Tales from No.9 Ice House Street

5. The Case of the Eye-Blinking Barrister

Lawyers come up against all kinds of experiences in court. Some of those experiences are pleasantly memorable, others less so, while yet others positively distasteful. The following is an account of one of my past experiences which fell within the third category, although the ending was a happy one. On that occasion, I was defence counsel for a businessman who was charged with having knowingly made a false report to the police. He admitted to having made the report but denied knowing that any part of it was false, as he himself had been misled by a subordinate of his. The trial took place before a magistrate who was a new arrival from England and altogether unknown to me. The prosecution was conducted by a senior European police inspector instead of Crown Counsel. In those days, the Legal Department (subsequently known as AttorneyGeneral ’s Chambers) was said to be regularly understaffed, although, to my knowledge, not a few Crown Counsel were seldom denied their leisure. As I was appearing before this particular magistrate for the first time, I invited the European police officer in charge of the case to join me in calling on and presenting our respects to the magistrate in his chambers before the trial, as was the custom in those days. Accordingly, we requested the magistrate’s clerk to present us to the magistrate in his chambers. However, shortly thereafter, the clerk returned to inform us somewhat surprisingly that the magistrate would not see us in his chambers and would hear what we had to say in court instead. I must say this sounded a little odd. The case proceeded as scheduled. A police witness was called to give The Case of the Eye-Blinking Barrister 5 5 96 TALES FROM NO. 9 ICE HOUSE STREET evidence on the receipt of the report made by the accused, while another police officer described how the falsehood of at least a part of the said report was discovered upon investigation being made. After the prosecution had closed its case, I put my client in the witness box to explain the circumstances under which that false report came to be tendered and his ignorance altogether of its false content. As the accused pursuant to questions put to him by me began telling the court how business was conducted in his company, and who did what from day to day, the magistrate suddenly intervened, and the following unexpected altercation followed between him and me. Magistrate: Mr Yu, I notice you have been blinking your eyes constantly. Do you deny it? I: Indeed I have been doing so, Your Worship, and I see no reason why I should deny it. Magistrate: So you do admit blinking your eyes at the accused? I: In a sense, yes, as I was leading evidence from him. Magistrate: Why!? I: I do not know what Your Worship is driving at. Surely I cannot be expected to look elsewhere other than at my client every time I blink my eyes. Nor am I aware that blinking one’s eyes is not allowed in any court of law. Magistrate: What I am driving at is that you seem to blink your eyes regularly every time you ask your client a question, and I must ask you to stop doing so. I: I am afraid I cannot oblige Your Worship. Blinking my eyes has been an unfortunate habit of mine ever since childhood. Asking questions of the accused has nothing to do with it. Magistrate: I will not tolerate the possibility that by blinking your eyes you could be sending messages to your client in the witness box. I: If Your Worship is genuinely bothered by that possibility, you will have to order me out of Your Worship’s court, and/ or lodge a complaint against me with the Bar Association for blinking my eyes in order to send messages to my client while he was giving evidence. At this point, our distasteful altercation came to an end, and while the magistrate stared hard at me, I stared back while still continuing to blink my eyes, perhaps even more frequently as I habitually do when under pressure, although not deliberately. This silent confrontation lasted some twenty to thirty seconds before the magistrate announced that he would adjourn for fifteen minutes. THE CASE OF THE EYE-BLINKING BARRISTER 97 In the ensuing quarter of an hour and in...