What do you do when you have a spare few hours inbetween lectures...take a group of five friends and go to the Crown Court of Winchester. Originally we were looking for the magaistrates court, but low and behold we end up walking into the Crown Court. There we were greeted by two secruity guards, a scanner (similar to one you would find in an airport) and the constant beeping of the alarm. I think this could of been caused by the fact everyone was wearing a belt, but never the less we had passed security and had to make a decision of which court we should go too.
After the helpful advice of the lady at reception we decended upon Court Four with anticipation and wondering who would be the first person placed in front of the judge for contempt of court. After cramming into a lift I thought we would end up gettting stuck in, we ended up outside Court Four's veiwing gallery. We walked in not knowning what to expect. The jury started to fill in aswe were sitting down and we found the usual suspects: The judge, the defence, the prosecution and the defendant. Before the proceedings began the judge explained how one of the jurors had been dismissed as they were friend's with the defendant's father from what I could gather.
Then the proceeding began with testomony from a Forensic Scientist. As the questioning from the prosecution began a note was revelaed, which was revelaed as a death threat. So the question that came to mind instantly was: Was this the ongoing proceeding of a murder trial?
As the questioning continued we found out that there was three different set of DNA imprint of the notes, one set belonging to the defendant as suggesting upon by the Forensic Scientist. The odds of the imprints not belonging to the defendant were described by the Scientist as "very slim" and that only 400 people in the whole of The United Kingdom would have the same set of Alleles as the defendant.
The defence then started their failed attempt of trying to question and exploit the reliablity of the forensic results of the note. However from the questioning that had been carried out by the prosecution, the amount of overwhelming evidence was overbarring against the defence who evidence appeared to be very limited at best. We left after the second testemony and I could honestly say I was gripped by the case and was in complete awe of the amount of news that could of came out of this one case.
Unfortunatly prior engagements left me unable to attend the session at Pizza Hut afterwards, even though I was given the full details about Ali and the spoonful of Humous (very graphic by the sounds of it) and the now infamous squash downing contest. However two things can be said for the day at Winchester Crown court, we all survived without any formal prosecution and I have become hooked into the world of court reporting.
great stuff - I really like this
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