Anne-Marie Hutchinson

She died on 2 October 2020 of cancer. She had two children, Catherine (born 1987) and Sam (born 1995).

In 2013, she became a commissioner on the Forced Marriage Commission.

Hutchinson also worked to introduce the Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007, which made it illegal for women and girls to be taken overseas to be forced into marriage.

A 2006 case in which she represented a British-born Pakistani woman set a legal precedent when the High Court ruled forced marriages could be annulled due to lack of consent.

She received an OBE in 2002 for services to international adoption and child abduction and was made an honorary QC in 2016.

She worked on the first English court case of forced marriage in 1999. She ensured the return of a Sikh girl who had been abducted by her parents to force her into marriage in India.

Hutchinson won the UNICEF Child Rights Lawyer Award in 1999 and the International Bar Association Outstanding International Woman Lawyer Award in 2010.

Hutchinson joined the London law firm Dawson Cornwell in 1998 and became the head of its children's department.

She left St Peter's School at 16 and worked as bank teller for two years. She then attended Huntingdon Technical College where she received 3 A-level qualifications. She graduated from the Leeds University with a degree in international history and politics and became a qualified solicitor in 1985.

Anne-Marie Hutchinson OBE QC (Hon) (1 August 1957 – 2 October 2020) was an Irish lawyer known for her work in the UK concerning children’s rights, particularly forced marriage and international child abduction.

Hutchinson was born on 1 August 1957 in Donegal in the Republic of Ireland. Her mother was a nurse and father ran a barbers. She was the third of six children. She moved to England when she was a child after her father got a job on a US airbase near Huntingdon.