AL Court Reporter common mistakes
AL Court Reporter · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
Transcribing a legal term from sound alone, writing 'hung jury' as 'hung jury' but rendering 'mistrial' as 'miss trial', or writing 'voir dire' as 'voir dire' but producing 'voir dyer' when the speaker is fast.
Candidates rely on phonetic spelling for terms they have heard but never seen written, and court reporting dictation rewards quick phoneme-to-letter conversion over lexical lookup.
What to do instead
Build a personal spelling list of high-frequency legal terms (voir dire, arraignment, allocution, demurrer, estoppel, tortfeasor, res judicata) and drill them from dictation until the written form is automatic; verify any term you cannot spell with certainty against a legal dictionary before finalizing the transcript.
Misplacing or omitting commas in restrictive versus nonrestrictive clauses, e.g., writing 'The defendant who was wearing a red jacket left' and 'The defendant, who was wearing a red jacket, left' interchangeably.
Spoken dictation gives no audible comma, so the reporter must infer sentence structure from meaning, and time pressure pushes toward guessing punctuation by pause rather than by grammar.
What to do instead
After transcription, re-read each sentence and apply the restrictive/nonrestrictive test: if removing the clause changes which person is meant, no commas; if it is parenthetical information, set it off with paired commas. Practice with paired-clause exercises where only the meaning distinguishes the two.
Confusing homophones that are frequent in testimony - 'counsel' vs. 'council', 'principal' vs. 'principle', 'elicit' vs. 'illicit', 'affect' vs. 'effect', 'waiver' vs. 'waver' - and leaving the wrong one in the transcript.
Machine shorthand writes by sound, so homophones produce identical strokes; the reporter must disambiguate from context during transcription, and fatigue causes the first plausible spelling to be accepted.
What to do instead
Maintain a homophone checklist tailored to court vocabulary and run a targeted search of the finished transcript for each pair, reading the surrounding context before choosing. Add these pairs to proofreading drills so the disambiguation becomes a habitual pass.
Guessing at medical terminology in testimony rather than flagging it, e.g., writing 'cervical' for 'cervicle' or substituting a plausible-sounding drug name for the one actually spoken.
Medical vocabulary in depositions and trials is dense and unfamiliar, and candidates fear interrupting or marking the record, so they silently substitute a near-miss word.
What to do instead
When a term is not confidently heard, mark it in the transcript (e.g., bracketed with a note) and verify against the record, exhibit, or a medical dictionary; never substitute a different term silently. Build familiarity with common anatomical, diagnostic, and pharmacological roots and suffixes so unfamiliar terms can be parsed rather than guessed.
Failing to preserve the verbatim record - cleaning up grammar, completing fragments, or omitting false starts and repeated words in an attempt to make the transcript read smoothly.
Candidates apply essay-writing instincts and equate a good transcript with readable prose, forgetting that the transcript is evidence of exactly what was said.
What to do instead
Transcribe exactly what was spoken, including repetitions, false starts, and grammatical errors, using standard conventions for inaudible or unclear passages rather than editing. Review the transcript against the recording and restore any cleaned-up language.
Letting the writing fall behind during dictation and then improvising or leaving gaps instead of writing a brief or conflict-free outline for the missed phrase.
Hesitation on an unfamiliar word or a brief that will not resolve causes a stall, and the candidate tries to catch up by skipping material rather than using a fallback stroke.
What to do instead
Practice a defined fallback strategy - write the word out phonetically with a conflict-free outline rather than freezing, and mark the timestamp to reconcile later. Drill dictation at graduated speeds with deliberate practice on recovery after a stumble, since recovery skill matters more than never missing a stroke.
Submitting the transcript without a systematic proofread, relying on the realtime translation as final output.
Realtime output looks finished on screen, and time pressure makes candidates skip the read-through, so untranslated strokes, wrong homophones, and formatting errors survive.
What to do instead
Adopt a fixed multi-pass proofreading routine: first pass for untranslates and obvious mistranslations, second for punctuation and grammar, third for names, numbers, and case citations against the record. Never treat realtime output as the final product; the proofread transcript is the deliverable.
Altering or summarizing the record to protect a party or to smooth over an embarrassing or unclear exchange, or discussing testimony outside the proceedings.
Candidates may feel loyalty to a speaker or discomfort with sensitive content and rationalize minor edits as helpful; confidentiality obligations are also easy to underestimate.
What to do instead
Treat the transcript as an unalterable record: transcribe sensitive content exactly, use the prescribed procedure for unclear or inaudible passages, and never discuss or disclose testimony outside authorized channels. Review the applicable ethical rules on accuracy and confidentiality before the exam and apply them to scenario questions.
Misrendering numbers, dates, and amounts - writing 'fifteen' for 'fifty', '2015' for '2050', or dropping a 'hundred thousand' - in testimony about damages, dosages, or dates.
Numbers are acoustically similar in rapid speech and carry no context to disambiguate, and candidates transcribe them from memory of the sound rather than verifying against the record.
What to do instead
Slow down and write numbers with deliberate attention, then verify every figure in the proofreading pass against the recording, especially in damages, medical dosage, and date testimony. Practice number-heavy dictation drills at speed until digit and word forms are reliably distinguished.
Confusing similar legal roles and terms in transcription - 'plaintiff' vs. 'defendant', 'appellant' vs. 'appellee', 'complaint' vs. 'motion' - when the speaker's reference is ambiguous.
These terms appear frequently and sound or read similarly, and candidates infer the role from the flow of testimony rather than confirming which party the speaker means.
What to do instead
Track party designations explicitly at the start of each proceeding and confirm ambiguous references from context or by marking them for verification. Drill role-and-term pairs in context sentences so the distinctions are recognized from usage rather than from sound alone.