Wednesday 25 February 2009

R is for rectitude


Rectitude - n - correctness of judgment



I am no stranger to pro bono work, did 2 years of it during LLB and thoroughly enjoyed it. However, my BVC pro bono is not quite so, er, how shall I say, er, straightforward, in fact it's a minefield and the clients are all (well ok, nearly all) stark raving mad. Perhaps they all come out of the woodwork when it's my pro bono day?

Today was no exception to a 'normal' day's pro bono. The first client looked ok, quite normal in fact, apart from her eyes, which were wide and wild. Having lost her court case at first instance, this lady was in the mood for battle. Not at all thwarted by the somewhat dismal and very conclusive judgment against her, pro bono client is now going to expand her litigation and sue, the solicitor who represented her, the barrister who represented her, the CAB who are giving her bad advice "all the time", the expert witness who's report was "wrong".

The thing is, I do like to enter these things with an open mind, but time after time, the same theme seems to crop up - "conspiracy". Pro bono client didn't loose the case because it had no merit, no, no, no, it was lost because it is all a conspiracy against her, from the judge to the usher, "they're all in on it you know, no I can't give you my name, no you cannot ask what the case was about, because you are in on it too and will inform the other side of my cunning plan for appeal".

The second client looked dodgy from the word go. Another conspiracy theorist, wanted to bring a private criminal prosecution against Woolies for making all of those people redundant. No he didn't work for them, in fact had no connection with Woolworths at all, but he couldn't tell me too much because it involved top secret intellectual property that somehow was connected to making all those people redundant. Had a quick ask around the office and no-one had Stella Rimmington's telephone number to hand, so I sent him to the CAB instead.

Third client was quite normal, apart from the fact that he had been sent to prison for no good reason, but it was something to do with changing the television channel with a pen? No I couldn't work it out either, but was too exhausted to ask:-)

I'm now going to have a little lie down.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

My Dear Maid,

Some PB Clients are indeed Bizzare - you seem to have had more than your fair share of them!!

I once encountered a client who wanted to sue the local Ambulance Station in negligence for its consistent failure to meet its response times. Whilst it initially appeared that he might have something of a case, it transpired that , in dialing 999 at LEAST four times an hour, 24 hours a day in perpetuity , only to meet the wired and exhausted crews at his doorstep with a stopwatch, appallingly RUDE good health and comments to the effect that "Well, you are 27 SECONDS F**king LATE, AGAIN" ( more intense expletives deleted) he was making an extreme nuisance of himself. When this was tactfully pointed out to him, he gave us all a mouthful, muttered something his PERSONAL and Public RESPONSIBILITY to TRAIN the crews to turn up on time a responsibility that we plainly failed to comprehend, and sacked us on the spot.
You really DO have to love this job, sometimes......

Swiss Tony said...

Blimey BM, what do you do to attract these nutters?

Are you sure its them and not you?

Can you let me know next time you are on call, because I might just be able to send some people your way for advice.

Swizz

TheFatBigot said...

Oh yes, you have enjoyed a nice selection of nutters. But nothing out-nuts a nutter who pursues one of these hopeless claims and pays for it in real money (no Legal Aid or contingency fees).

I had a few over the years, fortunately only a few. My favourite was the man who kept a log of his next-door neighbours' movements. Books and books of logs were exhibited to his home-drawn affidavit supporting an application for an injunction. He required an injunction because the neighbours were unstable and dangerous.

He knew they were unstable and dangerous because one week they would take the rubbish out at 8pm and the next week it was 8.15, then 8 again, then 7.45. The highpoint of his argument was that people capable of such unreliability in their personal habits must also be capable of acts of the gravest depravity and violence.

Oh, and sometimes they had yoghurts delivered with the milk but there was no pattern to it. He provided pages of (inaccurate) statistical analysis to show their yoghurt consumption was suspiciously random.

The judge knew exactly what the score was and nodded along sagely as I heaped praise upon my client's diligence. "Yes, Mr Bigot, it is an act of rare dedication to find a litigant who has made his case so fully and clearly in writing. I am enormously grateful for the trouble he has gone to to assist me."

He then turned to my opponent and said, with a wry smile, that he was minded to accept all Mr Nutter's evidence and hear argument on a narrow and technical point of law, any relevant rebuttal evidence to follow the decision on the point of law. Of course that point of law was that none of it disclosed anything resembling a cause of action.

He gave a lengthy judgment in which my client's diligence and helpfulness to the cause of justice were lauded for all to hear and his hopeless application was dismissed with indemnity costs in the most charming way. Mr Nutter couldn't have been happier. He had an official stamp of approval, a judge had said he did well and refused to allow the other side to contradict his evidence.

Something they don't tell you at any law school is to beware the litigant in person who turns up with papers in a crinkly plastic carrier bag. The louder the bag, the nuttier the litigant.