Great legal fiascos V.2

Anyone who has ever found the law to be an ass will find further evidence for that opinion among the tales in this second selection from Stephen Tumim's fund of legal absurdities.

Even a subject as seemingly dull as contempt of court yields such unexpected delights as the seventeenth-century offender who, according to the records, 'ject un brickbat á le justice que narrowly mist and was immediatement bangé for his audacity. Traditionally it is between the judges and barristers that the most hard-hitting projectiles are exchanged, verbal of course, though nowadays it is quite often the prisoner in the dock who has the last word. 'You are a humourless automaton,' said one would-be practical joker to a senior judge on receiving six months for contempt, 'why don't you self-destruct?'

Admiral Sir Thomas Troubridge said in 1801 that he would like to hang a hundred lawyers for their interference in his summary treatment of mutineers - and certainly the exploits and idiosyncracies of many of the leading protagonists have over the years given rise to some fierce confrontations, quite apart from ludicrous lawsuits which were, and sometimes still are, possible to bring through the obscure ramifications of the legal system.

For in this anecdotal survey of the antics of the law over the last few hundred years it is the system itself that emerges as the grand perpetrator of great legal fiascos.