This blog aims to tell you a little more about what Atomic Law offers you and why. The Magistrates’ Court is a straightforward, common sense, and time constrained place. It is a world away from the complex Judge and Jury system of the Crown Court, which is reserved for complex and serious cases. Most driving offences will be dealt with at the Magistrates’ Court as the law is relatively simple, the facts are often relatively simple. This simplicity means these courts are entirely suitable for people to represent themselves when pleading guilty to these simple offences.
The Magistrates either have a trained lawyer to advise them, or are lawyers, and will therefore ask the pertinent questions to make the legal decisions they have to make. Providing you go into court understanding what you need to get across to fully inform the Court of all the relevant facts, both about the offence and your personal life, you will get the best result possible. A frequent thought I have had when in court is “there is nothing quite as powerful as the client representing themselves”.
The authenticity, emotion, and sheer connection to the case that someone representing themselves can give is something that is hard for a lawyer to replicate, and cannot be understated. The ability to say clearly what a shorter ban for drink driving, what “exceptional hardship” would be encountered by others if you were banned, or what happened in your life which prevented you from telling the police who was driving your car, is powerful and compelling.
Whilst waiting to address a court on another matter, I once saw a man pleading guilty to drink driving offence. This man had an amount of alcohol in his system that would have (according to the Magistrates’ Sentencing Guidelines) led to a 16 month ban.
This man was a Builders Merchant’s delivery driver, and he had his manager tell the court that if the the driver could be banned for no more than 12 months, he could keep his job. The manager said the guy was such a good and conscientious worker, that he would employ him in the yard for a up to a year, and then put him back to delivering. This was this man’s first brush with the law, and the offence had been caused through some severe personal circumstances.
There was a break in the proceedings, and I took the liberty of approaching the driver and offering to give him some pointers. I could see he had plenty of relevant information in his head and just needed some help with structure to get all the salient points across to the court. These unique, and persuasive, facts, when delivered in a structured way that the Magistrates could easily digest, allowed the Court to practice some discretion and deliver a punishment that was both punitive and compassionate.
There were two key factors, in my opinion, in achieving this result. Firstly, the powerful message delivered to the court of a person speaking for themselves, presenting for themselves, and just trying to put a bad incident behind them and get on with their life. Secondly, the efficient and effective packaging of all the relevant facts, both from the incident and the driver’s life, that allowed the court to depart from the guidelines and deliver a compassionate punishment. That formula is something I believe I can deliver to you.