I just wish GWB hadn’t been such a big softie when Scooter’s lawyer turned on the waterworks.
I think that the proposed order is completely unenforceable. There’s no way to prove that the tears are faked, or simply turned on for effect.
As others have said - if the case before the jury is such that the idea of someone crying over the death of the convicted murderer is enough to sway their vote for the death penalty, then maybe it’s not that strong a case.
Seconded. Judges routinely limit what a jury may see or hear, and often provide strict guidance as to what victims’ families may do or say when addressing the jury. If, as the article suggests, particular lawyers were routinely and cynically crying at just the right moment in court, I as a judge would entertain such a motion.
I don’t see crying as any different from other attorney courtroom acting. When I was on a jury for a sexual assault case, both attorneys were literally shaking with rage in their vehemence as they delivered opening statements. It was clearly an act. Should this be outlawed, too? Do we just have the arguments read aloud by computers?
Only if they use the same voice synthesizer/talk box as the one Peter Frampton uses in “Do you feel like we do?”.
That sort of behavior is why I’m glad I took to heart the judges admonition that “anything the attorney says is not evidence”.
I was struck by how much the trial really WAS like trials on TV dramas.
Except for being longer and lots of boring parts the shows cut out. 
(Mine was 3 weeks of testimony…the worst was the video depositions)
Seconded. “Counselor, we don’t want the 14-minute extended jam version. Take 8 bars to finish and move on.”
The OJ trial left me really disappointed. Prosecuters seemed to be winging it, like they hadn’t considered how to phrase their questions beforehand. If courtroom dramas on TV were like that, I don’t think anybody would watch.
Heh.
Sometimes it happens that a witness that previously testified in a matter is unavailable to testify again – they refuse to testify, they’re dead, whatever. And sometimes in those circumstances their previous testimony may be read into the record of the current trial. This is often done by the court reporter or the clerk, who reads it in a near monotone. It’s kind of macabre, when the subject is something that obviously was upsetting the first time 'round… when the clerk finishes, deadpan, with “…whereupon a recess was called to permit the witness to compose herself…”
Does the court recorder actually type:
Witness: sobs uncontrollably
or
Witness: answer unintelligible due to blubbering?
Not that I’ve ever seen. But a lawyer eager to make a record on appeal may say something like, “Your Honor, obviously my client is distraught. She’s been sobbing off and on for almost half an hour. May we have a brief recess?”