Word: courtroom
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Dabbing tears from her eyes, Joan Collins was the perfect picture of the wronged woman. "I never met a man yet who was able to take care of me," she said sadly. "I've been taken advantage of by men since I was 20." Then, staring across the courtroom at her estranged husband, she added, "Men have a tendency to change when they get married." Collins was not rehearsing Dynasty, but the lines she spoke last week sounded as if they came from a soap opera -- The Bold and the Beautiful, perhaps...
...beautiful was, of course, Collins, who at 54 can still turn a few heads. In fact, the 45-seat courtroom was not big enough for the many reporters, European as well as American, who wanted to cover the best show in town, and crowds gathered outside the door to watch the drama on TV monitors. In many newspapers and on some TV news shows, it threatened to upstage the Iranscam hearings...
...congressional committees in particular were stunned by the media monster they created. Fitting punishment for their hypocrisy: first, the committees create a courtroom drama, complete with sharp lawyers shredding hapless witnesses on live television; then the committees complain that America has been captivated by a witness's manner instead of concentrating on his words and deeds. Can't have it both ways. Turn an inquiry into a spectacle and you cannot protest that the audience is insufficiently attentive to the transcript. The Iran-contra committees could have modestly pursued their business off-camera, as did the Tower commission. No secrecy...
...collar crime. Last January he joined the Iran-contra investigation for what he calls the greatest challenge of his career. For the defense: Brendan Sullivan, 45, a partner at Washington's best-known criminal- law firm, Williams & Connolly. Despite his mild appearance, Sullivan is a tireless worker and tenacious courtroom fighter...
Outside the courtroom, the surrounding Ukrainian countryside remained desolate 14 months after the Chernobyl accident. Farms were devoid of livestock, gardens were untended, and weeds grew above the windowsills of abandoned houses. The town of Pripyat, once home to some 50,000 workers, may never be resettled. Nearby, 27 villages are still so heavily contaminated that workers have abandoned cleanup efforts. Signs warned against driving on road shoulders, which could stir up radioactive dust, and army trucks made up most of the traffic on two-lane roads that once were thoroughfares to markets...