Paul Kennedy

Sir Paul Joseph Morrow Kennedy, PC (born 12 June 1935) is an English jurist. He is a former vice-president of the Queen's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice of England and Wales, and former Interception of Communications Commissioner.

Life Kennedy was born in northern England in Sheffield, Yorkshire, in 1935. He studied at Ampleforth College in North Yorkshire and at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and received his final law training at Sheffield University.

From 1992 to 2005 Kennedy was an appellate judge on the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, known as a Lord Justice of Appeal. From 1997 to 2002 he also served as the vice-president of the Queen's Bench Division. Kennedy served until December 2012, and was succeeded by Sir Anthony May in January 2013. In 2014, Kennedy served an additional six months as Interception of Communications Commissioner due to the convalescence of Anthony May from an accident.

Also in 2006 Kennedy was appointed to the Court of Appeal in Gibraltar, where he became president in December 2011.

Controversies In 1995, Kennedy was an advisor to a charity that promoted a controversial, brainwashing style rehabilitation program for young offenders reminiscent of that used in Burgess's A Clockwork Orange, for which he was later taken to task by the press.

In 2011, while serving as Interception of Communications Commissioner, Kennedy and the Intelligence Services Commissioner, Sir Mark Waller, were ridiculed for allowing their new web site dealing with state security to have open editing access.

Memberships and awards Knighted in 1984. Member of the Judicial Studies Board and chairman of its Criminal Committee from 1993 to 1996. Chairman of the Advocacy Studies Board from 1996 to 1999. Member of Queen's Counsel Appointment Panels for England and Wales from 2008 to 2009. Member of the Queen's Counsel Appointments Committee for Gibraltar since 2011. Honorary fellow at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge in 1998. Honorary LLD from the University of Sheffield in 2000.