Sita Cox

Sita has been practising as a barrister for over 35 years, and joined Becket Chambers in 2022. She specialises in family law, representing spouses, cohabitees, single parents and children in matters involving finance, custody and allegations of serious physical and sexual abuse.

Sita is skilled at helping people to deal with disputes, and is able to remain neutral, allowing each person a ‘safe space’ to voice their grievances, needs and concerns. By helping both sides to bring clarity to their issues, she can enable them to reach an amicable resolution and compromise.

Using her vast experience, she applies creative and innovative techniques to help many clients to resolve their issues outside the court room.

Where a case goes to court, Sita’s ability to highlight the relevant information and put it to the bench clearly and succinctly is one of the skills which enable her to get the best outcomes for her clients.

She prioritises understanding her client’s situation and objectives, enabling her to rapidly assess complex information, and explain their options, as well the most likely outcomes. She is highly empathetic, and skilled at ‘reading’ people, allowing her to tailor her communication style to suit their needs.

She’s a logical and critical thinker, skills she uses to help her clients analyse their issues and risks, and to approach matters practically, resulting in a realistic solution which is acceptable to the client, their solicitor and the court.

Sita is Direct Access Qualified, and in order to ensure that her clients understand how Direct Access works, and to identify the true legal issues that need to be addressed, she offers a half-hour free consultation. In this session, she does not provide legal advice on their situation, but explains how Direct Access works and discusses whether it is suitable for their needs.

She is also a qualified Family Mediator and Civil Mediator.

Sita is regularly instructed in Public Children matters, to represent parents, other family members i.e. grandparents or aunts/uncles and children in matters of care from basic neglect to the most serious cases of abuse.

She is highly accomplished at working with people with learning difficulties, or where drug or alcohol dependency is a factor, and understands the psychology behind addiction, trauma and other life stressors.

Both Sita’s experience and her compassion enable her to work with clients experiencing extremely challenging circumstances in a supportive and understanding way.

Sita understands that Family Law proceedings can be some of the most stressful situations that her clients have experienced, and she ensures that she explains every stage of the journey in a way that they can understand, as well as being open about the potential result and reassuring them that their situation is in good hands.

Her main aim is always to resolve problems in her client’s best interest, and she is highly sensitive to difficult and distressing situations, whilst clearly understanding what is realistically possible as an outcome.

She has also worked extensively with non-English speakers, where communication needs to be through an interpreter.

Sita welcomes instructions in matrimonial finance matters as well as where inheritance act claims interact with financial remedy. She also handles financial disputes between cohabitees, Inheritance Act claims, and applications for financial provision for children under schedule 1 of the Child Act of 1989.

She is a pragmatic person, and her approach is focussed on seeking a practical outcome whether the case goes to court or whether the parties reach agreement themselves.

Financial matters in law are complicated, and Sita makes sure to adapt her communication style and to use easy-to-understand terms. She explains what’s possible, and helps to guide the people involved towards reaching an acceptable solution.

Matrimonial finance arguments often come wrapped in a number of other issues. Sita has extensive experience of dealing with many of these matters, for example;

• Boundary disputes


• Building disputes


• Contractual disputes


• Disputes between family members or ex partners regarding ownership of property


• Rights of way


• Trust of Land Act and Appointment of Trustee’s Act 1996