Lady Edwina Grosvenor
English criminologist (born 1981)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lady Edwina Louise Grosvenor DL (born 4 November 1981) is an English criminologist, philanthropist and prison reformer. She is a founder and a trustee of the charity The Clink, and founder of the charity One Small Thing. She is the sister of Hugh Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster.
4 November 1981
- Criminologist[1]
- philanthropist
- prison reformer
Lady Edwina Grosvenor | |
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| Born | Edwina Louise Grosvenor 4 November 1981 Eaton Hall, Cheshire, England |
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| Children | 3 |
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Early life and education
Lady Edwina Louise Grosvenor was born at the family seat of Eaton Hall, Cheshire, on 4 November 1981.[2] She is the daughter of the 6th Duke of Westminster and Natalia Ayesha Phillips.[3] Through her mother, she is descended from the Romanov imperial family of Russia and the Russian writer Alexander Pushkin, as well as from the latter's great-grandfather – African tribal chief turned Russian nobleman Abram Petrovich Hannibal.[4] Grosvenor's godmother was Diana, Princess of Wales.[5] She went to a private school, Ellesmere College, in Shropshire.[2][6] At the age of 12, she was taken to a Liverpool rehabilitation centre, where she was introduced to heroin addicts and became interested in helping society's unseen people.[7] At age 15, she volunteered at a homeless shelter run by the charity Save the Family.[8] She spent her gap year working in a prison in Kathmandu before studying criminology at Northumbria University.[2] She studied criminal behaviour at Edith Cowan University in Perth, Australia.[9] In August 2021, Grosvenor graduated from Solent University with a master's degree in criminology and crime scene management, achieving a distinction.[10]
Career
Prison reform
During her time in Nepal, Grosvenor worked for The Esther Benjamins Trust, now Child Rescue Nepal, a UK-registered charity which works to have children removed from prison, where they were held when their parents were convicted of crimes.[11] She also worked at the Central Jail in Kathmandu.[7] Lady Edwina commissioned research by the Corston Coalition into the needs of women offenders,[10][12] set up in the wake of the 2007 report by Jean Corston, Baroness Corston. She spent a year as a support worker at Cheshire's HM Prison Styal,[13] then worked in HM Prison Garth in Lancashire, helping with the restorative justice program.[13] She sits on the advisory board for Female Offenders under the Secretary of State for Justice[11][14] and, from 2007 to 2010, was an advisor to James Jones, then Bishop of Liverpool and Bishop to Her Majesty's Prisons.[2][10][15] In 2009, Grosvenor became the founding investor of The Clink, a charity that identifies the training and support needed for prisoners to find jobs following release.[10][16] The Clink restaurant, a fine-dining training restaurant, opened in HM Prison High Down in 2009.[6] She served as a trustee of the charity from 2011 to 2018, and then as one of its ambassadors[17] She also works with Pathways, a London-based community regeneration program that helps to create sustainable businesses run by former offenders.[2]
In 2014, Grosvenor presented the BBC Radio 4 Charity Appeal for the Prisoners' Advice Service.[18][19] In 2015, she visited Ellesmere College and delivered a speech about prison reform and rehabilitation.[6] She founded One Small Thing, a charity that seeks to understand the trauma within the prison system and raise awareness of how compassion and respect can prevent women from re-offending.[10][20] One Small Thing trains prison staff about trauma, helps them change their behaviour to protect women inmates, and develops trauma services within prisons.[21] Grosvenor founded the Becoming Trauma Informed programme across the Female Prison Estate in England and Wales.[21] In September 2017, One Small Thing collaborated with the Rumi Foundation to research women's prisons around the country.[20] In 2018, One Small Thing was awarded the Howard League for Penal Reform's Criminal Justice Champion Award.[22]
Grosvenor became a member of the advisory board to the Centre for Criminology in the Faculty of Law at the University of Oxford,[10] and, in 2020, donated £90,000 to the University of Oxford to fund the Death Penalty Research Unit.[23]
Grosvenor worked on a project called Hope Street, a healing residential community alternative for women who were in custody prior to sentencing or already served their sentences alongside their children.[8][24] The programme was monitored by the University of Southampton, The Prison Reform Trust and EP:IC.[25]
In March 2022, Grosvenor became High Sheriff of Hampshire for a one-year term.[26] She was appointed a deputy lieutenant of Hampshire in 2025.[27]
Recognition
In July 2018, Grosvenor was awarded an honorary fellowship of Liverpool John Moores University for her contribution to public life.[28]
Personal life
Grosvenor married television presenter Dan Snow on 27 November 2010. The couple were married by the Bishop of Liverpool, James Jones, at his official residence, Bishop's Lodge.[29] They have three children.[1]