Lionel Haward

Lionel Richard Charles Haward, (1920–1998) was a British clinical psychologist and academic, who has been described as the "father of British forensic psychology". Following service with the Royal Air Force Police during the Second World War, he worked in the National Health Service in psychiatric hospitals. He led a successful campaign to allow psychologists to testify as experts in court in England, and was then himself an expert witness at a number of high-profile trials. He latterly taught at the University of Surrey, rising to become Professor of Clinical Psychology.

Early life and education Haward was born in 1920. He was educated at the Earl Haig School in Aldershot, Hampshire, England.

Haward successfully led a campaign to allow psychologists to testify as experts in court in England; previously only medically qualified persons were allowed to testify on the "mental functioning of witnesses or defendants". He was an expert witness for many notable criminal trials in the 1960s and 1970s, including Donald Neilson, John Stonehouse MP, and the Oz magazine obscenity trials.

He worked in the National Health Service as a clinical psychologist at psychiatric hospitals, including Barrow Hospital, Bristol, Winterton Hospital, County Durham, and Graylingwell Hospital, Chichester. giving his inaugural lecture in 1979 titled "Hypnosis in the service of research". He retired from the university in 1987 and was appointed professor emeritus, but continued to work as an honorary consultant psychologist and as an expert witness.

Selected works