Wellington barrister Greg King's comments to the Otago Daily Times last night followed reports that Dunedin lawyer Judith Ablett-Kerr QC - who led the Weatherston defence - had received death threats and had acid thrown on her car.
Ms Ablett-Kerr, who could not be contacted yesterday, had argued during Weatherston's trial that he had been provoked by his victim, Sophie Elliott, and was therefore guilty of manslaughter rather than murder.
Use of the provocation defence aroused considerable public anger and Mr King confirmed Ms Ablett-Kerr had suffered an "unprecedented level of attack".
"There were abusive communications by the truckload," he said.
Asked why a defence of provocation was used, an "irked" Mr King said lawyers offered advice but were bound by the instructions given to them by their clients.
"Who do you think calls the shots in any case? . . . Do you think the lawyer makes it up?"
Mr King said he would not comment specifically on the Weatherston case but then said: "You know the person you are dealing with, you know his intellect, and you know his approach. You've seen him give evidence on the media presumably for days and days and days. Do you really think that was a lawyer-driven defence?"
Weatherston's time on the stand was marked by behaviour described variously as superior, narcissistic and contemptuous.
Mr King said lawyers' first obligation was to the court.
Their second was to their client.
"Lawyers run the case that their clients instruct them to run whether we think it's good, whether we think it's bad. Obviously, we advise. Obviously, we discuss. But at the end of the day, we take instructions and we follow those instructions. That is our system."
A "sector of the community" did not have any "real understanding or appreciation" of what role lawyers played in the justice system and the "popular media; not journalism" promoted misunderstanding.
"Programmes that centre around court processes, from Boston Legal to a million others, really do not represent accurately the role of the lawyers. Going off on hunches, going off on tangents, going off on what they think is a good idea - that's not how it is in the real world. In the real world, the lawyer follows the instructions of the client.
" . . . these programmes just completely misrepresent how it actually is."
