Lawyers mock CPS social media campaign

Criminal lawyers have been entertaining themselves by mocking the Crown Prosecution Service’s social media campaign aimed at educating the public about the work it does.

Throughout April an A-Z guide of legal terms will be posted using the hashtag #DiscoverCPS. One term and its explanation will be shared each day.

On Monday, ‘A’ for ‘advocate’ was posted. However, it didn’t take long for the legal Twitterati to poke fun at the Sesame Street-esque campaign.

Steven Young & Co solicitor Tim Burrows replied: ‘“A” is for yet “another” forgotten and bad character application and application to adjourn as forgotten to warn witnesses.’

Criminal law blogger Matthew Scott also responded: ‘Before “advocate” comes “adjournment”. For those pupils starting their 2nd 6 [months of pupillage] today, no skill is more vital than applying for an adjournment.’

For the letter ‘B’, the CPS posted ‘bad character’, to which Scott said: ‘But B is for “breakdown” of the DVD player which happens at least once in every case.’

The day after, ‘code for crown prosecutors’ was published for the letter ‘C’ with Burrows equally dismissive: ‘Also “chaos”, “cock up”, and “computer crashed causing complete calamity”.’

Scott said: ‘“C” is for “crap case”. Theft of frozen chicken. Nobody asked for the CCTV and the only witness is in Thailand, [because] nobody checked dates to avoid.’

With the letter ‘G’ due on Sunday, ‘guilty’ seems the most obvious choice. However, don’t put it past one of two lawyers to use the opportunity to remind us of the Chris Grayling and/or Michael Gove eras.