Welcome to Week 1 of Court Visit Breakdown!
So, a bit of backstory:
Yesterday I attended court
I sat in the public gallery of a Crown Court (yes that means there was a jury – even more exciting!)
It was a domestic abuse case deciding whether the defendant had in fact committed the acts of abuse against his wife or not. Had the defendant been verbally abusing and hitting their partner, or did it simply never even happen?
So, let’s get started… what did I actually see
The court hearing began at around 10:30 AM where the prosecution called to the stand their witness to the crime (this was the niece of both the complainant and the defendant). This is what they call Examination- in – Chief, in which the witness gave a breakdown of the events that occurred (from their point of view) to set a clear understanding of what they believe to have happened. She went on to explain the relationship dynamic between the defendant and the complainant at the time she had been living with them, and that she had personally witnessed the defendant holding down the complainant and hitting their arm. It was evident at this stage that the witness was in support of the complainant.
After this I was able to observe the opposite, Cross-Examination, where the defence was able to ask leading questions and challenge what the witness was saying. It was interesting to see how the defence barrister started his questioning (basically saying, I’m arguing that none of this ever actually happened, and here is why). I then noticed that the defence barrister mainly relied on inferring opposing ideas to what the prosecution had already spoken on. For example, rather than reiterating and arguing with the witness that the defendant can be morally good and did in fact not abuse his wife, he refrained from speaking too intensely on the incident itself but rather reminded the court about the money and place to live the defendant had given the witness to be able to study in the UK. To me this in a way created a sense of good character of the defendant, successfully creating some doubt as to what the witness had previously said, and whether the defendant’s character was really as bad as the prosecution made it out to be.
Finally, there was a slight Re-Examination by the prosecution. However, it was really interesting to see how involved the judge was in this proceeding. The prosecution indicated if the judge had any questions of their own to ask at the end, and throughout the questioning, the judge was regularly checking what the witness was saying, the progress of the line of questioning and ensuring the procedure was running fairly. I mean this gave quite a lot of confidence that should the case result in a sentencing, then the judge has remained very involved, and gained a clear understanding (hopefully meaning the result will be as fair as possible)
Following on from this came one of the more exciting aspects of court proceedings (primarily for someone watching), the defendant was called to the stand to give evidence!
Once again this started with the Examination-in- Chief from the defence. It was particularly interesting to see first-hand how open ended the questions really have to be. You literally cannot lead the witness into a certain event or train of thought at all. During the questioning of the defendant this was proving to be fairly difficult at times (again regularly corrected by the judge which was a positive). The defence barrister was bringing in the idea that the complainant (the defendant’s wife) would regularly get angry and slap and scratch the defendant. The defence relied upon the fact that the defendant has attended doctor’s appointments after an altercation with his wife, and it was here that the barrister was stopped many times for leading the defendant to talk about a particular incident. Whilst I was listening to the defence counsel, I was thinking how can this question actually be asked! I mean it is clear what event they are wanting the defendant to talk about, but when the defendant just isn’t mentioning it, what do you do? I guess this showed the skill that comes with being a barrister and thinking quickly, as the defence was still able to reach the event that they wanted to talk about.
This part of the hearing brought up another interesting aspect of the criminal justice system, and that was the use of an interpreter for the defendant. Even though the defendant was able to speak a small amount of English, it was specified that every single question and statement made by the barristers and judge, had to be translated by the interpreter, to ensure 100% that the defendant understands the question and understands what answer they are giving. Yes, this does mean the questioning takes twice as long, but I respect how fair the justice system can be.
Once the questioning of the defendant had finished, the barrister referred to a ‘red statement’. I definitely started listening here because this is something I had never seen before. This is a statement that is made by a witness (typically a police officer etc) that has previously been agreed by both the defence and prosecution as fact. Both parties agree that what the witness has said, has definitely happened and there is nothing to dispute on this. Therefore, the barrister simply just reads it out to the jury. It was also exciting (as a law student who has just read this in a textbook) to see the judge giving guidance to the jury before the statement is read, to ensure they treat this statement as just as important as if the witness was on the stand speaking themselves. Here the prosecuting barrister read out a statement made by a police officer in regard to an arrest of the defendant.
After the questioning of the witness and defendant (as well as some legal admin that takes place) it had taken the court right up to lunch time. It was about 1:15PM at this point and this was when the judge finished the proceedings for lunch.
So, those were the main parts of my visit to court that really stuck out to me. Luckily week 1 gave a good range of different elements to discuss. I wonder what will happen next week!