Sir Nicholas Felix Stadlen (3 May 1950 – 5 October 2023) was a British judge who served on theHigh Court of England and Wales.[1] He was appointed to the High Court'sQueen's Bench Division on 2 October 2007 and retired early, on 21 April 2013.[2]
Nicholas Felix Stadlen was born inHampstead, London on 3 May 1950.[3] His parents were political activistHedi Stadlen and pianist and musicologistPeter Stadlen.[4] He was educated atSt Paul's School, London andTrinity College, Cambridge, where he read history and classics and was president of theCambridge Union in 1970.
Stadlen was working as abusboy in New York'sTimes Square on 4 April 1968, when theassassination of Martin Luther King Jr. happened inMemphis, and travelled to the south to witness the extraordinary events following his death. This awakened him to the issue of racism, which led to a lifelong interest.[5]
In 1972 he married Frances Edith Howarth. He was called to the bar in 1976 and became a QC in 1991, and was a member ofFountain Court Chambers.[6]
From 2006 to 2007 he conducted a series of interviews with well-known figures (Gerry Adams,Desmond Tutu,F. W. de Klerk,Simon Peres,Hanan Ashrawi,Tony Benn andDavid Blunkett) which were podcast byThe Guardian.[7]
In 2005 at theRoyal Courts of Justice Stadlen made the longest speech in English legal history when he spoke for 119 days while representing theBank of England in its defence of a compensation claim worth £850m made by creditors and liquidators of theBank of Credit and Commerce International. In beginning his speech, Stadlen said "After six months, the empire strikes back." The previous record had bern held by the other side's leading counsel,Gordon Pollock QC, speaking in the same case.[8]
Stadlen was appointed aHigh Court Judge and knighted in 2007.[1] From his retirement in 2013, Stadlen researched the history of theanti-apartheid struggle in South Africa and was writing a book on theRivonia Trial, which led toNelson Mandela's imprisonment.[9][5] In 2015–2016 he was awarded the Alistair Horne Visiting Fellow Fellowship, an "annualfellowship designed to encourage the completion of works in modern history and biography which combine academic scholarship and a wider public appeal", atSt Antony's College, Oxford, to work on his bookBram Fischer QC and the Unsung Heroes of the Struggle Against Apartheid 1960–1966 (as of April 2019[update] unpublished).[10]
In 2015 he appeared on theBBC Radio 4 programmeGreat Lives, nominating anti-apartheid lawyerBram Fischer.[11]
In 2017, Stadlen directed a documentary film entitledLife is Wonderful, featuring the then remaining survivors of the Rivonia trial,Denis Goldberg,Andrew Mlangeni andAhmed Kathrada,[12] along with lawyersJoel Joffe,George Bizos and Denis Kuny, which tells the story of the Rivonia trial. The title reflects Goldberg's words to his mother at the end of the trial on hearing that he and his comrades had been spared the death sentence, and Sir Nicholas said that he was inspired to make the film after spending a day with Goldberg.[13][14][15][16]
Sir Nicholas Stadlen died frommesothelioma on 5 October 2023, at the age of 73.[3]