Judges
All judges sitting in the Old Bailey are addressed as "My Lord" or "My Lady" whether they are High Court, Circuit Judges or Recorders. The Lord Mayor of the City of London and Aldermen of the City of London are entitled to sit on the judges' bench during a hearing but do not participate in hearings. By tradition the judge sits slightly off-centre in case the Lord Mayor decides to come in; if he did he would take the centre chair.
The most senior permanent judge of the Central Criminal Court has the title of Recorder of London, and his deputy has the title of Common Serjeant of London. The position of Recorder of London is distinct from that of recorder which is a part-time judicial office, holders of which sit part-time as judges of the Crown Court or the county courts. Some of the most senior criminal lawyers in the country sit as Recorders in the Central Criminal Court.
As of 2010 the Recorder of London is Judge Peter Beaumont QC, appointed in December 2004 following the death of his predecessor, Judge Michael Hyam. From 1975 to 1990 the very outspoken Sir James Miskin served as the Recorder of London with a number of controversial cases coming before him. The current Common Serjeant is Judge Brian Barker QC.
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Famous quotes containing the word judges:
“If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye had not found out my riddle.”
—Bible: Hebrew Samson, in Judges 14:18.
To the men who had answered his riddle, “Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness.”
“The world, the wise world, that never is wrong itself, judges always by events. And if he should use me ill, then I shall be blamed for trusting him: if well, O then I did right, to be sure!—But how would my censurers act in my case, before the event justifies or condemns the action, is the question.”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)
“The rage for road building is beneficent for America, where vast distance is so main a consideration in our domestic politics and trade, inasmuch as the great political promise of the invention is to hold the Union staunch, whose days already seem numbered by the mere inconvenience of transporting representatives, judges and officers across such tedious distances of land and water.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)