Judge in dock on exposure charges

12 April 2012

One of Britain's most senior judges is due to appear in court charged with exposure.

Lord Justice Richards, who sits in the Court of Appeal, faces two counts relating to two alleged incidents on trains in south-west London last year, British Transport Police said.

He was arrested on January 19 following a complaint from a female train passenger that a man exposed himself to her.

Sir Stephen Richards, 56, a married father of three, was charged last Friday and bailed to appear at City of Westminster Magistrates' Court.

The judge, who lives in Wimbledon, south-west London, was arrested following an undercover operation.

After his arrest in January, Sir Stephen insisted he was innocent.

At the time he told the News of the World newspaper: "I spoke to police and gave them my full co-operation about an incident last October which I deny."

The judge has overseen a number of high-profile hearings, and in January ruled in a High Court case brought by the family of Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian gunned down by armed police who mistook him for a suicide bomber.

He married wife Lucy in 1976 and has two sons and a daughter.

Educated at King's College School, Wimbledon, and St John's College, Oxford, he was called to the bar in 1975 and became a High Court Judge in 1997 before becoming a Lord Justice of Appeal in 2005.

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