You'll work at a Law practice situated in the middle of Negombo. The head Partner is also an acting magistrate in Negombo and is often in the office. The lawyers you'll work alongside are very friendly and speak good English. The office is small but neat and professional, and has air conditioning, two main rooms and a staff of five local lawyers.

WORK CONTENT:
Although they speak Singhalese and Tamil in Sri Lanka, the official language of law is English. Most court hearings take place in English, as does all legal documentation. Much of your work in the office may involve proof reading and drawing on your native language skills.

You will become involved in the current cases and you will also have the chance to sit on the bench at local courts observing hearings and trials. There are three courts in Negombo - the Magistrates Court, the High Court and the District Court. The Magistrates Court is conducted in Sinhalese, but it is possible that you will work at both the District Court and the High Court (where murder trials take place) - both of which conduct the majority of their proceedings in English.These are both within 2 minutes walking distance of the office and situated practically right on the beach!

You'll work from approximately 08:30am to 4:00pm from Monday to Friday. You'll live in Ja-Ela with all the other Travellers volunteers (who will be doing teaching or conservation projects) and you'll commute daily. Negombo is about 45 minutes from Ja-Ela.

Daily Schedule:
There is not a typical daily schedule as the placement is tailored around your  interests. If you wish to spend the majority of the time at Court this will be possible, likewise, if you wish to spend the majority of time in the office this can be arranged. A guide of what should be expected is:

The office day starts around 8am and interns will get to go to the Courts some days where they will sit on the bench and listen to the proceedings. You'll only attend Court when the proceedings take place in English. For ‘Court days’ you will be in court from 9-10 am and then again from around 2-3:30pm with a break for lunch in between. You will then work in the office again until 4.00pm.

On non-Court days you will stay in the office with the lawyers and help with writing deeds and day-to-day legal duties.

Exactly what your office work will involve will vary from day to day, case to case and intern to intern. You'll be able to help out with everything that goes on in the office and you will gain an extraordinary insight into the operations of law in Sri Lanka - a first-hand insight into international law.

Godfrey, the head partner of the firm is also the acting magistrate. This means he must attend post-mortems at the mortuary in cases where there is an ambiguous cause of death. If this is something you are interested in, you are welcome to attend (and please note, you do not have to attend - the lawyers in the practice are aware that some interns would find this distressing and would not wish to attend!) If you are interested, we cannot guarantee that you will be able to attend during your placement (as it is dependent on the number of post-mortems needed, which for obvious reasons, we hope are kept to a minimum!) but on average Godfrey attends the mortuary approximately once a month. 

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