Blue Loo

I was in Edinburgh Sherif Court yesterday - I hasten to add because of my involvement with the Gurkha Welfare Trust.
I went to the loo to discover that it is bathed in a most nauseous blue light. The ceiling had had initials burned into it by lighters, and anti-pig remarks. When I came out I asked the Sherrif I was seeing why the blue light.
" It stops them shooting up in there," he said." They can't find their veins"
He also told me that, this morning, he was going to have to deal with a total of 49 custodial sentences, and decide the length of time each person should serve. As he says, he only sees the charge, the plea entered and hence whether the accused plead guilty or was found guilty by trial. So he has no real idea of the circumstances ( pace background reports) and is largely fishing in the dark.He also says that because of the paperwork and general hassle involved, the Police ( in Lothians anyway) would appear to be concentrating on minor offences they can prove, and anything a bit more difficult gets shunted around, and hence badly dealt with.
A case in point was a murder. Circumstantial evidence included the murder weapon, victim's blood on the accused's clothes, a witness who overheard an exchange of words ( " It's yer birthday" " Yeah" " Here's yer present then, ya bass!" BANG!) The accused had an alibi. The Police hardly bothered to interview the people who the accused named as they said they would lie for him anyway. One day before the trial, the Procurator Fiscal gave the papers to the QC who would prosecute. Needless to say he had no time to do any checking ( remember Rumpole?) and ploughed on through two weeks of contradictory statements, bungled interviews and having to deal with three different lots of policemen who had been involved with the case.
At the end of it, the Judge simply had to direct the jury to acquit.
He has absolutely no doubt as to the accused's guilt.