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The lawyer who fought Franco and some overcharging builders!
FRANK Loeffler, who has died, aged 87, was a lawyer who was happy to use his legal training not only to fight for the rights of international political prisoners in high-profile cases, but also for neighbours facing problems with house repairs or welfare issues.
Frank, who passed away last week, was born in Oxford in 1920. His father George was a chemist, who originated from Germany. He and his wife Elizabeth had left England at the outbreak of the First World War to live for its duration in Canada to avoid being interned, and then slowly made their way back to their adopted country when peace broke out. They spent some time back in Germany and then in the Channel Islands. Frank’s early experiences of moving around helped shape his later interests in the plight of refugees – he was to become the chairman of the Refugee Council, and his life’s love, his wife Sabina, was a refugee from Nazi Germany.
Frank read law at Cambridge in the 1930s, and this experience helped shape his belief in Communism.
During the Second World War, he worked in an electrics factory – a protected industry – and he also worked as an air-raid warden in Hampstead, where he was then living.
After the war he returned to practise law, and set up a chambers in Bedford Square with the famous Belsize Park-based Communist lawyer Jack Gaster.
The firm, Gaster, Vowles, Turner and Loeffler became known for their work for social justice.
He was a regular visitor to Franco’s Spain to fight for the rights of political prisoners, and worked as an advisor for legal teams on the Julian Grimau case in the early 1960s, which saw the former leader of the PCE – the Spanish Communists – arrested by Franco’s police and then tortured. He was eventually murdered by a firing squad, despite Frank’s help publicising his plight across the world.
Following his retirement, Frank could regularly be spotted walking around the streets of Lissenden Gardens with a pipe clenched between his teeth.
He would offer free legal advice, write letters on behalf of tenants, and after his retirement embarked on a long battle to help people living there ensure they were paying correct charges for building work. Close friend Ian Marshall-Fisher, who lived in Lissenden Gardens, recalls how Frank took on Camden Council over a bill for building works that saw leaseholders on the estate overcharged. He was also a member of the Haldane Society, which united like-minded left-wing lawyers.
Mr Marshall-Fisher would often turn to Frank for advice – Frank was a keen theatre-goer, and spent many years supporting the socialist drama group Unity Theatre.
“Frank was always available to share his wisdom and wit,” said Mr Marshall-Fisher.
Frank Loeffler is survived by his son Ian and daughter Harriet. His wife Sabina and daughter Caroline predeceased him.
His funeral is on Friday, July 20 at Golders Green crematorium at 3pm, and all are welcome to attend.
DAN CARRIER |
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