Professional Court Reporters Benefit From the Aid of Scopists

By turning to litigation support services, clients can expect to have their choice of professional court reporters that possess the training, experience and accuracy that court trials and depositions demand. However, after depositions and court testimony have been recorded, there has to be a quick turn around time between the end of the recording and its transition into an error free transcript. To this end, professional court reporters can benefit from the aid of a reputable scopist; a person who helps to ensure the accuracy of a final transcript.

On the surface, scopists can seem like little more than proofreaders, but their skill set extends far beyond simply correctly ancillary mistakes in transcripts. In fact, most scopists have the same skill set as court reporters when it comes to producing final transcripts. When court reporters finish recording testimony, they use computer aided translation software (CAT) to translate the shorthand produced by stenography machines into a rough manuscript. When aided by a scopist, a court reporter then entrusts the final version of the transcript to the scopist. In addition to the rough transcript, a scopist also receives any supporting audio recordings and other documentation and verifies the accuracy of the transcript against these sources. In addition, scopists also help court reporters update their CAT dictionaries with new stenographic keystroke patterns.

Whether or not to recruit a scopist in addition to a courthouse reporter is consideration that should be based on the workload of the reporter. If a reporter figures to remain busy with depositions and trials, expecting him or her to then produce final manuscripts can lead to overwork and a compromise in the reporter's ability to remain sharp. Since the quality of a final transcript is ultimately on the shoulders of a reporter, some reporters are hesitant to work with scopists. Yet, on the flip side, when reporters find a scopist they feel they can trust, they usually prefer to let a scopist aid them in the production of final transcripts, especially during times when multiple reporting assignments can lead to a backlog of rough transcripts.

When a client wishes to hire a scopist and has no luck with a litigation support services provider, consulting a legal staffing service that offers staffing for a broad range of legal positions usually results in a find. Clients can expect for a reputable legal staffing service's scopists to undergo the same rigorous screening that it applies to attorneys, paralegals, court reporters, etc. As with other legal positions, an impeccable scopist is someone who possesses the right training, experience and personal disposition for the job. Therefore, in addition to screening scopists on objective criteria like their education and skill sets, staffing services also evaluate scopists on whether their personal tendencies represent a benefit or detraction to the demands of scoping.