Sarah Asplin

Dame Sarah Jane Asplin DBE QC (born 16 September 1959) is a British judge who serves as a Justice of the High Court (Mrs Justice Asplin), one of the Senior Courts of England and Wales. She was granted the customary appointment as Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2012.

Education

Asplin attended the Southampton Sixth Form College for Girls and read law at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, earning a BA in Law in 1982 (MA (Cantab) 1986). She went on to complete her BCL at St Edmund Hall, Oxford.

Legal career

Asplin was called to the bar (Gray’s Inn) in 1984 and was appointed a Queen's Counsel in 2002 (Fitwilliam College's first female law graduate to be so appointed). She became the Head of Chambers at 3 Stone Buildings in 2009, and was a Deputy High Court Judge until her promotion to the High Court on 1 October 2012 and became The Honourable Mrs Justice Sarah Asplin when assigned to the Chancery Division. On 3 February 2016, she granted a death certificate for the missing (and fugitive) Lord Lucan, who has not been seen for more than 40 years (although seven years is the legal requirement), on the presumption that he has died. His son, George Bingham, was thus enabled to become the 8th Earl as a result.

On 22 February 2013, she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.