Courtroom TV: ‘There are moments that would make breathtaking television. But victims are the core constituency’

COMPELLING, wasn’t it? BBC Scotland’s recent coverage of the trial of the pair accused of sending parcel bombs to Celtic manager Neil Lennon? Explosive, you might say; or would have been had the whole scheme not been defused at the last minute.

According to a source in the Glasgow legal fraternity, the BBC last month hoped to film Lennon giving his evidence in the trial at the High Court in Glasgow last month. Nothing else, mind; just Lennon saying his piece. Suspecting that the BBC’s motives might not come from a desire to illuminate the wheels of justice, the Court of Session in Edinburgh refused.

However, broadcasters are nothing if not resourceful, as is the legal establishment. There can’t be many professions whose practitioners are so determined to let us see just how tedious their daily labours can be. But lawyers do. Or such seemed a subtext to news that, in for the first time in British legal history, television cameras will be permitted to film a judge passing sentence following a defendant’s conviction for murder.

This Wednesday cameras from Scottish Television will be in the High Court in Edinburgh, as Lord Bracadale, the judge who in 2010 jailed Tommy Sheridan for perjury, passes sentence on David Gilroy, the Edinburgh man convicted last month of murdering former lover Suzanne Pilley. Permission to film was granted by the Lord Justice General, Lord Hamilton, on the basis of “overwhelming public interest” in the case.

Many at the heart of the court process have proclaimed themselves delighted with this week’s developments, perfectly understandably in the context. Lawyers, whether solicitor or QC, do seem to mind the fact that courts are a magnet for cliche. Think law court and you see Rumpole or Perry Mason; you picture tearful breakdowns and wily barristers blowing defences apart. Anyone who has attended a trial knows different, that proceedings are long and slow, methodical and painstaking; less Twelve Angry Men than an Andy Warhol movie.

In this issue, Scotland pipped the UK to the post, it having been announced last month at legislation allowing cameras into English and Welsh courts would be included in the Queen’s Speech at the opening of the 2012/13 parliamentary session in May. As will happen here, the start will be slow and limited, confirmed Keir Starmer, the director of public prosecutions.

“I welcome these moves but very cautiously,” says Martha Rafferty, a criminal law solicitor with Anthony Mahon & Co in Glasgow. “As long as the coverage stays as a single camera shot of the judge giving his summing up, that’s fine.

“More problematic would be showing a whole trial, or even chunks of it, if the trial were ongoing. The first principle of sitting on a jury is that you must not discuss the trial with others. That would be impossible if the trial was coming into peoples’ homes. In those circumstances, the temptation to talk about a case would be overwhelming.”

The lower rungs of the legal establishment have long argued that justice and democracy can only benefit from increased transparency. The problem is that, historically, judges have tended to have a different outlook. Although a stance regarding cameras in the courtroom has never been put explicitly, it’s easy to infer one – that judges worry for the dignity of the courtroom. Cameras bring a threat, however insignificant, of exhibitionism and emotional incontinence: in 2003 the accused Bali bombers were seen on television screaming praise to their god in court and smirking as chilling evidence was read out.

Cameras introduce also technical complications: jury anonymity, the protection of vulnerable witnesses and so forth. Cameras bring unhappy associations too: most memorably OJ Simpson, Michael Jackson, and his doctor, Conrad Murray.

But that was then. Unlike the High Court judge who once famously asked “And what, pray, are Diana Dors?” their lordships do seem to be making a fist of this 21st century malarkey. The judge presiding over the Pilley case, Lord Bracadale, also last year green-lighted tweeting from the final day of the Sheridan perjury trial: “I genuinely think the judges are just not asked enough,” says Steven Raeburn, editor of the legal journal The Firm. “This idea that judges are trapped in the 19th century is quite incorrect. Over the past 20 years they’ve shown themselves perfectly willing to introduce new courtroom technologies, providing the core interests of justice are not hindered.”

And when it comes to letting justice be seen to be done, Scottish Television does have considerable form, having applied previously to televise the appeal hearings of Luke Mitchell, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi and Nat Fraser. The Lord Justice General approved the requests: hypothetically, cameras have been permitted in Scottish courts since 1992, but only if the consent of all parties is given.

On Wednesday, the issue will not apply. Only Lord Bracadale himself, his clerk and the court usher will be allowed to be shown. Given that the mandatory sentence for murder is life imprisonment, the footage is scarcely likely to be a cliffhanger, and neither will it go out live. It will be approved by the judge and by court staff, after which it will be shared with other broadcasters. Much depends on Wednesday’s experiment. If it is seen to have gone well, requests to cover future trials will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

But the outcome may have a more immediate relevance. Windfall Films, a respected production company concentrating on historical and general interest documentaries, has been preparing a series on the Scottish justice system. It’s believed a major element will be excerpts from the retrial later this month of Nat Fraser, the Elgin man who in May won his appeal against conviction for the murder of his wife Arlene. Fraser’s retrial begins on 23 April. Windfall wants to feature footage in its film. The trial judge, Lord Bracadale again, has consented already; approval is awaited from others involved. Fraser himself is the known unknown in this respect, having long demonstrated an unease with the media.

Windfall, meanwhile, refers all enquiries to the Channel 4 press office, which gives out a prepared statement: “Channel 4 have commissioned a documentary series based in the courtrooms of Scotland, providing insight into several cases, into the court process and the people involved. Windfall, who are producing the series, are currently exploring a number of cases to assess their suitability for filming but cannot confirm which trials will be filmed until they actually begin.”

It’s assumed widely that America is the hell to which the road of good intentions has led.

We’re all familiar with the emotional car crashes of American court room scenes.

Raeburn, however, emphasises that court TV has proved as much a learning curve for them as it yet might for us. Although cameras in courts are permitted in California, the Simpson trial in 1995 caused many judges in the state to ban them. Pete Wilson, then governor of California, later added his own opposition and attempted to have restrictions on all electronic media coverage reinstated: “The difficulties with OJ Simpson and Michael Jackson,” he says “had virtually nothing to do with the presence of cameras, those were down to flaws in the judicial system itself. As a result of the televised coverage those flaws were seen and addressed.”

“As someone who came through old-fashioned court reporting but now works in television I’m a bit torn,” says Mark Daly, BBC Scotland’s BAFTA-winning investigations correspondent “On one hand there are moments of drama and confrontation that would make breathtaking television. There were things in the Sheridan trial that had to seen to be believed. So, as a television reporter, I think anything to bring that closer is to be welcomed.

“There is also the judges’ point of view. Courts have a tremendous solemnity, they’re not just places for airing grievances or having battles, they can be very sad and upsetting places. Victims are the core constituency. Would the family of Stephen Lawrence have wanted their tears broadcast around the country? I know they wouldn’t have. And there’s also the issue of national difference. I know of a few judges down south who love nothing more than a full press gallery and who’d no doubt relish the increased attention television would bring. I don’t know if that’s so true in Scotland, I just can’t see the Lord Bracadale Show, for instance. Will just the judge and the QCs be seen? It’s a massive issue and massively important but also massively complicated.

“I suppose we have to start somewhere, though, and it looks like we have.”

• Suzanne Pilley: The Woman Who Vanished, BBC Scotland, Wednesday 10.45pm