Court Observation

My report on court room observation focuses on observations from two courts, Slough Magistrates court in the Thames Valley area and the Central Criminal court most commonly known as the Old Bailey which is a Crown court in London. Courts are held in order to resolve local disputes and maintain order in society this is an ongoing process which started over six hundred years ago. Although there has been literature outlining the differences between judges and magistrates in each court, I have found it difficult to find in-depth information on their actions. Therefore the aim of the court room observations was to find out the main differences between each type of court and most importantly to answer the question 'to what extent each judge or magistrate's actions influences a case in both types of court'. The attitudes and demeanour of the defendant and how the defence interacts with other actors in the court was also observed.

Before attending, each court was contacted in order to find out the times and cases that could be attended as some cases such as youth cases are not open to the public. Slough Magistrates court was visited on 21st March and old Bailey was attended was visited on 4th April. Upon arrival at both courts we had to report to the ushers who were dressed in black gowns in the magistrate court and white shirts and grey trousers in the Old Bailey. The ushers organised the case throughout each court and kept us and others informed of any progress of specific cases and checked that defendants and lawyers were present and ready to attend court.

A duty solicitor was present at the magistrate court and was only available to a defendant who was accused of an imprisonable offence or if the defendant was already in custody. There were also volunteers known as Magistrate court witness service volunteers who aim was to make the experience of giving evidence as stress free as possible by reassured witnesses by providing them and their supporters with advice, support and information to assist them with practical and emotional impact of attending court and giving evidence. This involves providing information on the court procedure and layout, familiarising themselves with the court, explaining any legal jargon and listening and emphasising with victims concerns and anxieties.

The Magistrate court appeared to be of a safe, secure and friendly environment which is important as some individuals may feel nervous of the thought of giving evidence. Tea and coffee was available and magazines and pay phones were within the suite. This is known as witness support service. The majority of court cases were delayed. The cases were to start at 10.00am, however, we were told that delays occur due to the defendant and their legal team arriving at court unprepared and this was most common for follow up appearances.

We found that the job of the magistrates was to give out sentences in magistrate courts, for the majority of cases there were three magistrates who sat together on panel. The three magistrates were 'lay' persons who were neither professional judges nor are they lawyers and like the jury are persons from the local community and work as a part time job. I found this information very disturbing because they were not familiar with the law as they kept referring to a clerk who was positioned directly in front of them, to state the law from time to time, however, it has been stated that Magistrates value their independence and state that their experience and common sense makes the system work (Parker et al.1989). The magistracy also appeared to be dominated by white middle-class and middle aged individuals, however, at present the magistracy is 'approaching ethnic representativeness of the population at a national level but with substantial local variations, so that, in areas where there are large minority ethnic groups, such as London, the local bench may not reflect that' (Auld 2001). During April 2003, it was noted that there were 28,334 'lay' magistrates in England and Wales, with 14,392 men and 13,952 women (Davies,Croall, Tyrer, 2005). In recent years there has been an increase in the number of 'stipendiary' magistrates who are paid magistrates and are qualified lawyers, during January 2002 there were 95 district judges in post and are more commonly