A day in court that actually went my way? What?

[JKmadu619]

Did you know you can just walk into the courthouse and watch court cases? I thought this was crazy, but apparently not, considering me and a few recently made friends just walked in and watched some civil cases.
Apparently one picked up a tip from one of his friend's mom or somethin'. We left before a major murder trial though. Figured it was the wrong place to be considering they would need to pat us down, put us through a metal detector, we would need to hear in great detail every part of the murder, and we would be in the same room as a killer.
Everything about staying for that case seemed akward.

Staff there can also give you a tour if you ask for it at the public relations desk. I never knew that, so I just thought I'd share this with you guys. If you're too broke for a night at the movies, an amazing amount of drama goes down at the courthouse for free. Although during major cases you will have to go through a metal detector (Or for all cases in major cities.) I mean we watched a divorce settlement, a drunk driver get fined, and a lawsuit. Simply badassed, and best of all, with me and my friend's homeschooling program we could simply write a journal entry about our trip and it actually justified a whole day of schoolwork! Haha. What a freaking awesome day.

- Justin

[Kitty.]

Wow that's pretty neat!

[MegaMadness]

I wanna go to this. It sounds fun

[bitesize]

It can be fun, but it can be horrifying boring. When I was sixteen my class spent a week doing different things in Dublin, one of which involved visitng the four courts. All I remember is an hour of deathly monotonous boredom.

[JKmadu619]

bitesize: It's like a movie theater. There's usually a huge board telling you what cases are happening. You're school probably chose a boring case as to not offend anyone with something like a drug or gang case.

I personally was thrilled. It was all so exciting considering I had never been in the courthouse before. There's like sheriffs who are kind of like police officers who only work in the courthouse, and who transport criminals from court to prision every night. My friend (Who wants to go into frenensics when he's older, therefore Police are god's on earth to him, he's the one who set the trip up actually) and he asked them a pile of questions about his job, weapons, ect. I was amazed at the pateience they had.

We actually found a judge who was walking to his lunch break. Wearing the robe, cuffs and shoulder pads. My other friend adressed him by "M'lord" because she heard a lawyer use it earlier. The judge laughed and explained outside of courtrooms he didn't want to be known as a judge. He said "Would you call someone a carpenter outside of his office? No, that'd be akward."
He answered about a dozen questions about all sorts of crap.

Overall I was amazed at how nice everyone was. Overall I know alot about going to court, and the courthouse, at leat more than I knew yesterday.

- Justin

[bitesize]

Originally Posted by JKmadu619

bitesize: It's like a movie theater. There's usually a huge board telling you what cases are happening. You're school probably chose a boring case as to not offend anyone with something like a drug or gang case.

Hah no, other classes got to watch interesting things...I think we just picked a courtroom at random at the end of our tour.

[Snufkin]

Every sheriff court is open to the public, because it's a legal right that the public get to see justice served. This will probably differ from country to country, I suppose.

Justice isn't always an exciting affair, mind you. And sheriff courts (in Scotland) don't hold large trials. The most exciting thing I've seen was an assault case with 27 witnesses. Went on for a few days. Seen a few sentences for drug dealing/possession as well.

Having to report on cases here can be a tad irritating as well. Recording technology is forbidden so it's all done in shorthand. Fun times.

[Heartlines.]

Whoa, I didn't know that.
It actually sounds like fun though. :]