How to Get Featured in Law & Crime

Law & Crime is one of the better routes for a practising lawyer to reach a wide audience, and one of the easiest to get wrong.

Here is what it covers, how coverage happens, and what you have to be careful about.

What Law & Crime is

Law & Crime is an established outlet covering court cases, trials, criminal justice and true crime. It has its own editorial team, reporting on live matters for an audience that follows cases closely.

That audience is unusual. It is general rather than professional, but it is far more informed about procedure than a typical news reader, because it follows hearings and rulings as they happen.

Coverage is an editorial decision made inside that team. There is no route that lets you publish yourself on the masthead, and earned coverage is exactly what it sounds like.

Who gets used as a source

The realistic route in for a professional is commentary. An editor or producer needs someone who can explain what a ruling means, why a motion matters, or what is likely to happen next in a matter already being covered.

Credentials are the currency. Your practice area, the courts you appear in, the kinds of matters you have actually handled: that is what decides whether you get used. A criminal defence lawyer who has tried cases is useful on a trial. A commercial solicitor is not, however senior.

Availability matters nearly as much as expertise. These stories move in hours, not weeks. The lawyer who answers the phone at four o'clock gets quoted, and the one who replies the following morning does not.

Getting on the list is mostly logistics. A short biography that states your jurisdiction and practice area, a number somebody can actually reach, a recent clip if you have one, and a willingness to say when a question falls outside your expertise.

What makes good legal commentary

Explanation, not advocacy for your own practice.

What gets used is plain language about a technical thing: what a charge actually requires the prosecution to prove, why a judge ruled the way they did, what the defence is likely to argue next, what a sentencing range really means in practice. If a viewer finishes the segment understanding something they did not understand before, you have done the job.

Be careful with certainty. Predicting outcomes in a matter you are not party to is where commentators damage themselves, and it is also where conduct rules start to bite. Explaining the range of possibilities is more useful and more defensible than calling the result.

Nobody is interested in how good your firm is. Say something worth hearing about the case and the credibility follows on its own.

Brevity helps more than people expect. A usable quote is one or two sentences that stand on their own, and a commentator who answers in paragraphs tends to be cut down to the least interesting part of the answer.

Professional conduct rules still apply

This is the part that makes legal media different from every other kind, and it is the part people skip.

Lawyers commenting publicly on cases remain bound by their own bar association or regulator's rules. Those typically cover publicity and advertising, client confidentiality, conflicts, comments on live or pending matters, and claims about outcomes. The specifics vary by jurisdiction and by the type of admission you hold.

We are not your regulator, and nothing on this page is legal advice. Check the current rules that apply to you, and clear anything you are unsure about through your own firm's process before you speak. In practice that usually means avoiding outcome claims, avoiding anything touching a client matter that has not been properly authorised, and being careful about live proceedings.

The routes in

• Expert commentary. Being reachable, quotable and right about a case already in the news. Earned, and the most durable route by far.
• News with substance. A matter you are involved in that has genuine public interest, within what you are permitted to discuss.
• Advertising and sponsored content. Separate commercial products, labelled where they appear, and not the same as editorial.

Be sceptical of anyone guaranteeing the first two. If you want something more reachable to build a record with first, a smaller legal title is a more honest starting point.

Building a record first makes all of this easier. Editors and producers are far more likely to use someone who has been quoted credibly elsewhere, because it tells them you will not create a problem on air or in print.

What we do

We develop the angle, prepare you as a credible commentator with the material an editor needs, and take it where the fit is genuine. You approve everything before it goes anywhere, which matters more in a regulated profession than almost anywhere else.

We will also tell you when this is the wrong target, and when your own compliance process needs to see something before we do.

Frequently asked questions

Can I buy editorial coverage here?

No. Advertising and labelled sponsored content are separate commercial products. Editorial coverage is decided by the editorial team and is not for sale.

What kind of lawyer gets used?

Practitioners with direct experience in the area a story concerns, usually criminal law, litigation or a specialism a case turns on, who can explain it clearly and quickly.

Do my bar rules apply to media appearances?

Generally yes. Publicity, confidentiality and comment rules apply to media work as they do to marketing. Check with your own regulator, because we cannot advise you on them.