'It’s not me’ –Snr Magistrate on new court rules
“It’s not me,” said the Senior Magistrate.
“It’s coming from someone way, way higher than me,” Ms Richards said in open court as she noted that the blame is being thrown at here by bloggers on local online news sites. “The bloggers saying Tamia making her own rules but that’s not so, it’s not me.”
New guidelines
Recently, a document was posted on the doors of the courtroom with stipulations that attorneys appearing in court must follow. The court guidelines came into effect on March 1, 2015. It stated in part, “The presiding judge may refuse to hear counsel who is not appropriately dressed for court until and unless that counsel’s attire meets the standard of dress directed in practice note.”
It is clearly stated that the inner blouse/shirts acceptable in the courts are to be solid or pin-striped white; navy blue or dark grey to be worn with suits of black, navy blue and dark grey.
It was the colours worn as inside blouses by two lawyers who appeared at the bar on Friday that prompted the response of the Senior Magistrate. In a very cordial, yet firm tone, she cautioned the two attorneys that the rules of the court must be upheld at all time. She; however, pardoned them for that day and allowed them to go ahead with representations for their clients.
Snr Magistrate not above the rules
Magistrate Richards told the attorneys that she also is not exempted from the newly set rules as for the day in question she had to change what she had initially planned to wear to work as it was “too tight”.
In the light moment of discussing the matter, other members present at the bar said, “Time to go shopping.”
The two who were not dressed in accordance with the set guidelines did apologise to the learned Magistrate for being unacceptably dressed. A female lawyer was wearing a very light green blouse while a male attorney had on a burnt orange inside shirt.
Other stipulations in the new guidelines are that there should be no extravagant designs on clothing, no excessive amount of jewellery, no eyebrow or nose rings and other non-traditional piercing when appearing at the bar.
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14 Responses to “'It’s not me’ –Snr Magistrate on new court rules”
I think we are more concern about bullying people, abuse of power and speaking to people like they are children!
Stop trying to be like Judge Judy!