Today I went to see if my burglar would turn up in court, and to see how he'd plea. I've never seen him before so now knowing what he looks like doesn't seem like a big legal problem to me.
After sitting through a few previous cases, and just before my burglar's one was about to start, the Court Clerk was a little perturbed that two "witnesses" would be watching proceedings. (The other "witness" was the person who saw an unknown person leave my premises, and who followed that person, called the police, and was there when they were apprehended.) After some discussion with the Prosecutor the latter came over and said that if we stayed it could cause problems, and the case might be thrown out. As neither of us wanted any reason for the case to proceed we agreed to leave. The prosecutor did say that the defendant was going to plead Not Guilty and the case would go on to Crown Court. This information was really all I went to the Magistrate's Court for, as well as to see how justice was actually carried out in this country.
Up until the point that Court Clerk raised the issue of me being there I thought that anyone could sit in on any court case that they liked (ignoring the national security special cases). I just don't understand why I, who was almost out of the country at the time of the burglary, so have no idea who the accused is, couldn't sit in court as a member of the public and watch what happened.
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