[4] Justice was founded in 1957, following the visit of a group of British lawyers to observe the treason trials of members of the African National Congress (ANC) in apartheid South Africa and the show-trials in communist Hungary.
[5] Other founding members included Sir John Galway Foster QC,[6] and Peter Benenson who later established Amnesty International.
Thus, although founded with an international orientation, Justice quickly established a specific focus on the rule of law and protection of fundamental rights in the UK.
Through the 1990s it established and developed programmes on human rights legislation, criminal justice, asylum and immigration, discrimination and privacy.
[10][11] The first JUSTICE Scotland working party report, looking at legal assistance in police stations, was published in July 2018.
[13] Previous directors of Justice include Dame Anne Owers CBE, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons, Leah Levin OBE, a founder and trustee of Redress,[14] and Andrea Coomber QC (Hon), chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform.
As a policy organisation it is less involved in overt campaigning and individual casework and more on providing independent, expert legal analysis on matters of fundamental rights.