Court reporting services are incredibly important to our justice system, yet many people don’t realize the importance of it. Court reporters are a necessary and downright useful component of the judicial system, and without them cases would be difficult to conduct — or review. Read on for a few of the ways they help out every day in our court system.
Court reporters must go through a certification program at the end of which they are certified court reporters. In order to be certified by the NCRA (National Court Reporters Association), they must be able to type 225 words per minute. The NCRA currently represents 20,000 of the 21,200 court reporters in the United States.
Accuracy
Court reporters are required to have the ability to record what is said in the court room with 95% accuracy or higher. It is one of the things that makes court reporting incredibly difficult. With this kind of accuracy, appellate courts can easily go in to look at a case and make a decision about whether any legal wrongdoing happened during a trial. It also makes it easier for other judges to study cases which set a precedent for later cases.
Transcription
Court reporters also transcribe things for attorneys, providing a necessary and sometimes menial task in order to give attorneys time to fight a case or go through evidence. It is services like this that take a court reporter to the next level.
Translation
Many times, a court reporter will have to translate a case, evidence, or a transcription into a different language. This can be for any number of reasons and a service for any number of people, and it is a necessary task for many reporters. This is why in today’s society, it is recommended that reporters be bilingual or at least proficient in another language.
