‘Was that a gavel I just heard?’
Barristers have taken to Twitter to point out a number of supposed legal inaccuracies in ITV drama Quiz.
The three-part series premiered last Monday and is based on the real-life story of ‘coughing Major’ Charles Ingram and his wife Diana, who along with co-conspirator Tecwen Whittock, were convicted of attempting to cheat their way to the £1 million cash prize on Who Wants to Be A Millionaire.
The actors were praised by viewers for their gripping performance in the drama which aired in hourly instalments and drew in almost six million viewers on Wednesday night’s finale.
Yet, the legal Twitterati, including anonymous bar blogger The Secret Barrister (SB), were quick to point out a number of courtroom blunders in the show’s re-enactment of the trio’s criminal trial at Southwark Crown Court. “It was a complete bingo card of legal fictions,” SB quipped.
Bingo. Bingo. Bingo. Full house.
— The Secret Barrister (@BarristerSecret) April 17, 2020
Below we profile some of the most glaring errors spotted by barristers:
2 Hare Court crime barrister Fiona Robertson tweeted a detailed thread listing a total of 14 legal errors. “Cannot take the eye twitches anymore,” she wrote. “The legal errors in Quiz are making my head explode.”
2. Defence Q.C. casually representing three defendants despite potential conflicts
— Fiona Robertson (@barristerfiona) April 15, 2020
5. "Hello Kevin" . We're in a court room not a pub (those were the days!) Not a way to greet any non vulnerable witness *face palm*
— Fiona Robertson (@barristerfiona) April 15, 2020
14. And in case you think i forgot the police lets not forget the casual interviewing of 2 suspects at the same time thereby contaminating any accounts you might actually get from them
— Fiona Robertson (@barristerfiona) April 15, 2020
Tom Sherrington, a criminal barrister at St John’s Buildings Barristers’ Chambers, pointed out Celador producer Mark Bonnar’s witness summons is in fact a mock-up from a civil, and not a criminal case. There is no “claimant” (or “plaintiff”!) in a criminal trial.
This was the last tram for me and it was pretty early on: pic.twitter.com/2V25mYr0ZB
— Tom Sherrington (@TomSherrington) April 16, 2020
Fellow criminal barrister Maximilian Hardy of 9 Bedford Row humorously tweeted:
The court toilets are not broken in Quiz, most unrealistic thing in the whole programme.
— Maximilian Hardy (@MaxJLHardy) April 15, 2020
CrimeLine, a resource for criminal law professionals, pointed out:
“There was also no solicitor present, which seems highly unlikely.”, around 50% have no solicitor despite it being free. Bizarre but true, even for very serious offences
— CrimeLine (@CrimeLineLaw) April 18, 2020
Ishan Kolhatkar, former 2 Hare Court criminal barrister turned BPP director of education technology, commented:
DID THE JUDGE JUST SAY "Order Order"
WAS THAT A GAVEL I JUST HEARD?
WAS IT?
WHO'S GOT A GAVEL?
HAND IT OVER NOW AND WE'LL FORGET IT EVER HAPPENED— Ishan Kolhatkar (@BPTC_Lecturer) April 15, 2020
Not a single Archbold or bag of Haribo between the Silks. Some pile of blue practitioner texts in the row behind. Three of them. Probably "The law of objections".
— Ishan Kolhatkar (@BPTC_Lecturer) April 15, 2020
SB published a blog post over the weekend containing a breakdown of the errors with handy explainers, before questioning whether it mattered that Quiz had got the law so “hopelessly” wrong?
“Is this not simply what anybody has to endure when watching a fictionalised representation of their specialism?”, he or she wrote. “The only difference, surely, is that lawyers are prima donnas sufficiently precious to compose laborious Twitter threads and blog posts on how and why the errors offend them?”
The post continued: “Pedantry is our stock-in-trade, and we can and do deploy it indiscriminately and, inevitably, sometimes needlessly. But I do think there’s a distinction, and a point, here. I think there is validity among the snark.”
One Twitter user responded:
It matters. I spend hours supporting witnesses whose only knowledge of a court room is based on what they see in TV dramas. Their biggest fear nearly always relates to barristers wandering around the court and approaching the witness in the box. TV companies need to get it right
— Pauline Roberts (@Pauline07523163) April 18, 2020
Hardy added: “Knowing the rules and rejecting them for purposeful dramatic licence is one thing but a wholesale failure to represent reality adds nothing and takes away a lot.”
SB concluded: “[I]naccuracies in the way we depict our justice system damage our understanding of something that matters to us all, more than I think we realise.”
