Chris Daw QC writes
A judge’s final remarks were broadcast for the first time. This should be the start of opening up
One evening in June 1994 – my first year as a criminal barrister – I arrived home from court, turned on the news and found myself watching something extraordinary, not only in the annals of crime but in the history of broadcasting.
OJ Simpson was being pursued by the police on a California highway, broadcast live from a television news helicopter. Eventually, 20 police cars joined the chase before Simpson reached his home in suburban Los Angeles, where he was arrested and later charged with two counts of first degree murder.
The high drama of the chase was just the beginning. Every moment of the legal process, including the enthralling jury trial, was captured on camera and broadcast live to the world. This was open justice in its most extreme form; nothing hidden, no broadcast editing or delays. Everyone had an opinion about the case but, in the end, only 12 opinions mattered. It took the jury just four hours to find Simpson not guilty.
The verdict was highly controversial and opinion remains divided to this day, but at least we were all able to watch the evidence unfold for ourselves, without the filter of selectivity. For me, for all the flaws of the US justice system, the televising of the Simpson trial was a huge advance for transparency and public engagement.
By the time of that verdict, I was almost two years into my career as a criminal defence barrister. Almost three decades later, now wearing a silk gown rather than the rough cotton of my junior robes, I still ply my trade in the criminal courts, often in cases making headlines around the world.
I have become increasingly frustrated and angered at the disparity between what happens in court in front of my eyes and what is reported in the media. I frequently watch or read reports of my cases that simply bear no relationship to the evidence presented or the judgments reached. The law and the evidence are mispresented, key details are distorted or omitted altogether; the picture painted by reporters is often simply wrong.
The problem is then compounded by news outlets further distorting the events in court, based on secondhand reporting by journalists who were nowhere near the courtroom. This is journalistic Chinese whispers of the most dangerous and damaging kind, distorting public perception of why a verdict was reached or a particular sentence was passed.
We are at an all-time low in public confidence in the justice system, with almost daily calls for “soft judges” to be sacked or for the law to be changed in response to verdicts and sentences, which are not even properly explained in the media, let alone widely understood. When the public no longer trusts the courts to deliver justice, one of the vital pillars of a functioning democratic society is undermined. Our politicians, the present government more than most, ride every populist wave towards harsher, more irrational policies.
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