Intermediaries for defendants, David Wurtzel (2014)
I feel as if I were there at the beginning. In March 2007 I spoke to the Midland Circuit of the Bar about intermediaries. The scheme was still in the pilot period and awareness of it was low. A barrister came up to me afterwards and explained that his lay client who was appealing a conviction in the magistrates’ court bore all the hallmarks of a ‘vulnerable witness’. Could an intermediary help this vulnerable defendant when giving his evidence? An intermediary did, and I think she was the first to do so.