It was a fraught year for the bar thanks to the government's controversial legal aid 'reforms'. But Grayling's frontal assault wasn't the only news from the courts.
2014 also saw the back of one of Britain's most vexatious litigants, as a notorious barrister (also a TfL customer service assistant) was finally banned from bringing actions after never winning a case. Joining him in the foyer was debenched Constance Briscoe, while the year's most extraordinary barrister, Dr The Right Honourable The Lord Harley of Counsel of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, inventor of the siege weapon known only as The Hedgehog, also found himself in hot water.
 | Dr The Right Honourable Etc |
Another barrister was unfazed by the future of the bar because he's the kind of fellow who threatens to "do the c*nt" and he'll break it's faackin knees, you mug, when he's not being disciplined. In other sweary news, a judge mixed up who was "a fucking dickhead" and who was "a c*nt". He was lucky not to be sitting in Kazakstan, where dramatic footage surfaced of a furious lawyer attacking a judge with a fly swat.
Another judge making the headlines was (ex) DDJ Richard Hollingworth, who, in one of the year's most extraordinary stories, mused to an astounded court, "with a name like Patel, she won't be working anywhere important". Further demonstrating that the bar's loon-filtration system is in need of fine-tuning, 2014 also saw the trial of a barrister who claimed that Germans were planning to blow up the Queen at the 2012 Olympic Games with a nuclear bomb.
 | "It's all a conspiracy, even Nostradamus knows that" "Meow" |
Despite the rotten apples, and the cuts, there was some good news. The courts still managed to get things done, resulting in shocked faces at Camden Council when High Court bailiffs arrived to cart away its furniture. 2014 also brought the barrister's miracle pooch who taps his diabetic owner's foot when her blood sugar drops too low, while a brief found love and global fame marrying a Nespesso salesman. And another achieved slightly less fame by claiming Milkybars are decorated with penises.
 | Have your say. The RollOnFriday Firm of Year 2015 survey is now open, and so is the survey for in-house lawyers. |