Katie Stephens – Pupil

Introduction

Katie Stephens began a specialist family law pupillage in October 2024, supervised by Carolyn Jones and Juliet Allen. Katie accepts instructions in financial remedies, private children, care proceedings, and cohabitee disputes.

Since getting on her feet on 1^st April, Katie has been instructed in first direction appointments, financial dispute resolutions, multi-day final hearings, and enforcement proceedings. Katie has also drafted a particulars of claims and part 36 offer, and provided advice, for a TOLATA claim.

In children proceedings, Katie is frequently instructed at dispute resolution appointments and multi-day final hearings, including in cases with 16.4 guardians and in cases featuring allegations of abuse. In care proceedings, Katie has acted at interim care order hearings and at an issues resolution hearing. Katie previously worked as a paralegal for a local authority assisting with deprivation of liberty and care proceedings from PLO through to final hearings.

Katie has completed Advocate’s Pupil Pledge through providing advice at conference prior to a TOLATA trial. She has also completed a further two hearings for Advocate: an FDR which led to settlement and a final hearing in which she successfully argued against a PODE report, resulting in the court making a pension sharing order in favour of her client.

Alongside her practice, Katie contributes to the Financial Remedies Journal, writing case summaries of recent judgments. She previously worked as a research assistant to Dr Rob George for his book Wards of Court and the Inherent Jurisdiction, published in 2024. In 2024, Katie wrote an article on diversity in judicial appointments which was published in the Lincoln’s Inn Student Law Journal and she was runner-up in the 2024 Young Association of Lawyers for Children Legal Advice Competition, where she advised on contact and parental responsibility in a sperm donor case. That same year, she won the Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn Debate Shield. Katie studied the bar course with scholarships from Lincoln’s Inn, the Family Law Bar Association, and the Leonard Sainer Legal Education Foundation.

Katie was ranked the 29^th barrister LinkedIn influencer for the first quarter of 2025! In her spare time, Katie enjoys dance lessons, crafting, and spending time with her cat! She also volunteers with Bridging the Bar, an organisation that supports students becoming barristers from underrepresented groups at the bar.