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Talking Heads

This country does not televise trials, although some tentative initial steps towards introducing the TV cameras to the court room have already been made. If and when it happens, lawyers will have to learn to live with the existence of the cameras.

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United States

It is a very different story in the United States. Cameras are already in the court room. There can be few people who did not at some stage see a clip of film from the O.J. Simpson trial. Some will have seen rather more than that. (There were a lot of people who watched a lot of the coverage but were curiously shy about admitting it. You would get people who would say they had watched the odd bit would then be able to recite copious amounts of the evidence).

One of the features of the coverage was that they actually had legal people commenting on the performance of the lawyers. Speeches, cross-examination, whatever. They were known as the "talking heads".

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Vincent Bugliosi

One of my favourite legal books is a book called "Outrage: the Five Reasons Why O.J. Simpson Got Away with Murder" by Vincent Bugliosi. You will have gathered from the title that Mr Bugliosi is not one to mince his words. He writes clearly, interestingly, and with the confidence of one who knows what he's talking about when it comes to trials. He had an outstanding record as a prosecutor, perhaps his most notable trial and success being the Charles Manson murders.

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Talking heads

In his book Bugliosi was dismissive of the judgment and expertise of the "talking heads". He pointed out that many were law professors or tutors. This made them expert in the law, but how many trials had they undertaken? Usually none. Knowing about the law does not make you know about tactics, questions, procedure.

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Football opinions

Of course lack of experience or expertise does not generally stop people having strong opinions about things they follow on the television. In the long-running (and largely unsuccessful) England football saga, virtually everyone, including lawyers who have not kicked a football for 30 years (and possibly who only see matches on television), has their own firm idea as to which players the manager should pick and the formation he should play them in.

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In principle, a good idea

As long as suitable protections are in place to safeguard the interests of justice, I think that in principle televising court proceedings is a good idea. Justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done. (Although in the memorable phrase, J. B. Morton once said that in England Justice must not only be seen to be done, it must be seen to be believed). However, like many other lawyers, I think that having people commentate on television about your performance would take some getting used to. Particularly if they were people who had never conducted hearings, and so perhaps could not fully understand what you were trying to do and why.

Mind you, they say what goes around comes around. Perhaps one day we will have football coaches discussing the court performance of lawyers, with all the know-how and expertise that the lawyers display when it is the other way around.

Michael J. Booth QC