Order of the Bath

Like many others, when I need relaxation I turn to crime fiction. In fact there are so many of us that I am surprised that all crime in Oxford has not already been solved by Morse and Kate Ivory between them and that there is any one left in the Midsomer district, the residents all having been murdered or locked up.

What struck me as strange is that when our cases come to court we suddenly cross the bench and abandon the police and investigators who have brought the suspect before the jury. Now our heroes are the defence lawyers. We loved Perry Mason and Kavanagh. I can think of two reasons why this may be.

Assuming that we are innocent, if we are wronged then we would want the trusty PI or PC to find out who done it. However, if for some reason we are accused then it is the lawyer who is on our side to put things right.

Secondly, and what makes for a better story, was highlighted by Michael Connelly (The Lincoln Lawyer Orion:2005 ISBN 0-75287-955-3). He says (paraphrased)

The scariest client a lawyer will ever have is an innocent client. With a guilty client you do your best for them but with an innocent client there is no acceptable verdict but Not Guilty.

And this is the excitement of the story, very much related to our own fears of ending up in this situation, we are hanging on for the truth to be revealed and the accused to walk free.

Of course life is not like that, the innocent are always scarred by crime. Even if acquitted, they have probably lost their job, savings and reputation in the intervening period so we must depend on the investigators to get it right in the first place. By the time the lawyers get involved, it is too late.

This entry was posted on 6 May 2006 at 11:28 by Rick and is filed under Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.