.

Kama has experience of cases involving ‘baby shaking’ murder, torture of children, neglect and child cruelty.

In 2016 Kama conducted a case involving joint hearings of criminal and family jurisdictions, dealing with disclosure and expert instruction.

The detailed knowledge Kama has of the manner of criminal prosecutions of carers and parents would be invaluable to the robust defence of a parent accused of causing harm to a child.

Kama is a nationally recognised expert at dealing with vulnerable witnesses including the evidence of children.  She has delivered training on this subject to The National Bar Conference, the CPS, the National Criminal Bar Association Conference and the Family Law Bar Association.

Kama is an advocacy trainer for the Inns of Court College of Advocacy (previously known as the Advocacy Training Council) and for the North Eastern Circuit.  Kama is an accredited teacher of advocacy trainers.

Kama’s national reputation in this field has meant that she is regularly asked to provide expert commentary for the National Media.  Kama has made multiple appearances on Radio5 Live, Sky News, This Morning, BBC News Channel, and BBC Breakfast.

Career

Call 1997, Silk 2016

Appointments:
Grade 4 prosecutor

Board member for women’s health matters

Bar representative for the Leeds S28 pilot scheme (pre-recorded evidence)

Selected by the BBC for training as an expert commentator on serious crime

Member of the Criminal Bar Committee in relation to youth justice

Member of the Criminal Bar Response Committee to the Auld Report

2000–2003
Elected member of the Bar Council

2006–2009
Youth offending team volunteer mentor

2014
Vice-Chair of Bar Conference

2015
Chairman of Bar Conferenc

2018
Appointed Recorder

Memberships

Criminal Bar AssociationNorth Eastern Circuit

Education

1996
University of Leeds, Law

1997
Inns of Court School of Law