Who does Asylum Aid represent and what can we do?

Asylum Aid's Legal Team provides advice to people who are
in the UK and are in fear of returning to their country of origin.
This includes individuals, families and children seeking asylum, refugees with families overseas, victims of trafficking and domestic violence, and stateless people.

	Sandi Kudhail Supervising Solicitor Sandi joined Asylum Aid from O'Keeffe's Solicitors in 2010, and has more than ten years experience working as a solicitor-advocate.  She works on a range of asylum issues, and has developed specialisms working with victims of trafficking and domestic violence.
	Kamla Adiseshiah Supervising Solicitor  Kam joined Asylum Aid in 2010.  She has more than a decade's experience as an immigration lawyer, including time with the Citizens Advice Bureau and the Immigration Advisory Service, and holds an MA in Applied European Studies. Kam qualified as a solicitor in 2003.
	Connie Sozi Solicitor Connie has represented asylum seekers and refugees since 2000, when she started work as a legal assistant at a small legal firm in Hammersmith.  She has worked in particular with survivors of torture and gender violence, and foreign prisoners.  Connie was previously called to the Bar while  at Bindmans LLP in 2006, and qualified as a solicitor in 2011.
	Carmen Kearney Senior Caseworker Carmen has worked at Asylum Aid for more than a decade, and has built up particular specialisms dealing with victims of trafficking and domestic violence.  Prior to this, she worked as a debt advisor for an east London HIV charity. Carmen holds an MA in Refugee Studies.
	Kenneth Tait Senior Caseworker Ken has worked as an asylum and immigration caseworker for thirteen years, in both private practice and the not-for- profit sector.  He has specific expertise working with asylum seekers who have been persecuted on account of their sexuality.
	Emma Terenius Children's Caseworker Emma joined Asylum Aid in 2011, having worked in private practice and for three years as a Senior Caseworker at Refugee and Migrant Justice.  Emma works with unaccompanied children seeking asylum in the UK.
	Louis McWilliam Triage Caseworker Louis joined Asylum Aid in 2012.  He has previously worked as a Caseworker for Refugee and Migrant Justice and the Immigration Advisory Service, and holds an LLM in Human Rights.  Louis leads our outreach work, which provides legal support to destitute and highly-vulnerable asylum seekers.

In particular, Asylum Aid represents:

• Asylum seekers
• Children seeking asylum
• Refugees
• Victims of trafficking
• Stateless people
• Those who have suffered domestic violence and relationship breakdown in the UK and fear return to their country of origin or residence
• Refused asylum seekers who want to regularise their immigration status

Some members of the team have developed particular areas of expertise, including: 

• Providing representation in asylum appeals
• Representing victims of trafficking
• Representing children, including unaccompanied asylum seeking children
• Representing gay men and women
• Representing destitute asylum seekers with further submissions
• Representing victims of domestic violence  

Other than under exceptional circumstances, we can only provide representation to clients who live within the London area.  Due to restrictions in funding for Legal Aid, Asylum Aid is not able to provide representation to people in immigration detention.  If you are in immigration detention, you need to seek advice from a provider with an exclusive detention contract, listed here.

Asylum Aid provides our clients with legal representation in their asylum and immigration claims.  We will represent our clients in their applications to the UK Border Agency, and in all stages of their appeals to the Asylum and Immigration Chamber and beyond.  We also provide our clients with legal representation in Judicial Reviews. 

We realise that our client’s legal problems can be complex, and we are able to offer them a wide range of services.  For example, we offer legal representation in:

• Asylum claims and appeals, including further representations after their initial claim or appeal has been unsuccessful
• Applications and appeals on behalf of asylum seeking children who are seeking to extend their permission to remain in the UK
• Applications and appeals on behalf of clients who are in fear or unable to return to their country of origin and are seeking to regularise their immigration status in the UK
• Applications for family reunion when a person has been recognised as a refugee or granted humanitarian protection 
• Applications for bail or challenges to the lawfulness of detention to secure release or damages for people held in prison
• Applications for emergency injunctions to prevent existing clients being forcibly removed
• Applications for existing clients who require help to obtain travel documentation or naturalise as British citizens

Unlike many other legal aid funded representatives, we aim to attend substantive asylum interviews with our clients, because we believe that this is a necessary part of representing our clients.

Asylum Aid is able to provide interpreters for our clients where needed.  We are happy to represent clients of all nationalities and backgrounds.

We specialise in representing women, who make up at least 50% of our clients.  All women clients are offered the choice of having a woman legal representative.

If we are unable to help, please see our guide to finding other legal representation.