James Atkin - Judge

Judge

He became a judge of the King's Bench division of the High Court in 1913. Work at the King's Bench involved him in criminal cases which had been outside his experience as a barrister but he established a high reputation as a criminal judge. Harold Cooke Gutteridge observed that "at least two of the most experienced Clerks of Assize of the period regarded his as one of the best criminal judges of his generation." Reputedly, Atkin enjoyed his six years at the King's Bench more than any others of his legal career. The following nine at the Court of Appeal he enjoyed the least.

Atkin became a Lord Justice of Appeal in 1919. In the 1920 case of Meering v. Graham-White Aviation Co. Ltd Atkin showed his disapproval of unjustified restriction on civil liberties by holding (obiter) that a person could sue for false imprisonment even under circumstances where he had been unaware of his imprisonment at the time. Again in 1920, in Everett v. Griffiths Atkin held that Everett was owed a duty of care by a Board of Guardians who had detained him as insane on inadequate grounds. However, Lord Justices Scrutton and Bankes held otherwise and their majority prevailed over Atkin's dissenting judgment.

From 1928 until his death he was a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary under the title Baron Atkin, of Aberdovey, in the County of Merioneth. Atkin was strongly motivated by his Christian faith and relied on testing the law against the demands of common sense and the interests of the ordinary working man. He came to a settled view early on in hearing a case and, as a Law Lord, his colleagues often found him indefatigable in his opinions and difficult to persuade as to the merits of alternative views.