Court Potato

Legal Affairs, May, 2002 by Dashka Slater

Five days, one T.V., 65 hours of courtroom drama, 150 cases. My afternoons have been spent in the company of jurists like Judge Sheindlin of “Judge Judy,” Marilyn Milian of “The People’s Court,” and Judge Mablean Ephriam of “Divorce Court”—modern-day Solomons who deliberate for an entire commercial break before extending the long arm of the law over the bench to slap the litigants silly.

My nights have been spent at the feet of the giants of the T.V. bench—nine once-a-week Supreme Court justices, a babe of a family-court judge, and a bunch of world-weary gavel-pounders who often sigh irritably before ruling. I’ve learned a lot about judges in my hours on the couch. Thanks to reruns of “L.A. Law,” I know that if a district attorney and a public defender are sniping at each...