Amanda Vaughan
Northern News Services
Published Friday, November 9, 2007

YELLOWKNIFE - In a courtroom, the media tend to focus on the "star players": the judge, the lawyers, the criminals and the victims.

Jane Romanovich transcribes a presentation being made in a Yellowknife courtroom to a handful of teens in the room learned about the justice system for Take Your Children to Work Day. - Amanda Vaughan/NNSL photo

However, there are a number of other professions required to facilitate the daily execution of the law, such as sheriffs, clerks, and of course, court reporters.

Jane Romanovich has been a court reporter since 1986, taking her training in one of two schools that have since closed down. In fact, there is now only one place in the country where a person can study the profession.

"The only program available now is at NAIT in Edmonton," she said.

Romanovich, who lived in Calgary at the time, got into the career after being a legal secretary for a few years.

"I had taken law in high school, and was interested, and the money was good," she said, adding fondly that it seemed rather prestigious to enter through the large brass doors in Calgary's courthouse at the time.

After 21 years in the business, she said she has seen a lot of the same types of cases come through the system, but that she still finds the job interesting.

"I find wildlife cases fascinating," she said, mentioning a specific civil case that involved a company's effect on a regional fishery in the territory.

"It was about the biology and the fish spawning areas, and the terminology was different than what we normally see," she said.

Though the administration of justice can be interesting, it definitely has its negative side, and Romanovich said that can take its toll on court workers.

"Sometimes (being in court all the time) makes you feel like there are more criminals in the world than there are good citizens," she said, adding, "you have to remember that the majority of people never come through the courts, so you don't see them."

She said listening to the unpleasant details of cases doesn't affect her too severely, because she is able to focus on her task.

"This is my job," she said. "I take down what they say. I am dealing with people that I don't know."

It's easy to imagine how focused a court reporter has to be when he or she is expected to transcribe dialogue at speeds well over 200 words per minute.

Romanovich said the job requires detailed theory training in the phonetic construction of words.

"We learn the letters that make up certain sounds," she said.

The stenograph machine court reporters type on does not use the entire alphabet.

They type in phonetic combinations of letters, and computer software translates the key combinations into proper English in real time.

Romanovich said changes in the technology are constantly evolving the job.

"I have had to learn different theory at least a couple of times now," she said.

"If you have to think about it, you've missed a sentence," she said, adding that the automatic nature of the job filters over into her spare time.

"Sometimes when I am watching TV or listening to someone speak, I will be patterning the words in my head," she said.

Also, if people are saying it, she said, you have to know it. Court reporters take courses in English and Latin as well as legal and medical terminology in their training, but the language learning curve never stops.

"I've built up a collection of reference books," she said.

She has had to learn terms used by industries ranging from construction to pharmaceuticals, and added that the Internet is a big help for reference as well.

Since there's no stopping to look up a word in the courtroom, it's all about keeping a large vocabulary.

"The training is very intense," she said.