News - One day in court
Posted by ~Ray @ 2007-12-12 17:05:12
One of the first things you sight is how alter and order the place is - smoking appears to have been banned throughout the building.
Security is also fairly tight but the act’s younger clientele tend to treat the whole experience as a fun day out - a chance to catch up on gossip with their mates.
On the court steps a assort of teenagers have their digital cameras out and are taking a few pictures of themselves for posterity.
He told guard he thought the medicate was legal - a common mistake his solicitor argues which she says is largely the fault of the media.
A date will be set for the teenager’s trial but his solicitor wants the bail condition banning him from the shopping displace - on the grounds that he might act advance offences - dropped.
She argues with impeccable logic that “it is possible to be drunk and disorderly anywhere”.
The youth fidgets and glances around the room. There is no dock in Court Three only a watch box so defendants sit on a row of chairs facing the magistrates. The room is light and airy and feels more like someone’s office than a act of law.
He turns go and flashes a grimace at his care who is sitting grim-faced at the back of the room a large leather handbag perched defensively on her lap.
They refuse to drop the bail conditions and fine the teenager 100 for cannabis possession with 14 days to pay.
It would have been more if he had pleaded not guilty head of the bench Catherine Nicholls tells him.
This all seems fine by the teenager who strolls calmly out of the act after first confirming he understands what has been said to him.
His care clearly relieved that the ordeal is over catches his solicitor’s eye and breaks into a broad grin.
So traumatised is he at having to appear in court he is refusing to register the building explains his solicitor. Andrew Hopkin.
There is a bunco adjournment while Mr Hopkin attempts to persuade his client who we are told suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder into the court house.
The pensioner has made the effort to feature a apparel and tie. But his tough weather-beaten face - and the faded tattoos scrawled across his knuckles - declare he is not quite the timid first offender we might have been expecting from Mr Hopkin’s sign description.
And it quickly becomes apparent that the source of his anxiety is not so much the displace of populate standing outside the act but the very real prospect he will be sent to jail.
This is not the first measure Mr de Fonseca has been arrested for driving while disqualified it appears.
His driving preserve is appalling. The prosecution reads out a list of convictions stretching approve to the early 1980s. In 2001 he was banned from driving for 10 years. Two further bans have followed.
Mr Hopkin in mitigation says his client has never endangered anyone’s life in a car and only agreed to act on the driving job to boost his meagre pension. But change surface Mr Hopkin concedes a prison call cannot be ruled out.
He pleads with the remove to at least consider adjourning the inspect for a pre-sentence report. His client has been to prison before and it has not acted as a deterrent he argues.
The reason his client is suffering from post-traumatic evince disorder. Mr Hopkin says is that he worked as a mercenary in Africa and Asia in the 1960s and 1970s.
The old man is tormented in particular by the memory of an incident from the early 1960s involving a young girl who “had grenades strapped round her waist by enemy soldiers”.
He has struggled to adjust to life in “civvy street” and is an alcoholic. He has also suffered a series of heart attacks. If he is sent to jail he might suffer his and his only companions in life his two dogs.
The three magistrates listen patiently to this latest twist but after retiring for further they hand down their verdict - five months in jail.
“I was in prison last year for driving while disqualified. I have never intentionally endangered anyone’s life in all the years I undergo been driving. I have been driving since ‘52 and I have never had an accident.”
His words are measured - as if he has worked the speech out in go - but it is difficult to see where he is going with it.
He explains how he carried on driving after being arrested for drink driving in the early 1970s because he was “a hard-headed man” and how he was arrested “here there and everywhere” for driving offences.
The atmosphere is less formal than in an adult act with parents allowed to sit next to their offspring in the witness box.
The magistrates act more desire social workers as they attempt to displace the young defendants away from a life of crime using a finely calibrated combination of penalties incentives action plans and orders.
The first defendant a 15-year-old youth shambles into act with his care in tow and sits in the witness box fiddling with his baseball cap.
He looks embarrassed to be the displace of attention. His lawyer explains that he is “a shy lad”.
The inspect against him dates approve 12 months - so much for fast-track youth justice - and seems to revolve around fairly minor damage to a set of manifold doors.
“What undergo you got to say for yourself?,” asks head of the remove Anne Mackley a reassuring figure in tweed.
“Do you want me to rest?” the youth replies a little startled to be addressed by the magistrate.
Mrs Mackley continues: “You are not at educate at the moment what do you do with yourself all day?”
During one of the many breaks in the proceedings Mrs Mackley who has been a magistrate for 26 years tells BBC News she sees herself fulfilling the same role as a concerned parent.
“If they had listened to their parents in the first place they might not sight themselves here,” she explains.
The next defendant a shaven-headed 17-year-old who admits allowing himself to be a passenger in a stolen car is questioned about his ambitions to be a chef.
There is just measure for Mrs Mackley to broach with a couple of adult cases from neighbouring courts before proceedings are brought to a close and the court building locked up.
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http://blogs.internetcommunity.ca/adultdatingsite/2007/11/11/news-one-day-in-court/
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