The Queen's College Record 2023

Meantime I, London born and bred, had made my first excursions north to stay with
the Dobkins. I had my first experiences of Shabbat in an Orthodox Jewish home and
with the United Hebrew Congregation in Shadwell Lane, Moortown.
Obituaries
He had a sense of mission too about showing me Yorkshire, cities, towns, and
country too – although he was by no means a countryman; music in Leeds and
Harrogate, the Mystery Plays in York.
After Queen’s, followed Gray’s Inn, the Bar Examinations, call to the Bar in 1971,
pupillage in Leeds, and the beginning of a distinguished career practising in criminal
law as a barrister on the North Eastern Circuit from 1971 to 1995. He was made an
Assistant Recorder in 1986, Recorder in 1990, and in 1995 became a Circuit Judge.
His health sadly necessitated his early retirement in October 2010.
I am grateful to a colleague of Ian’s in the North Eastern Circuit for the following:
“Ian joined 38 Park Square Chambers and quickly built a reputation as a committed
defence barrister. He was a fierce cross examiner but he rapidly established himself as
someone who could deliver a powerful mitigation for a defendant who pleaded guilty.
In 1982 Ian joined nine others to set up St Pauls Chambers, which is now one of the
leading sets on circuit. After about 20 years as one of the leading defence juniors in
Leeds, he decided to go on the bench. As His Honour Judge Dobkin, he was known
for his sympathetic and compassionate views. Always a favourite at the bar, he was
sadly missed when he had to retire due to ill health.”
He was also a politico. He had been already at school, in mock General Elections in
1964. Although he was a member of OUCA and regular at the Oxford Union, it was
not to the fore at university. Back in Leeds, however, and established at the bar, he
became a Conservative Parliamentary candidate, for the Yorkshire constituency of
Penistone. Labour held and unlikely then to change. But the death of the MP caused
a by-election in July 1978. Ian had both Edward Heath and Margaret Thatcher there
canvassing. He did not win it then, nor at the General Election in 1979. Many have
served like this before getting a ‘safer’ constituency.
Ian did not follow it through. In 1980 he and Andrea were married. Fatherhood
followed. Neither was he a Thatcherite, probably not ‘one of us’. He was and remained
opposed to capital punishment when many Tory politicians were not. He never lost
his interest however; and he and I went on disagreeing. I was worse than wet.
Other and responsible concerns arose, too, in Synagogue and community. In
1985 the Moortown Synagogue came together with others in new, larger and welldesigned
premises in Shadwell Lane beyond the Ring Road. This is a community in
which through this time Ian was active, and was for a number of years President. It
was there that my wife and I attended his and Andrea’s sons’ bar mitzvahs.
102 The Queen’s College | College Record 2023