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4 Nov, 10 tweets, 3 min read
.@realDonaldTrump mood right now
In fact, the entire Trump presidency is basically an updated and unnecessarily extended US adaptation of Blackadder III.
Does anybody seriously think that this *exact* scene has not taken place in the West Wing at some point in the last four years?
Every West Wing staffer this morning
Trump before beddy byes last night
Anniversary with Melania
Anniversary part 2
Trying to teach Trump about the electoral system
Teaching Trump polysyllabic words
Plainly this is now all set up for a Trump landslide and plenty of egg on my stupid face, but I maintain that the comparison holds strong.

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More from @BarristerSecret

The Secret Barrister Profile picture
31 Oct
ASK. ONE. QUESTION. AT. A. TIME. JOURNALISTS. IF. YOU. DON’T. KNOW. HOW. TO. DO. THIS. I. CAN. TEACH. YOU.
“Prime Minister - Keir Starmer was right, wasn’t he?”

Keep your question short, make him answer it.

Basic principles of questioning.
If (as expected) he says “No” and waffles, the next journalist should follow up. Again, keep it short:

“You criticised Keir Starmer’s suggestion of a two-week lockdown, and are now having to impose a four-week lockdown. Why is this better?”
Read 4 tweets
The Secret Barrister Profile picture
28 Oct
We have more information now about the case of #ClaireParry, following news reports of the judge’s sentencing remarks. And it is complicated, more so than I had appreciated when I tweeted last night.

So a brief [THREAD] to look at what seems to have happened.
It was widely reported yesterday that the defendant, Timothy Brehmer, had been acquitted by a jury of the murder of Claire Parry. It was said that he strangled her after she sent a text message to his wife telling her of their (Parry and Brehmer’s) affair.
It was also reported that Brehmer had admitted manslaughter, but denied intending to kill or cause really serious harm (the necessary intention for murder), claiming that the fatal injuries were sustained “accidentally” during a “kerfuffle”.
Read 26 tweets
The Secret Barrister Profile picture
27 Oct
There are understandably strong feelings and a lot of questions about this verdict.

Not knowing the evidence, I can’t offer much insight, save to say that proving murder is a high threshold.

The jury have to be sure of an intention to kill or cause really serious harm. [1/3]
It means that if the jury think he might have intended to kill/cause really serious harm, he’s not guilty.

If the jury think he *probably* intended to kill/cause really serious harm, he is not guilty.

If the jury were *almost sure* he did, he would be not guilty. [2/3]
The burden and standard of proof is often misunderstood. It’s something I look at in depth in #FakeLaw.

Without having heard all the evidence, it is impossible to draw any conclusions about what the jury did or did not believe. Other than - they weren’t sure. [3/3]
Read 8 tweets
The Secret Barrister Profile picture
23 Oct
@davidbarrett David, you’ve read my book. You’re an intelligent man who knows that we have an adversarial system, unlike most other European states, and that therefore our legal aid budget is relatively high, and the rest of the justice budget is relatively low.

You chose not to include this
@davidbarrett You know (because you’ve read it both in that very report and in my book) that, because we have different systems, isolating legal aid and drawing the conclusion that we spend too much cannot in good faith be done.

Yet that fallacy is the premise of your article.
@davidbarrett You include context-free claims about certain criminal legal aid cases which ignore publicly-available corrections such as this: tuckerssolicitors.com/response-to-th…
Read 8 tweets
The Secret Barrister Profile picture
23 Oct
I’d like to thank the Mail for printing this rot and giving me an opportunity to plug both Stories of the Law & How It’s Broken and #FakeLaw, both of which expose the wild dishonesty of this claim.

Stories of the Law: amazon.co.uk/dp/1509841148/…

Fake Law: amazon.co.uk/Fake-Law-Truth… Image
Journalist @davidbarrett makes this ludicrous claim.

I challenge him to read Chapter 6 of #FakeLaw and justify his assertion.

Because - spoiler - the “study” does no such thing.

I’ll let readers form their own views on Mr Barrett’s journalistic abilities. Image
There’s also a ready quote from professional simpleton @tomhunt1988.

I’d ask Tom:

Why do we need to be “careful”? About what? What does this mean?

Legal aid rates are *fixed by government*, you permabronzed halfwit. Image
Read 8 tweets
The Secret Barrister Profile picture
12 Oct
At the risk of giving this kind of #FakeLaw the publicity it craves, the reality is that thousands will read it, and I do think it’s important to put the truth out there.

So here goes.

More #LegalAidLies from the Mail... [THREAD]
1. We start as ever with a claim that the defendants “got £17,000 off taxpayer”, like they were handed a bag of swag. This is in fact the cost of legal aid set by the government. It’s like saying someone who receives a NHS heart transplant “gets” the cost of the operation in cash
2. Readers are invited to conclude that £17,000 is too much to spend on this very serious case. The journalist has not bothered to tell you any of the context that you would need to even *begin* to assess whether that cost is too high, too low, or about right. Such as...
Read 23 tweets

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