Going inside: A behind-thescenes look into a day in court
A day in court is hours of work hardly anyone sees. Deborah Morris, who has been covering proceedings from the media bench for years, tags along with a judge to see how it all works.
It’s 4pm on a Wednesday and Judge Andy Nicholls has just finished four sentencings. Back in his office – called a chambers – he sheds his robe. Soft music is playing and on a table are the first of the files he needs for Thursday.
Eight files to start with, applications for bail and some applications for a limited driving licence – from those who had previously been disqualified but need a licence for work and bail applications.
“A lot of those licences are precious to them for work and family and I need to really process them,” he says.
Each case has different demands and each one comes with its own set of factors the judge has to consider.
It is an important part of the job, to get some time to prepare. “That can vary wildly as to how much time you get to prepare for the day ahead.”
While Wednesday’s court is over, work on Thursday is just about to begin.
District Court judges are mostly seen on the bench, working their way through whatever case is before them. But it is very much the tip of the iceberg.
Behind the courtroom are a multitude of people working, sometimes into the night, Nicholls says, to get ready for the next day.
Court files can be made up of conviction lists, summary of facts, witness statements, victim impact statements, probation reports, lawyers’ submissions, reports from various organisations or people like doctors and mental health experts.
When someone wants bail, it might also include a bail assessor’s reports and opposition from police.
There can be lots of voices involved, the more the better as far as Nicholls is concerned, to give him the best picture.
It all needs to be read and considered, hopefully before the judge has to go to the courtroom.
There’s a balancing act involved, especially with bail applications.
Nicholls will have read them all before he finishes for the day.
“Bail oppositions are not straightforward,” he says.
“For example, surprises come up. Can you deal with it on the spot and in a quality way? Or do you need to hit the pause button and give everybody a chance to unpack?”
He says there is a need to stay curious and humble about what information could still come in.
Thursday, 9.15am
Thursday morning and back in his office, casually dressed – he has yet to change into his suit for the day – he’s going through the files that arrived this morning.
The soft music is back, the office is calm but without a single law book in sight. Instead it’s plants and an Avengers poster – a gift from former colleagues.
He’s received files for four overnight arrests. As yet, those files have little in them and he won’t get all the information until he’s in court.
Once he’s there, he’ll get even more cases. Those that come out of the registrar’s list when people appear for the first time, mostly wanting to plead guilty or for bail conditions to be considered. He’s very conscious of time.
“As a judge I am acutely aware that people can be waiting a long time.
“Each day has a distinct character in terms of the nature of the conversations that you’re having with defendants and their lawyers in what they want to achieve in the courtroom that day.”
Nicholls came to the District Court bench after being Wellington’s managing partner at Chapman Tripp – one of the country’s biggest law firms. He had no criminal work background but it was time for a change, he says.
And he arrived at a time of upheaval – fresh out of the Covid lockdowns and with protesters occupying Parliament grounds, arrests from the scene were some of the earliest criminal cases he dealt with.
A judge’s day is determined by a roster. Some weeks it’s the main criminal list in Courtroom One, on others it’s a trial or he might be heading out of town to the Hutt Valley or Porirua courts.
And it’s definitely not predictable. “On a day where we’re doing the criminal list, which is a busy, busy court day, a variety of things can be presented to the judge to move matters along for people.
“You will have done some preparation and you will have an expectation about what it is that the lawyers want to achieve and what the lay of the land looks like. For other matters you will not have seen the file before it’s handed up to you. And so you do live by your wits.
“Some surprises can come up even in the files that you think you’ve prepared for, that you haven’t seen until the moment that they handed up to you, so you do have to be prepared to adjust your thoughts or your take on what it is that you’re going to achieve that morning or that afternoon.”
He needs those appearing in his court to know that he can see them, can appreciate where they have come from and that everyone in the room has worked hard to understand how they got there and where they go from here.
9.50am
Just before court starts and the courtroom is teeming. Lawyers come and go, mostly waiting to talk to the prosecutor, a probation officer or the registrar. The public gallery has a small group already taking up seats. Out in the foyer are more. One chap, wearing work gear, settles in, he doesn’t know how long he’s going to be here.
The door to the courtroom swings open and the registrar announces the arrival of the judge. Nicholls welcomes everyone and the day kicks off.
First up is one of the limited-licence applications – for someone wanting to keep their job and look after their grandmother. It’s one of the files he had read the night before.
He grants it and wishes them good luck with their grandmother and to look after the licence.
With that, the list is under way. Nicholls thanks everyone who comes forward, asking them to wait for a moment while he talks to the lawyers and saying he’ll come back and talk to them.
The old hands with a few court appearances under their belts give him a nod. Those in court for the first time relax a fraction. It’s clear his greeting takes a bit of the sting out of the scariness of court.
Courtroom One is an endless procession of defendants, lawyers, probation officers and prosecutors. They move about in what looks like chaos but it’s all about pushing cases forward.
Nicholls says that behind the scenes police are working as fast as they can to get the information to him if they are opposing bail for people who have been picked up overnight and brought to court.
“There also needs to be time for them to talk to a duty lawyer, it’s not pleasant in the cells.
“We are hamstrung without the information. It can slow the process down and put additional pressure on.”
Court staff also come in and out, bringing more files from other courts.
11am
In the first hour he’s dealt with four limited licences, three people from the cells who are able to be given bail, an impromptu sentencing and a couple of guilty pleas.
It’s not him doing whatever he likes. “There is a balance. I get the file for any appearance. A lot has happened to get to this point [of appearing in court]. It means a lot of work to do to understand all the individual circumstances.
“Nevertheless I am still conscious a judge might not have all the information. It’s an imperfect way of managing risk.”
In court he reminds one chap that it was important to keep his court dates, then thanks the brother of another for turning up to support him.
A student who had a few beers on the ferry is called. He was over the alcohol driving limit. Today is his first appearance and he wants to plead guilty on the spot.
Nicholls disqualifies him for six months.
“I’m not going to lecture you, you know it was the wrong thing to do and easily avoidable,” he tells him. “It’s the first time you have stumbled like this, just don’t drink when you are going to drive.”
Nicholls is very aware that for everyone who appears before him it’s a serious matter to them.
“There’s a lot of people in New Zealand waiting to have their matter aired in court. And you’re very aware of that and that right now, this conversation with this New Zealander in front of me is really important for them.”
Among the cases he is hearing are bail breaches. Police often check bail conditions, especially curfews.
A breastfeeding mother went out to get food and came back later than her curfew allowed.
Her going back on bail is not opposed by police, but the judge tells her she’s going to have to make it work until her next court appearance.
Another breach from a chap who didn’t have the key to get back into his home and had to go and get one. He gets bail too.
“Cheers boss,” he tells the judge as he’s sent back out to sign a new bail bond.
11.45am
Shortly after the morning break a woman appears by phone. The courts allow remote appearances by audiovisual link or phone – especially if people are living and working at a distance from Wellington. Then it’s on to an application for electronic bail. Nicholls, however, is worried about where the bail address is and whether the others in the building know what the defendant is charged with.
“If you hop on Google Maps, there are four units in a building,” he says. He stands the case down until the afternoon for some inquiries to be made.
2.15pm
A brother and sister appear for assaulting a bouncer outside Wellington’s Mermaid Bar. Each has a previous conviction for violence.
Their lawyer, Blake Dawson, says they did not start the fracas and asks Nicholls to consider convicting them and getting them to make an emotional harm payment.
“Given the history, I am hesitating here,” Nicholls tells him. “It was a bouncer and he was hit in the face and stomach.”
Instead he gives them 40 hours of community work – the least he’s able to impose.
3.15pm
By mid-afternoon a man is appearing for a family-harm incident on the Chatham Islands.
He appears in the audiovisual screen in the tiny court there, beamed right into the main Wellington court.
There is a bit of figuring out to do. He is being brought over on a flight the next day and going to stay at an address in New Plymouth.
4.20pm
The last case of the day comes after a short delay. It’s called a late arrest – meaning the man was arrested in the morning and brought down to court for the afternoon session. There also appears to be an active warrant for his arrest from 1993.
It’s a file that Nicholls sees only when the registrar hands it to him. His everpresent glasses, on the top of his head when he’s talking, come down to read it.
The man’s lawyer, Hugo Porter, arrives and still has to talk to him, having been assigned to him only minutes ago.
The short break gives Nicholls time to read the file.
Usually late arrests are just desperate to get bail but the guy wants to plead guilty.
The offence – a stupid burglary of commercial premises committed on methamphetamine while he was deep in grief over the loss of his mother – has been bothering the man badly. He even still has most of the goods and has waited for weeks for police to turn up.
He wants to give it all back if he can. Police are opposing bail and Nicholls runs through his past history and the circumstances behind how he ended up offending.
Bail is granted.
“You’ve led a hell of a life, constantly in the criminal justice system,” the judge says.
He says he can see why police were cautious about the man being back on the street.
“It was helpful to hear about your attempts to get off meth, it’s the right thing to do and you are going to have to deal with it.”
The judge puts him off to a sentencing date.
Considering bail, a sentence or name suppression is not random. Judges have to follow a set of rules just like anyone else. “There are statutory tests to be met, we have them to guide judges – we don’t have unrestrained discretion,” Nicholls says.
During sentencing, judges have some options but they cannot go outside those. There is a hierarchy of sentences, jail at the top down to no conviction and no punishment. But judges can’t decide to make up their own sentence outside those mandated by law.
“We don't just exercise judgment out of nowhere,” he says.
And within those restrictions are a series of guidelines handed down from higher courts about how a sentence should be structured.
If someone pleads guilty, they qualify for a 25% discount on the sentence. It’s designed to encourage appropriate guilty pleas before a trial or hearing. A late guilty plea, for example the day before a trial, would get a lesser discount.
There are other things that judges have to take into account. Remorse, willingness to consider restorative justice, to pay reparation and make amends, previous good character among others.
All sentencings are a series of pluses and minuses – or, as they are called in court, aggravating and mitigating features.
Judges do have to consider what is called the least restrictive outcome, which means whether a sentence in the community works rather than something more like a prison sentence.
Even then judges don’t get things right every time. And, as Nicholls says, there is an appeal process waiting if necessary.
With the last case of the day over, just before 5pm and more than 30 cases dealt with, he gets up and thanks everyone before court is adjourned.
When he gets upstairs to his office, Friday’s files will be waiting for him.