The seasonal holiday is time to relax, catch up on reading, learn something new, throw another piece of coal on the fire and sit back and unwind. It was a bumper year for new books which included heroes fact and fiction, legal thrillers and talking animals. Here are a few of my favourites this year.

REFUGE

 

William Kinread

 

£10.00

 

A lot has changed since the 1990s when this book is set. Technology must be the main development; mobile phones, social media, emails and all the rest have revolutionised the way we work. Another aspect of professional life that has moved on is money laundering and our attitude to risk for solicitors. This thriller is about crime and particularly money laundering – 1990s style. The hero is a solicitor called Ian Sutherland who we have met before in a previous book written by the author. Much of the solicitor’s professional life is buying and selling properties and usual high street work, but he drives a convertible Jaguar and knows how to make a mean cauliflower cheese! One thing that has not changed since the 1990s is the swear fee, which is still set at £5.00.

 

The book contains motifs that are significant to the plot and characters such as birds and animals. The backdrop of this fast paced thriller, set in North Yorkshire, is events in Kosovo and the civil war and the humanitarian crisis in the Balkans which led to refugees claiming asylum who became hard working entrepreneurs and also tobacco smuggling and laundering criminals. The story ends in an exciting showdown in the luxury hotels of Paris. It is an entertaining, thought-provoking and original legal thriller.

Justice at Trial: Courtroom Battles and Groundbreaking Cases

Jim Brosnahan

£27.50, Rowman and Littlefield

This book is part biography and part an account of various cases the author has been involved in during his remarkable career. It has got everything in it that is important about the law: the striving for justice whether the client is dirt poor or a millionaire, and the drama, the tension waiting for a verdict and ups and downs of the profession. It is also about opportunity and diversity in the profession.

The reader can almost taste the atmosphere of life in the American West and particularly California, the relationship between state and federal systems, and the local bar, which seems quite collegiate and good natured.

It is interesting the long shadow that the Great Depression had far beyond the 1930s. Clients were prosecuted in the 1970s for allegedly breaking a law that banned cheap liquor sales. The jury clearly asked what was wrong with selling cheap booze. During his days prosecuting, the system usually ran smoothly because most defendants pleaded guilty. This suddenly stopped and everyone wanted a trial. He asked a jailor and apparently one man in custody, an artificial inseminator of cows, was advising everyone to plead not guilty. The judge dealt with his case and life went back to normal. It is an excellent autobiography and very positive about the profession and the American Dream.

Women Who Kill, Criminal Law and Domestic Abuse

 

Edited by Rachel M. McPherson

 

£130.00, Routledge

 

Do abused women who kill get a fair response from the criminal justice system? If not, what can be done? Is the law biased against women? This book edited by a Scottish legal academic is a well-balanced mix of historical and scientific analysis and practical guidance. There is a preface by former Victims Commissioner Dame Vera Baird KC who reviews the progress of legal reform.

 

In analysing the defences and partial defences to the charge of murder and considering whether they are fit for purpose for abused victims, the book cites the case of Sally Challen. She killed her husband in 2010 and was convicted of murder. After several attempts by her lawyers, the Court of Appeal in 2019 ordered a retrial. She was released from prison and two months later the Crown Prosecution Service accepted a guilty plea to manslaughter, having served a sentence of 14 years. At the time of her original trial, there was no legal concept of ‘coercive control’.

 

Over the last decade, eight times as many men killed partners than women. The book argues that the criminal justice system has historically been male centred. Serious violent crime by women is rare. When a woman kills they are sometimes thought to be physically or mentally ill as no other explanation fits the circumstances. It is also argued that the legal concept of self-defence and the associated questions of what is reasonable force and the legal expectation that a victim must escape a dangerous situation rather than fight are usually explained by courts in language and terminology that is used by and for men.

Liar in a Crowded Theater: Freedom of Speech in a World of Misinformation

Jeff Kosseff

£25.00, Johns Hopkins University Press

I wonder why we do not have a law on free speech in this country. It is clearly something that is cherished in America as a fundamental right, essential to democracy, but has largely passed us by. This book analyses the various challenges to that entitlement, in a world of 'fake news' and disinformation. The author is a cybersecurity law professor at the United States Naval Academy. The somewhat confusing title refers to what happens if a malicious person shouts the word 'fire' in a public building, causing a stampede leading to death and injury. Could that liar rely on their constitutional right to free speech? It seems that he or she may well be able to. It is the equivalent of the person who cried 'wolf' too many times.

It is a fascinating book, with an interesting view of legal issues in America and very relevant for our time on both sides of the Atlantic. It is well worth the £25.00 price tag which is modest by legal text book standards. (That is my opinion and I am still sticking to it.)

 

£149.00, Globe Law and Business

 

Picture the scene. You have been in court all day and get back to the office at 5pm. Your emails have been read and sorted, the rubbish has been deleted, the important ones dealt with. That lease which you need to look at has been read and there is a concise note of the important points. A letter has been sent to your client highlighting the issues and asking for their comments. That bundle of documents for tomorrow’s case have been read and analysed. The client should settle the case. Your filing cabinet has been gone through and bills sent out and some even have been paid. There is also a confidential note on the productivity of the colleagues you supervise and this tells you one has put in extra hours and another less. Are you dreaming? No, this is what AI offers.

 

Whether it will deliver and in what way is the question. AI has its horror stories. In August 2019 Roberto Mata was a passenger on an Avianca flight 670 from El Salvador to New York and a trolley allegedly injured his knee. Mata duly sued Avianca and the airline responded by asking that the case be dismissed because 'the statute of limitations had expired'. Mata’s lawyers produced a list of over half a dozen previous court cases that set precedents supporting their argument. When the cases were read it was discovered they were all made up by a computer. The lawyer was an experienced litigator but had not used the particular chatbot before.

Sources of English Legal History Public Law to 1750

Sir John Baker

£150.00, Oxford University Press

Legal history explains why we do things the way we do and confirms many of the legal issues and challenges dealt with by lawyers over centuries have not changed much. We still help people manage their money, buy and sell land and assist when they get into trouble and have disputes with authority. Legal history is important because it tells us why the law is important.

This book is a work of considerable scholarship. The book includes the development of common law and the growth of rights of parliament. These include the ship money cases in the seventeenth century and the role of judges and courts. The ship money cases were challenges to King Charles’ decision to tax the middle classes without the authority of parliament. It galvanised legal opposition to arbitrary rule. A leading figure, John Hampden, lost his case but it was a key event in the history of democracy. Sir Edward Coke described the case as the 'greatest cause that ever came in question before any judges.'

Regrettably the book does not contain much about attorneys but there was a report of a Mr Bulthrope in 1607 who was locked up in stocks by a churchwarden merely for pleading the case of a client. He was given £100 compensation (about £25,000 in today’s values) for having been detained in the public view 'in his velvet jacket'. He relied on Magna Carta 'that no free man be imprisoned'. I wonder how much a lawyer wrongly imprisoned for representing a client would get.

 

Michael Culver

 

£80.00, Law Society

 

'Beware of Greeks bearing gifts', or so the expression goes, or 'don’t look a gift horse in the mouth'. This book looks at the legal pitfalls of acting for clients who want to give something away and how the advisor can avoid negligence claims (which is by looking in the horse’s mouth).

 

Who would think it would be so complicated and risky to do something as natural and generous as giving something away - usually to a close family member? The first question to ask is 'why?' Clients often do not appreciate being cross examined and may not want to explain or find it difficult to do so, but ask it we must. A significant gift of an asset for no apparent reason should be a red flag to any lawyer.

 

This is a very clear and helpful book offering excellent advice on a subject that is frequently met with. This is a very helpful and readable work full of advice for the traditional trusted advisor who cares for clients and does ask the right questions. But don’t count on getting a gift yourself!

A Cat's Judgement: Mr Perkins lays down the law

Suzanne Stephenson

£9.99

This is a delightful book about a judge and a cat. The judge is staying at a B&B temporarily as he has just been appointed to a full-time position and his house is not ready. He meets a mysterious cat that accompanies him to court (as they do!). The tale develops into various stories about the important role animals and particularly pets play in our lives. The cat who is the hero of the story helps characters in the book solve problems, interact with each other, communicate and even assist parties in disputes resolve them. This is a fiction of course but it has a message about difference and diversity and also a telling satire on the modern justice system.

The book is enhanced with marvellous illustrations of various animals. This book is a fairy tale but has an important message about how animals can aide communication. It is not sentimental nor silly. Some of us will know about pets therapy and animals in hospitals. I have only seen a review copy which concludes with a section on the courts system, and information on assistance and support animals.

The Reasonable Person: A Legal Biography

 

Valentin Jeutner

 

£95.00, Cambridge University Press

 

The Man on Clapham Omnibus, where did he get on and when will he get off?

 

The winter of 1855 was one of the coldest on record. A water main in Woodcock Street, Birmingham froze solid and the expanding ice burst the pipe. When the ice melted the escaping water flooded the area including the cellar of a Mr Blyth, causing damage to his goods and his four children caught severe colds. He sued for compensation on the basis the water company were negligent, in not having a water main that would withstand the worst weather. The water pipe had been there for twenty-five years with no previous problems and he lost his claim. His children were not compensated for their bad colds. In the judgment the court considered what a reasonable man would do in the position of the public utility. This is the first appearance in a court case of the legal concept of the 'reasonable person.' The first recorded use of the Clapham Omnibus was in 1903 by Lord Collins MR in McQuire v Western Morning news Co ltd. when the reasonable person was likened to the passenger on that transport.

 

The reasonable person changed gender in an interesting case in the 1950s when a Mrs Sayers was locked in a public ladies’ toilet. This book is an amazing work of scholarship, very readable and above all very positive about the way the law aims to be do justice, be fair, and adapt to society.

 

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