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Being there part 2

There are few more agonising experiences than being late for court. It is not something you ever want to allow to happen if you're a barrister - or any other sort of lawyer.

I know what you're thinking. How could this ever possibly happen? How could any barrister ever find himself in a situation where he was late for court? Very occasionally a barrister will be late where it is in some way his fault. Most of the time however it will be a case of the inexplicable or the unexpected intervening.

Apart from one episode which I'll recount within this series (when I will leave it to you to judge whether I was in fact late for court or not!) there have only been two occasions when I was late for court. Neither was really my fault.

The first occurred when I was very junior barrister. As you are supposed to, when I had no court case I was sitting in Chambers hoping that a brief would turn up. It did. It was a trial defending a juvenile in the juvenile court. I received the brief at just before 10 a.m. The trial was supposed to start at 10 a.m.. What had happened was that the solicitors had missed the date in their diary. As the time of trial approached, the anxious father of the juvenile had telephoned the solicitors from court to find out why there was no one there. They rushed the papers off the file round to Chambers, and briefed me for no other reason than that I happened to be available and within five minutes of the court room.

I raced over to court, arriving slightly late. Needless to say this was not my fault. However I was the person who was actually there and therefore the one upon whom the magistrates vented their entirely understandable annoyance. They gave me 15 minutes to speak to the client and take instructions (whilst reading the papers) and then it was into the case. It was not a happy experience.

The other occasion was also a criminal case, one of the last ones that I did before I ceased doing crime completely. I had just finished a fairly long civil trial. This was in Liverpool. When I telephoned Chambers the clerk told me I was back in Liverpool the next day. That was for a reckless driving trial. The brief would be at my home.

I prepared it and went back to Liverpool the next morning. I could not find the case on any of the lists. I went to the listing office and they could find no mention of it. I pointed to the case number on the front of the brief and there in the top right-hand corner it said Preston Crown Court. My then clerk had told me the wrong court. I had to get Preston as quickly as possible, taking care that I was not guilty of reckless driving myself. When I eventually got there the case had been adjourned due to lack of court time as there was no judge available to try it anyway!

Neither of those were pleasant experiences. However I know of one young barrister for whom such an experienced meant that his career ended before it had even really begun. I will explain why next week.

Michael J. Booth QC