Jo is a solicitor in the family team supporting clients through changes to their family structure. Her experience includes complex finances, child arrangements, child welfare and child relocation (for married and unmarried couples), divorce, domestic abuse, pre- and post-nuptial and cohabitation agreements.
Much of Jo’s work features international elements, and her cases have been determined through the Family and High Courts, or settled through lawyer-led negotiations and alternative dispute resolution. Her primary focus when providing legal support is always to adapt to the client’s particular needs, and to ensure the welfare of any children. Where it has been possible to achieve a favourable settlement without the need for court intervention, Jo works hard to achieve this for her clients.
Jo is a trained family mediator and is working towards accreditation with the Family Mediation Council. She is a member of Resolution, a community focussed on promoting constructive approaches to family issues that consider the needs of the whole family.
Expertise
- Separation and divorce
- Complex and multi-jurisdictional financial disputes
- Arrangements for children, welfare of children, and relocation of children to different jurisdictions
- Domestic abuse and non-molestation orders
- Pre- and post-nuptial agreements
- Cohabitation agreements
- Alternative dispute resolution, particularly mediation
Experience
- Acted in a complex financial litigation matter heard in the High Court, which involved family assets held through a complicated corporate structure of 29 companies based in the UK, BVI and Malta.
- Represented a father in various proceedings relating to the care and welfare of his child. Successfully defended the mother’s application for leave to remove the child from the jurisdiction, and worked to ensure the child’s privacy given the high-profile nature of the mother, securing orders in both the family and civil courts.
- Supported a US mother of two in divorce and financial proceedings and successfully settled a relocation case, enabling her to relocate with her children to the US.
- Advised a mother in financial and child arrangements proceedings, involving financial abuse and coercive and controlling behaviour. Finances successfully settled at a Private Financial Disputes Resolution hearing, and a fact-finding hearing ordered in the child arrangements proceedings.
- Work collaboratively with clients and lawyers drafting cohabitation and nuptial agreements involving inherited wealth, trusts, significant business assets and foreign jurisdictions.
Please note: The experience list above may include examples of work completed prior to joining Keystone Law.
Career
Prior to joining Keystone Law in 2023, Jo worked at the following firms:
- Jo Henley Mediation
- Mishcon de Reya LLP