During our work training we are given a mock cross-examination by a trained barrister (prosecuting lawyer).

They gave us this transcript to show that even the best can be made fools of (names may have been changed but damn funny reading)

Counsel: What is your name?
Chrysler: Chrysler. Arnold Chrysler.
Counsel: Is that your own name?
Chrysler: Whose name do you think it is?
Counsel: I am asking if it is your name.
Chrysler: And I have told you that it is. Why do you doubt it?
Counsel: It is not unknown for people to give false information in court.
Chrysler: Which court?
Counsel: This court.
Chrysler: What is the name of this court?
Counsel: This is number 5 Court.
Chrysler: No, that is the number of this court. What is the name of this court?
Counsel: It is quite immaterial what the name of this court is!
Chrysler: Then perhaps the it is immaterial if Chrysler is really my name.
Counsel: No, not really because…
Judge: Mr. Lovelace.
Counsel: Yes your Honour?
Judge: I think Mr. Chrysler is running rings around you already. I would try a new line of attack, If I were you.
Counsel: Thank you, your Honour.
Chrysler: And thank you from ME, m’lud. It’s nice to be appreciated.
Judge: Shut up witness.
Chrysler: Willingly m’lud it would be an honour to be told to shut up by you. For you I would..
Judge: Shut up witness or I will fine you for contempt of court. Mr. Lovelace carry on.
Counsel: Now Mr. Chrysler, for let us assume that is your name – you are accused of purloining (stealing) in excess of 40,000 hotel coat hangers.
Chrysler: I am.
Counsel: Can you explain how this came about.
Chrysler: Yes, I had 40,000 coats to hang up.
Counsel: Is this true?
Chrysler: No.
Counsel: Then why did you say it?
Chrysler: In an attempt to throw you off balance.
Counsel: Off balance?
Chrysler: Certainly. As you know all barristers seek to undermine the confidence of any hostile witness, or defendant. Therefore it must equally be open to the witness or defendant, to try and shake the confidence of a hostile barrister.
Counsel: On the contrary, you are not here to indulge in cut and thrust with me. You are only here to answer my questions.
Chrysler: Was that a question.
Counsel: No.
Chrysler: Then I cannot answer it then.
Judge: Mr. Lovelace might I point out you are still been given the run around here. You can do better than that. I hope for the sake of the English Bar that you can.
Counsel: Yes your Honour. Mr. Chrysler perhaps you can describe the reason you had to steal 40,000 coat hangers.
Chrysler: Is that a question?
Counsel: Yes.
Chrysler: It doesn’t sound like one. It sounds like a proposition which does not believe in itself. You know – “Perhaps I will describe the reason I had to steal 40,000 coat hangers…Perhaps I won’t…Perhaps I will sing a little song instead..”.
Judge: In fairness to Mr. Lovelace, witness I should remind you that barristers have an innate reluctance to frame a question as a question. Where you and I would say, “Where were you on Tuesday?”, they are more likley to say, “Perhaps you could inform the court of your precise whereabouts on the day after that Monday?”. It is not strictly a question or graceful English but you must pretend it is a question and answer it. Otherwise we will be here for ever. Do you understand?
Chrysler: Yes m’lud.
Counsel: Now Mr. Chrysler: why did you steal 40,000 hotel coat hangers, knowing as you must have that hotel coat hangers are useless in their design outside of a hotel wardrobe.
Chrysler: Because I build and sell wardrobes that are specially designed to take nothing but hotel coat hangers.
Counsel: Now, Mr. Chrysler am I right in saying that hotel coat hangers do not have hooks on top but little studs that will only work on special racks?
Chrysler: That is correct.
Counsel: This design arose because so many hotel coat hangers were been stolen from their rightful owners?
Chrysler: That is correct.
Counsel: And they had no option but to change the design to stop them from been stolen?
Chrysler: That is not correct.
Counsel: That is not correct?
Chrysler: No. The world of hotels had not one but two options. They could change the design of the way they were hung yes, but they could also cheapen the hangers. The could have easily given guests inexpensive plastic or metal hangers, they would not have missed if they were stolen. But that would have lowered the tone of the hotel. Even chain hotels like a touch of class. They like giving guests high-class hangers made from solid wood. It makes themselves feel good, and makes the hangar worth stealing.
Counsel: And people come to you, do they asking you to make special wardrobes to so they can use their stolen hangers?
Chrysler: It isn’t so much that they are stolen that makes them attractive. You have to remember that may top businessmen spend more time in hotels than they do at home. They become used to hotel life. They think of hotels as home. Therefore they become used to hotel hangars and think of them as normal, and on the rare occasion at home they struggle with the ill fitting, loose, hooked hangers that we take as normal. So they come to me and get me to make a hotel-style wardrobe.
Counsel: Are you seriously suggesting that there are people who prefer hotel life to home life?
Chrysler: Certainly I know a lot of people who would never go home if they had the chance. So when they get home they like to create the hotel experience in their own house. Many clients have their own mini-bar in their bedrooms. They have a TV set at the end of the bed on a raised shelf, often with a sex channel playing. All their products come in wrappers and are thrown away each day. I have even known people in their own home to put out Do Not Disturb signs on their bedroom door.
Counsel: Stolen, presumably from some hapless hotel.
Chrysler: Never call a hotel hapless. They never lose money willingly. They know what they are doing. They may have things taken from them but the stuff customers leave behind is equally valuable.
Counsel: Are you serious when you say that clients of your drink from a mini bar in their own bedroom, in their own home?
Chrysler: Certainly and they grumble about the size, price, and lack of ice for the drink. Just like in a hotel.
Counsel: So why don’t they get a fridge in their bedroom?
Chrysler: Because then it would not be like a hotel.
Judge: Mr. Chrysler do your clients also have Gideon Bibles in their bedrooms?
Chrysler: Certainly I provided these as part of my service.
Judge: And where did you get the Gideon Bibles from?
Chrysler: Alas these too have been taken from hotels.
Judge: So why are you not also up on charges for stealing Bibles as well?
Chrysler: Because the Gideon Bible do not belong to the hotels. They belong to the Gideon Society, who have decided not to prosecute me and told me to go and sin no more.
Judge: And have you sinned no more?
Chrysler: Since I am here I can only say no.

Take care
Matthew