The fight of the court

I didn't go to the law courts today. But yesterday was a very entertaining afternoon.

In the morning, I met my boss for his audience in front of the 1st civil chamber. There was a huuuge bench of lawyers ready to introduce their cases, and we could barely sit down (the lawyers are in front of the public benches). He left me after ten minutes, and I had to find someone again to present me to the judge. We asked the judge to report the case later, in November.

The afternoon was very different. We went to an audience in front of the 5th work chamber, in the new law courts building (there are two : the old one and the brand new glass one). We sat in silence, and began to listen the female lawyer that was speaking. I wasn't sure, because I'm just a junior, but I was quite sure she was saying totally wrong stuff. The judge seemed to agree with her, while the prosecutor (who, in work tribunal, is called "auditeur") seemed very annoyed by all the case, and giving reason to the other lawyer.

I didn't dare ask my boss what he was thinking of all that, because there wasn't many persons in the room, but after like thirty minutes it was the "auditeur" 's turn to speak, and believe me, this was great. He said something like that : "take this law, this law, this one, these special ones, put them in your mixblender and push very hard. Then, you can obtain all the crap this lawyer just told you". I thought the judge was going to suffocate and the female lawyer became suddenly pink, but I must admit I couldn't restrain me from laughing (so did the two lawyers near me). He also said the judge was asking silly questions that made him lose his precious time, which I thought was also true for me and the other lawyers.

Anyway, when we finally could go out and back to the car, my boss laughed with me and told me he didn't like the judge either. I was glad to find we were on the same page.

And now, I've got to go to sleep... At 6.03 pm, my boss stopped me just before the front door and gave me a thin file : "your first pleading is tomorrow. You just have to ask for the clemency of the judges, our client didn't do much wrong. Good luck!", with a big smile. I must say the case is not very complicated, and it is criminal law, so I'm happy (criminal law is my favourite branch of law). But... I'm gonna be against the prosecutor, which is normal, but also against the "Bâtonnier", who is the big chief of the lawyers of the district! His client provoked the car accident my client was involved in. Tomorrow at 8.30am... We will see!