Courts had always been solemn places. Even the most rebellious rock musicians had to wear formal attire on the day they appeared in court and remain quiet except when it was their turn to speak.
When the judge in black robes appeared in the courtroom, everyone had to stand. Only after the judge sat down could everyone else take their seats.
Yet in most cases, misdemeanor courts did not follow such a grand procedure. If a Manhattan bankruptcy judge accustomed to operating at the top of the pyramid spent a day in misdemeanor court, he would definitely be astonished—he might think he had gone to the wrong place and wandered into a livestock auction.
Unlike judges who handled major criminal cases and bankruptcy cases, misdemeanor court judges had an enormous workload and had to hear dozens of cases a day.
Sometimes they did not even go into the courtroom, because it was too noisy there, and they occasionally encountered mentally ill defendants who might be completely unable to understand them. These cases could take a minute or two at most, or only a few dozen seconds at least—faster than Sirius Black had been sentenced to prison. Some judges even directly suggested that defendants speak with prosecutors. Their offices were usually underground, and after reaching a deal, the defendants would go to court to enter their guilty pleas.
Refusing to provide lawyers to defendants facing imprisonment was unconstitutional, but in misdemeanor courts, it was not only the Constitution and judges that were held in contempt. The New York Times called this system "cash-register justice," while the private supervision companies that sprang up alongside it were "bounty hounds." What they had in common with bounty hunters in Westerns was that they completed difficult tasks for their employers in exchange for rewards. Only,