Prosecuting counsel Christmas Humphties: "When you fired the revolver at close range into the body of David Blakely, did you intend to kill him?"
Ruth Ellis, defended by Melford Stephenson: "It is obvious that I intended to kill him"
When the client gives an answer like that, it is difficult to know what to do. The first thing is that this line of questioning should have been rehearsed with the client. The client would then , with luck, avoid giving that reply. She might have answered simply "I don't know" or "No" or "I don't know what I was thinking" or "It went off by accident" any of which might have saved her. As it was, it was difficult to think of any question in re-examination. You could ask "What did you mean by that reply?" and hope that the client would backtrack or at least say something which would make her answer suggest a moment of madness and a crime passionel, with the chance of a reprieve from the death sentence.
Christmas Humphries, prosecuting, became, or was already,a Buddhist, and was the mildest man you could ever meet. Melford Stephenson, defending, was quite the reverse. He became famous, or notorious,as the toughest, and toughest sentencer , of all the judges. It is said that, as a boy, he learned and often recited the words judges used in sentencing someone to death. He retired to a house which he named Truncheons, which seemed appropriate. He was perceived as more for the side that had truncheons as standard issue than for that of the people arrested.