Videoconferencing in Removal Hearings: A Case Study of the ...

egularly witnessed attorneys and clients becoming frustrated because they had no
privacy. In one observed hearing, an attorney asked to speak to the immigrant in private.
In this case, the trial attorney left the
courtroom, although other court officials did
not. The detention officer at Broadview did
not leave the room either. Observers never
40
The vast majority of lawyers
believed that private conference
was impossible. Observers
regularly witnessed attorneys and
clients becoming frustrated
because they had no privacy.
saw a judge outright deny a lawyer’s request to speak with the client privately.
In most cases, these impediments to attorney-client communication seemed to
slow the hearing process. One attorney explained that he would never ask a question or
do anything else in court that he and his client had not discussed beforehand. Since the
lawyer and his client could not speak privately during the hearing, the lawyer would ask
for a continuance if any unexpected issues arose, thus slowing the overall pace of that
immigrant’s case. In most cases, attorneys would ask for a continuance or for a merits
hearing. In a small number of cases, observers saw the outcome of the immigrant’s case
actually changing in the course of a videoconferencing hearing, as in the following
example:
The immigrant decided during the hearing to just accept the charges and return to
his country. At that, the attorney requested to be relieved, and the immigrant
granted his wish. I wonder whether things would have gone differently if the two
had a chance to speak in private.
Interpretation Problems
Language interpretation is a serious problem in the Chicago court, and
videoconferencing exacerbates it. Observers witnessed interpretation problems in 14% of