What happens if a witness in a court trial can not speak English (assuming a US court for this)? What does the court reporter do? I assume there would be an interpreter. Is the interpreter deemed faultless in their interpretation and that is what is recorded? Or, is the testimony still preserved so another interpreter, at a later date, might dispute the official record? How does the court reporter manage that?
The official court interpreters are certified through a rigorous process that they will accurately translate a witness’s testimony. They would lose their livelihood if they translated inaccurately or poorly.
The court reporter only reports what is translated by the official court interpreter.
If an official court interpreter is not available – and that sometimes happens – then whomever is found to conduct the translation must first swear an oath that they will faithfully and accurately translate what is being said. IME, no one ever disputed the accuracy of a translation. It may happen, but it would be extremely rare.
Makes me wonder what happens when sometimes there truly is not a suitable equivalent for one word in another language, but the outcome of the court case may hinge heavily on that.
I know some interpreters aren’t “careerists.” My mother once worked as a court interpreter. She wasn’t a interpreter as her career, she was just hired somewhat ad hoc as a one-time job thing for one particular case where the defendant spoke only Mandarin. But she had a tense and scary moment where she had to ask the defendant (in Mandarin) for clarification about what he meant, lest there be misunderstanding (possibly gender-related, about how Chinese pronounces “he” and “she” the same, Ta, and my mother couldn’t know whether the defendant referred to the man or the woman, and the judge (who knew only English) snapped angrily at her, demanding to know if she was secretly collaborating with the defendant. That was the only time she ever took on such a court job. (This was in Massachusetts, IIRC.)
That is what I wonder too.
For example, let’s say I was in a Chinese court and testified that the defendant is a cool person.
Is that translated to a cold person or an interesting person? I think such a thing can matter.
See above for what counts as “accurately.” Are court interpreters meant to only 1-1 words or do they actually interpret what was meant? And, if the latter, can’t that be open to dispute?
I am not arguing…I am really asking.
Maybe, but I’ve never seen it happen, personally.
I know. 
Paging @Pardel-Lux !
Is there ever an official audio recording made of a trial, or is that just Not Done?
Yes. There are people called “legal transcriptionists” who transcribe court proceedings from recordings, after the fact (unlike court reporters who do the job on the fly). I don’t know what circumstances lead to the use of one over the other, though
I used to run Juvenile Diversion hearings in my city. Interpreters were only rarely needed. We had a Spanish interpreter once, who pointed out to me that he was explaining to the Spanish-speaking family that “Diversion” meant something completely different than how he and they would use the term in Spanish - as in doing an activity as a pleasant diversion.
In the courts where I worked, recordings were used in lesser proceedings (misdemeanors, simple civil matters with claims for less than $25,000). Official court reporters were used for the heavy stuff: Felonies and big dollar civil cases.
They are required to translate literally and not “interpret.” Occasionally they will ask for clarification (making clear for the record what they are asking. “Your honor, the witness used a word that can have two meanings, and I’m asking the witness to clarify.”). The good ones translate simultaneously. (Not always possible, depending on the languages involved)
ETA:: Although I’ve never seen it at trial, sometimes (rarely) in a deposition a party will bring their own interpretor to confirm everything is going as it should.
Will a court interpreter do this literally?
For example, in Spanish the noun comes before the adjective…coche rojo (car red). In English it is red car (adjective before the noun).
Which would the interpreter say to the court?
I know you asked about US courts and I’m not commenting, since this may be one of the things with regional variances.
However, in Canadian courts, the version given by the interpreter is the official version of the testimony, because that is what the judge or jury heard and used to decide the case. I’ve never heard of a case where there was a challenge to the accuracy of the translation.
Where things may get murky is where the trial court operates in one language (Dene, Cree, French), and that’s the language of the transcript, but the appellate court judges only operate in English and can’t read the transcript. I’m not sure how that gets handled.
Yeah, I’m curious about this too. If a witness says, “It was raining cats and dogs that night,” does the interpreter then say, “It was raining very heavily that night” or literally say “cats and dogs?”
The appointment of interpreters for court hearings (and also for police interrogations) varies according to national legislation. In Europe, interpretation is provided by a sworn interpreter who is registered as such with the courts. Proof of training is required for registration. There are exceptions for languages such as Urdu, Arabic, African languages, etc., for which there are no training centers in Europe. The interpreter must remain strictly neutral and is bound to confidentiality. They are paid by the court. I have done this work for several years: it is sometimes very stressful, especially in rape trials or in politically charged hearings. Police interrogations can also be very stressful. The interpreter is not allowed to talk about the behavior of the police.
Regarding @velocity’s question: The interpreter always translates what is meant into the other language, interpreting is never literal, because the content is translated from one culture into another, whereby there can be major differences between cultures, especially when it comes to non-European cultures. The work is interesting and offers a lot of insight into human situations.
It may be interesting to note that simultaneous interpreting is historically supposed to start with the Nuremberg Trials after WWII:
They are required to translate faithfully what the witness wants to say. They literally interpret.
Simultaneous interpretation depends not on the quality of the interpreter, but on the technical equipment. You can’t do simultaneous interpretation without a booth, microphones and headsets. You also need a sound technician.
There are good and bad simultaneous interpreters, and there are good and bad consecutive interpreters. Consecutive interpreting is actually considered the harder discipline by many interpreters. I am sure courts worldwide try to find the better interpreters.
Of course the interpreter will say what makes sense, and “llovía gatos y perros” or “es regnete Katzen und Hunde” makes no sense in Spanish or German. So he will say “llovía a cántaros” or “es goß wie aus Eimern”.
Apart from that, what Aspenglow wrote is correct.
That is always the danger in translations and interpretation, not only in court, and mistakes have and will be made. It is regrettable, but unavoidable. Judges, reporters, lawyers and DAs will make mistakes too, justice will be miscarried.
BTW: English speaking judges and juries have been known to misunderstand witnesses speaking in English without the need of an interpreter. Human communication is not perfect.
Of course misunderstandings work much better with the help of an interpreter. (slight irony off)
I’ve been a court interpreter. You use whatever equivalent expression the target language has for heavy rain.
ASL interpreters work in pairs, partly to spell each other, but partly to consult on how to interpret something difficult, and to call out each other’s mistakes.
We are all simultaneous interpreters.
When I was certified, I had an endorsement for court interpreting, but such a thing is not required to be able to interpret in court. If you are being hired unknown, though, it is something people look for. I did not have to swear a special oath to interpret in court.
I’ve always been told that you interpret spoken language, and translate written language.
This brings to mind the news when Trump was first elected, that Putin mentioned he was “brilliant”. Later news mentioned the word in Russian is perhaps better interpreted as “colourful” not “highky intelligent”. The word “brilliant” can have both meanings in English too, just rarely applied that other way. Nuance matters.
Those are not the same thing, as illustrated by the “cats and dogs” example.
Sometimes deliberately, like in one case where the defendant said “I want a lawyer, dawg”, and the courts interpreted that since there was no such thing as a legally-trained canine, the statement was nonsensical.
In Toronto, I have heard of people asking for a foreign interpreter (or in the case of a French guy, for a French-language court proceeding) when disputing a traffic ticket, in the hopes that the extra requirements will cause the case to be delayed long enough that the ticket gets dropped altogether.