COURTS

Bail

King Richard III (d.1485) introduced bail to the English legal system.

The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division

The Court of Criminal Appeal was established in the wake of a severe miscarriage of justice that involved Adolf Beck, a Norwegian. He had been mistaken for William Weiss, who had claimed to be John Smith.

Website: www.gov.uk/courts-tribunals/court-of-appeal-criminal-division

Criminology

Henry Fielding's Treatise On Robbery (1751) has been described as the founding document of criminology.

F***ing Losers

It had been claimed that upon one occasion a judge sentenced a convicted criminal, who promptly called him A f***ing loser. The judge replied, When this court rises I shall return home, enjoy a dry sherry, a welcoming dinner, and the company of my wife, followed by a good night's sleep in a warm bed. On the other hand, you will be taken on a bumpy ride to a grey police cell, fed a meal of minimal enjoyment, and sleep on a hard bed behind steel bars. So which of us is the f***ing loser?

Language

In the wake of the Black Death there a number of social changes. In 1362 it was declared that English would be used in the courts and the following year in Parliament.

Magistrates' Courts

Website: www.judiciary.uk/you-and-the-judiciary/going-to-court/magistrates-court www.magistrates-association.org.uk

Bow Street Magistrates Court

In medieval and early modern times law enforcement was handled primarily at the parish level. In London there was a system of parish watch-houses. As the city expanded westwards a new lawlessness became evident. During the course of the 18^thC, it became apparent that the old system was unable to maintain order in the newer West End. Therefore, a system of stipendiary magistrates was set up. In 1740 Colonel Thomas de Veil became the first Bow Street magistrate. He opened his office and court at No. 4.

Henry Fielding was a trained barrister. He was also one of the first novelists. His output included Joseph Andrews (1742) and Tom Jones (1749). In 1748 he was appointed as the Bow Street stipendiary magistrate. He secured the position because of the services that he had rendered as a political writer for the 4^th Duke of Bedford, who owned much of Covent Garden. Fielding was the first magistrate to hold the office who thought beyond his own capacity to make the position return an income. He established the Bow Street Runners, which acted as an early form of police force.

Fielding died in 1754 but his work was continued and extended by his half-brother Sir John Fielding. As a child the latter had had poor eyesight and had become blind as a young adult. He expanded Henry's information circulation scheme, first to the London area and then to the whole country. Amongst those who appeared before the younger Fielding was Casanova, with whom he was able to converse in Italian.

When Covent Garden fruit and vegetable market was operating, some of the market porters, having finished working through the night and having been to the early morning pubs, used to crowd into the court to see if there were any cases that were of interest to them.

Bow Street used to handle all extradition cases. It dealt with Spain's 1998 request for General Pinochet, the former Chilean dictator. However, the final decision in the matter was taken by the Home Secretary.

In 1992 Covent Garden Police Station closed. The Magistrates Court continued to function until 2006. Its functions were transferred to the City of Westminster Courts in Horseferry Road. In 2020 it was announced that the 1881 building was to become the Bow Street Police Museum.

Location: 4 Bow Street, WC2E 7AS (purple, red)

Lord Mansfield

If the 18^thC judge Lord Mansfield believed that barristers were waffling he would take out a newspaper and read it.

Location: Bloomsbury Square, WC1B 4DA. His home. (red, brown)

Westminster Hall, The Palace of Westminster, SW1A 0AA (purple, yellow)

Miscarriages of Justice

Ludovic Kennedy

Ludovic Kennedy (1919-2009) was born the son of a naval officer who had been subjected to unfair court-martial and the grandson of a professor of law. As a child he developed an admiration for the legal system through immersing himself in volumes of Notable British Trials. His work as a journalist led to a process of disillusionment setting in. The hanging of Derek Bentley, who had an I.Q. of 66, for participating in the murder of a policeman, completed the process. It prompted him to write Murder Story (1954), a play that ran in the West End.

It was reputed that upon one occasion Lord Chief Justice Lane and Kennedy encountered one another. They spoke civilly. His lordship remarked that he believed that he was under impression that he had seen Ludo upon a golf course in Scotland. This triggered the reply, Not me, I was n t there a case of mistaken identity.

The Old Bailey - The Central Criminal Court

The Crown Court has a number of seats throughout England and Wales. Its London site is the Old Bailey or Central Criminal Court. The cases that are heard there are usually criminal in character. However, it also accepts others from elsewhere in the country. The Old Bailey is the only court complex in Britain that is financially maintained by a local authority.

The building is topped by a gilt sculpture of a Justice (1907) holding her scales of justice. However, she is not blindfolded - justice is meant to be blind.

Location: 32 Old Bailey, EC4M 7HS (blue, red)

Website: www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/about-us/law-historic-governance/central-criminal-court

The Press Yard

One of Newgate Prison's yards was known as the Press Yard. This was because, if a prisoner refused to plead, s/he was taken to the yard where s/he was secured in a frame. On the upper portion of this was a flat surface. Stones were placed on this successively until either s/he pled or died. The practice was ended in 1772.

The Royal Courts of Justice

The Royal Courts building houses two of the three branches of the Supreme Court - the High Court and the Court of Appeal. The cases heard within it are usually civil in character. The entrance to the building regularly serves as a backdrop for television news stories about major lawsuits.

From the late 13^thC until the 19^thC, the chief courts of English law sat in Westminster Hall during the legal term. Out of term, they sat at a variety of other places. The Palace of Westminster burned down in 1834. Subsequently, it was decided the superior courts should be relocated so that they should be nearer to the Inns of Court. The Royal Courts of Justice (1882) in the Strand were built to provide permanent year-round accommodation. The 1000-room, G.E. Street-designed complex was paid for with Chancery funds that had not been claimed. There are 60 court rooms. The site stretches back to Carey Street. 350m bricks were used in its construction. (The facility received the courts that had been housed previously in Westminster Hall, Lincoln's Inn, and the Doctors Commons.)

In 1880 the pressure imposed by building the Royal Courts contributed to the death of Street. That he had died prematurely is indicated by the way in which his corpse was interred in Westminster Abbey. He was the only architect who had not been knighted to receive this posthumous distinction.

In 2003 12% of the complex was taken up by court rooms.

In the late 2010s there were over 200 judges working in the Royal Courts of Justice and its satellite buildings. There were 100 courts.

Location: Strand, WC2A 2LL (red, blue)

Website: www.theroyalcourtsofjustice.com

Badminton

It is believed by some that, when the building is closed to the public, its high-ceilinged Central Hall has sometimes used as a badminton court by people who work there.

See Also: SPORTS Badminton

Website: www.badmintonengland.co.uk

The Supreme Court

The setting up of the Supreme Court was done at the wish of Tony Blair and Lord Chancellor Falconer, both of whom had worked as barristers.

In 2009 the Supreme Court occupied the Middlesex Guildhall. The Art nouveau Gothic building has three court rooms.

Location: Parliament Square, SW1P 3BD (blue, yellow)

Website: www.supremecourt.uk

Law Lords

Tom Bingham

Tom Bingham (1933-2010) served as the Master of the Rolls, Lord Chief Justice of England, and a law lord. He was a figure who became more radical as his career progressed. He was involved in a series of rulings that sought to roll back the executive's attempts to use counterterrorism legislation as a means by which to extend itself.

Syd Vicious

Sydney Templeman (1920-2014) grew up in Middlesex. As a child he an avid reader. At the age of twelve, after having read a number of Dickens's novels, he decided to become a lawyer. He was a successful barrister, who was appointed to the bench and who eventually became a law lord. As a judge he had a reputation for not suffering any counsel whose argument he regarded as being without substance. This led to his being dubbed Syd Vicious . Upon one occasion in the Lords, he dealt peremptorily with a lead counsel and then inquired of the Q.C.'s junior whether he wished to speak. The reply came No, my lord. Not without a helmet. Away from the bench, Templeman was a genial soul.

David Backhouse 2024