Internet Newsletter for Lawyers
January/February 2003, by Delia Venables

The changing Face of the Official Record
by Martin Bangs

WordWave is an international court reporting, subtitling and transcription company operating out of 26 offices worldwide. With access to over 1,500 real-time writers, stenographers and offline transcribers the company provides a range of services in the legal, corporate, government and media sectors. The WordWave group includes Smith Bernal, the leading court reporting company in the UK and Ireland.

The Stenographer as an Artist

The exceptional skills of the court reporter - the ability to take an accurate, verbatim, punctuated note at speeds in excess of 200 words per minute, enabling a full transcript to be generated quickly, if not instantaneously - are being utilised daily in courtrooms across the country. There is no better way to rapidly create a textual record of proceedings of the highest quality.

By linking a computer to the stenographer’s laptop, courtroom users can access the transcript in real time, on a real-time basis, enabling analysis of hearings as they progress. For longer and more expensive hearings, the progress of matters is accelerated and significant savings can be made.

A modem connection can also allow immediate access to the transcript for interested parties anywhere. An office-based CEO of a Hong Kong bank can provide confidential information and advice to a QC sitting on the front bench within the Royal Courts of Justice seconds after his company has been referred to.

At Smith Bernal WordWave, we currently train around 15 new stenographers a year internally to help us to continue to build availability of services within our offices in the UK, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia. We have more than 150 court reporters world-wide covering a broad range of matters and we expect the demand for real-time transcription will continue to grow strongly.

However, professional stenographers command professional fees and remain in relatively short supply. Recruited trainees need to demonstrate a rare blend of English language wizardry, hand dexterity and dogged stamina. They undergo an arduous and expensive training programme to learn the stenographic arts. Using stenographers cannot be an appropriate solution for all hearings and situations.

Until recently, the only alternative to a stenographer was to record a hearing onto cassette tape. A record of proceedings is preserved and an accurate transcript can subsequently be prepared by playing back the tape.

Unfortunately cassette tapes are often unreliable and need to be physically stored, retrieved and moved to the transcriber as required. In every courtroom around the country there is a box somewhere with a rogue unlabelled cassette recording that escaped - let’s just hope it’s not the one that contains something of critical importance……

The End of the Cassette Tape?

Fortunately, the digitisation of sound recording offers something new and better. As technology has progressed, the quality of digitally recorded files has improved, while the cost of equipment required for recording has fallen. Digital recording has now become a better value-for-money alternative to analogue cassette recording. As recordings are held in a computerised digital format, the files are securely and efficiently stored on computer drives with controlled access being available widely.

Audio is transferred securely via the internet, so transcription can be carried out remotely, using home-based staff or an external service provider, leading to very significant operational efficiencies and savings. This allows transcripts to be prepared promptly, accurately and cost effectively by home-based staff, as well as allowing overnight transcription where necessary. Transcription starts more quickly and longer sections required to be transcribed can be easily split between a number of transcribers. Having to move physical cassette tapes - with all the inherent risks of damage and loss involved - is no longer necessary.

There is also an opportunity to reduce costs using staff based overseas. We maintain pools of home-based staff in the UK, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand. Using our court reporting and training skills, we have built teams that are fully trained and experienced in legal and court-based requirements and we make use of the time zone differences to provide maximum flexibility for our clients. New Zealand, for example, is on the other side of the world from the UK, enabling us to send audio at the end of our working day to them to transcribe during their working day. Transcripts can be returned to us at the end of their working day - the start of our next day!

What are the potential pitfalls? It is absolutely critical to retain a high quality of transcription to ensure an accurate record of court is maintained. A drop in standards is typically accompanied by additional hidden costs for the courts and its users, leading to inefficiency and frustration. All home-based staff must be carefully recruited, tested and trained to meet traditional court reporting standards and careful editorial and quality control measures must be applied to ensure standards are consistent. There is undoubtedly a real advantage if editorial control is provided by court reporters with direct experience of preparing transcripts from similar hearings. In this way, expertise gained over many years is not discarded and quality can be guaranteed whilst still delivering notable savings over existing solutions.

Does Digital Audio Recording Replace the Court Reporter?

In a word, no. Digital audio recording can provide a clear audio record of proceedings and improves the ways in which that audio can be used. Audio-mining tools can search through recordings to isolate words and names to allow those sections to be played back, a useful although imprecise tool. Text remain the best and most accurate way of searching, analysing and reporting upon proceedings, so transcripts will still need to be generated. Providing an audio record is undoubtedly an enhancement, as would be a video image.

Speech recognition software, which can provide reasonably accurate text translations from a trained single voice, struggles to cope with multiple voices and, in an emotionally-charged courtroom, this is likely to remain the case for years. However, speech recognition software is improving all the time and we shall continue to experiment with it. If a first draft of a transcript can be generated of more than 95% accuracy by using a single voice to repeat the words of a recording, then the transcription process can start to be speeded up. However, there remains a requirement for the careful editing of the draft transcript and the contextual understanding of a court reporter in this process remains essential in maintaining quality.

What is Happening Today in the UK Courts?

The Court Service is currently evaluating digital audio recording within Crown and Magistrates courts as part of the government’s courts modernisation programme. It is early days for the project and so far it has sought only to replace the unreliable cassette recorders within the courtroom. In time, the additional benefits of making the record of proceedings directly available to the judges and the parties - for playback within chambers, back at their offices or at home in the evening - can be tested. The initial up-front costs of installing equipment and training users can be recovered through administrative efficiencies, reduced storage requirements and more cost effective transcription costs, whilst extending the range of services available. Every major jurisdiction in the world is moving towards digital recording.

Digital audio recording not only offers an improvement where a record is already being taken, but its cost-effectiveness extends the availability of having a formal record made of other matters, such as tribunal hearings for example. Participants can concentrate more fully on proceedings rather than taking detailed notes, speeding up the hearing process. The knowledge that a recording is being made elevates the importance of a hearing in the minds of all participants and discourages improper behaviour. Any points of contention during proceedings can be clarified through the playing back of recordings.

Although the majority of courts in the UK do not yet have permanent, digital recording installations, services are being provided which take advantage of this technology and offer clients greater flexibility in terms of service options and costs. Digital audio recording and transcription is being provided to a growing number of clients where the requirements of the hearing are well-suited to recording and the transcript is not required on an instantaneous or same day basis. Smith Bernal WordWave has a team of audio recording technicians and portable recording equipment that can be set up on a temporary basis. Proceedings are monitored throughout and logged on a continuous basis to provide key information for transcribers. The recording set up and process does not interfere at all with the usual courtroom layout or flow of a case and at the end of a hearing clients can have access to both a written and digital record of what’s been said.

What is Possible Today in the UK Courts?

There are always many challenges to be overcome before changes can to be introduced to the technical working processes within a courtroom. However, based upon existing cost effective technology and working from a laptop in the courtroom, a judge to a criminal case could potentially have immediate access to:

• all reference material made available in searchable and linked text, audio and video formats, including:
   - all previous days of evidence;
   - suspect and witness interviews carried out by the police;
   - text-based and imaged documents pertinent to the case;
   - transcripts, audio and video from related criminal cases and Court of Appeal cases and relevant statistics from a central sentencing remark database;

• a real-time transcript provided by a stenographer, on which he can make notes and code sections to issues, with digital images of documents referred to embedded within the text at the points where they are referred to in the case;

• all transcripts linked to the digital audio file and a digital video file of each witness from proceedings and interviews, allowing courtroom playback of the words, the sound of the voice and a picture of a witness’ demeanour to the jury.

New technology is rapidly expanding the opportunities for courtroom users to accelerate and improve the trial process through increased access to the record of proceedings. The court reporter should continue to thrive as a skilled and independent provider of reliable and accurate textual records of proceedings, but will need to adapt to how services are provided where alternative solutions can improve service levels or reduce costs. We believe that combining the enhanced court reporting skills gained from working in the courts for many years with an efficient, effective, low-cost home-based transcription team offers a persuasive solution moving forward.

Martin Bangs is Managing Director - Government & Public Sector, Smith Bernal WordWave.

email martin.bangs@wordwave.co.uk

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