The Secret Barrister Provides an Insightful Yet Humerous Critique of Britain’s Criminal Justice System

Don’t know how I discovered the psudonymous Secret Barrister (SB) but I’m glad I did. Across 3 books, SB examines how Britain’s criminal justice system works and how it breaks down. There is so much misinformation around the criminal justice system peddled by media, politicians and those with agendas. On top of this, a lot is demanded of the criminal justice system yet they don’t have much to work with.

Stories Of The Law

The first book (which I read second) in the trilogy is Stories of the Law and How It’s Broken. It goes through Britain’s criminal procedure starting from arrest through to appeal. Along the way he shows how this system is broken. From cuts to legal aid which makes legal advice financially ruinous, endless court delays, overburdened legal workers and ever increasing demands, I doubt you would call this system just, to both defendants and victims.

Fake Law

The second book, Fake Law: The Truth About Justice in an Age of Lies examines how there are a lot of misconceptions about how the legal system works. The issue is less the misconceptions and more how they lead to media, politicians and those with ulterior motives to push for something to be done¹ which continue to strip away at people’s rights.

Courts ignore the wills of the parents and institute death panels. Eurocrats superced the British legal system. Lawsuits are out of control as millions are spend defending bogus claims. Too much money is spent on providing legal aid to guilty criminals. Burglars have more rights than you do even as they rob your own home. The soundbites go on and on and yet it takes a long time to explain why this happens. Heck, in this 658 (digital) page book the introduction is 13 pages of soundbites which require the remaining 645 pages to debunk them all.

As Brandolini’s law states:

The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it.

Those 645 pages are insightful and humerous however. You’ll understand that people have rights, there are many factors to consider, Republicans² are stupid and that media needs a court beat, even small towns. You might wonder how could they do this at some of the examples, but there’s a sound legal foundation for it.

Take self defense for instance where people think that their right to it is constantly undermined. Everyplace allows for self defense. Even if there was no objective presence of danger, you can use force to neutralize a threat. Key is neutralize, not retaliate. Even in places that uphold stand-your-ground laws don’t let you hunt down assailants long after they’ve fled. Still, because people think their self defense rights are being eroded, they push for corrective action that makes things wose, like stand-your-ground laws.

The book is far more impassionate than the others because of the nasty places that misunderstanding the law can lead us. It can also be challenging at times as SB stresses that people have rights, as despicable as they are. Whether it’s a terrorist who shouldn’t be stripped of her citizenship as she would be left stateless, or why an exec of one of the biggest banks which led to the Great Recession should still be paid his contractually entitled salary.

Nothing But The Truth

The third book is more autobiographical as SB shares their experiences as a criminal barrister, from university through to appeal. Like the other books, SB is humourous and witty in how they share these stories. At the same time, you get angry at how UK’s criminal system has been heavily neglected such that serious offenses take years to prosecute given lack of evidence, improper paperwok and lack of a court room.

When I say these stories are humerous and witty, I really mean it. In one (also mentioned in Stories of the Law), you get a ruffian accused of sexually assulting his girlfriend. SB argues hard to secure his bail³ to get out before appearing in court. Despite his criminal record and previous allegations. He seemed to turn a new leaf. The court agreed and he got his bail. And honestly, he did turn a new leaf, attending the trial date as required. Issue is that he came in a van

—a prison van.

From prison.

Where he’s serving a life sentence for murder.

🤷🏾

One idea in the book is that there isn’t much you can do to help some folk. The best you can hope for is to increase the probability of getting court and swiftly carrying out justice rather than hoping stiff sentences will stop criminals.

Much like the other books, it’s clear the British criminal legal system is unwell given all its disfunction. People do try their best, but they shouldn’t have to go this far just to do their job. And I haven’t mentioned legal aid where barristers work well below minimum wage on a case⁴.

Conclusion

It’s pretty clear that Britain is not ok [VIDEO 6:40] and the legal system is no exception. Through humor, wit and passion, SB exposes the issues in Britain’s criminal justice system and provides ways to fix them. Every British person, particularly politicians, should read all three of SB’s books.

If you want something similar, try This is Going To Hurt which is simularly as funny and incisive but with a focus on Britain’s heatlhcare system instead.