The Gazette 1995

GAZETTE

MAY/JUNE 1995

Reporting the Courts

By Kieron Wood*

The recent broadcast on RTE news of

pictures of the Supreme Court in

session brought home to many people

the gulf which separates the legal

profession from the public.

For most people, those pictures of five

Supreme Court judges listening to the

opening of the Abortion Information

Bill reference are the nearest they will

ever get to the courts.

While Article 34.1 of the Constitution

specifies that "save in such special

and limited cases as may be

prescribed by law, (justice) shall be

administered in public", it's a fact that

the vast majority of people in Ireland

have never been inside a courtroom.

Their knowledge of court proceedings

comes from watching Rumpole of the

! Bailey, American TV soaps, the

Simpson

trial and from what they see,

hear and read in the Irish media. All

the more reason, then, for ensuring

that - in the absence of television

cameras from all our courts -

proceedings are reported accurately

and in a form which is easy to

understand.

i It's all too easy for those involved in

| the law - including court reporters -

| to slip into such phrases as "reserved

j judgment" , "interlocutory

injunction", "unlawful carnal

knowledge" or even "jurisdiction" and

to expect the public to understand

what they mean. Most members of the

public don't even know the difference

between a solicitor and a barrister, and

| they wouldn't know

Anton Piller

from

Phyllis Diller!

; As the national broadcasting station,

RTE has a special responsibility to

I cover the courts. But its coverage

I differs from that of the newspapers for

several reasons. First of all, by the

nature of radio and television, time is

of the essence (another legal phrase!).

Whereas the Irish Times may be able

to devote two or three pages to an

exceptionally important case or

judgment, RTE news is restricted to,

| at the most, two and a half minutes for

a television package and perhaps one

and a half minutes for a radio

package. That time is further reduced

| on some bulletins: a story on the

hourly 2FM bulletins would rarely run

longer than 45 seconds, while a story

on the radio News At One would

normally last no more than one

minute. At an average of three words

a second, that's 180 words to report,

perhaps, a judgment that may run to

90 pages - two words per page!

Kieron

Wood

The most outstanding exception to

these fairly inflexible guidelines came

two years ago with the television

interview in the Kilkenny incest case.

;

The woman at the centre of that case

agreed to do an interview the day after

her father was sentenced. The

recorded interview ran for about half

an hour. The television news chief

sub-editor said he would take a three

minute clip, if the content was

i exceptional. The interview was so

harrowing and the interviewee so

j compelling that the piece ran for eight

I and a half minutes as the second story

on the 6.01 TV bulletin. The

extraordinary public reaction - as

evidenced by the number of calls to

RTE's switchboard - pushed the story

into the top slot on the 9 o'clock news

• (an almost unheard-of occurrence) and

the following day it made the front

page of every national newspaper.

But, as a rule, time is tight on news

bulletins, so stories have to be cut

back to the bare essentials. As a

result, there is a certain selectivity of

detail in what can be reported. In

Í criminal trials, for example, the

normal practice is to report the

; opening of the trial, the closing and

the sentence. That means that the

j prosecution case is fully reported

whereas the defence case may not

receive such complete treatment. In

civic cases, often the plaintiff's case

will be more fully covered than the

respondent's. While the newspapers

have a pooling arrangement which

allows them to cover cases from

beginning to end, RTE operates on its

own with - as a rule - one

correspondent (me!) covering all the

courts, from the District Court to the

Supreme Court. That can mean that

cases are missed and it certainly

means that coverage is more restricted

than in the newspapers.

So how are cases chosen for

coverage? Well, some cases are

known about well in advance, such as

the Article 26 reference to the

! Supreme Court. Other cases -

particularly criminal cases - are

followed through from arrest to the

court of trial (and possible the Court

of Criminal Appeal), with the

remand dates being noted in the

news desk diary throughout, so

I that an eye can be kept on the progress

of the case.

The Legal Diary is an invaluable mine

i of material and is scanned avidly each

morning, with well-known names

being underlined as a possible source

of stories. Occasionally solicitors or

counsel will tip off journalists about

forthcoming cases.