Everything is not as it seems – it’s worse

Most of us go through our lives, especially in Britain, assuming that the police only arrest people who have done something wrong, you only end up in the dock if you are guilty and that if you are innocent nothing bad will ever happen to you. Stories of the Law and How it’s Broken by the Secret Barrister will quickly disabuse you of all these ideas and show you that the idea that you are innocent until proven guilty is a myth rather than a reality. The Secret Barrister is a pseudonym for a currently practising lawyer who believes, and sets out to show, that the system is so broken that anyone could be charged and even convicted for things they haven’t done. It’s a scary book.

Most of our understanding of the law comes from TV programmes (usually American) and press coverage. This means that we undoubtedly harbour a series of misconceptions about Legal Aid, police forensic work, how courts work and the fairness of the system. The author takes us through the process from crime to conviction and shows how the lack of investment in the legal system means that evidence is not always fully tested, the police may look for an easy arrest, paperwork is often submitted late so that your advocate may not have full knowledge of the case against you, you may be held on remand for a considerable period of time, your case can take years to get to the courts and even if you do win you may be considerably out of pocket. To illustrate this s/he uses examples from their own practice and those we read about in the newspapers.

Given these shortcomings in the legal process we cannot be absolutely sure that all convictions are sound despite the best efforts of most of the people working in the system. The dysfunctionality of the whole process also allows those of bad faith and who may be incompetent to continue to work. It makes victims of people who are caught up in a situation not of their making and may even bankrupt them.

This is a book designed to make people take action and to inform those of us who live in a comfortable bubble that everything is not as it seems. It’s not a comfortable read and it’s not designed to be. I do think, however, that it’s an important one.