Sir Fenton Atkinson (6 January 1906 – 28 March 1980) was a British High Court judge. He was the judge who oversaw the trial of the Moors murderers, Ian Brady and Myra Hindley, at ChesterAssizes in 1966.
He was a member of the BeechingCommission in 1966–67 that recommended reforms to the court system of Assizes and Quarter Sessions, leading to the Crown Courts system from 1971.
Atkinson was promoted to the Court of Appeal in 1968, serving as a Lord Justice of Appeal until he resigned on medical grounds in 1971. He sat on the Court of Appeal panels that heard the appeal of James Hanratty in 1962, the appeals of the Great Train Robbers in 1964, and the appeal in 1971 in Knuller, Knuller v DPP, a case of conspiracy to corrupt public morals in relation to gay contact advertisements published in IT magazine.[1]