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Around Town Meets...
Stephen D Smith MBE
By Brian Elliott
 John Mortimer’s Rumpole would like him. Reality TV is all the rage these days. If our local courts were televised I know who would be an outstanding performer. Stephen Smith is a self-confessed ‘larger-than-life’ character in many walks of a workaholic life. What you see and hear is what you get in every context: in court, on stage, in public and private settings. The word ‘perform’ is key. That’s what he does best.
Not surprisingly, Steve is no stranger to the television studio and is a radio regular. Humour is a natural part of Steve’s day-to-day persona. Although he wont admit it, don’t underestimate his undoubted abilities in many socially important areas, his dedication and sense of justice. Not bad attributes for a criminal lawyer.
In the 1990s Steve appeared in two Rough Justice television programmes, acting on behalf of John Megson, who was wrongly convicted of murder when he refused to ‘gas’ on his mates under an unwritten bikers’ ‘code of silence’. The amazing story with a successful outcome was told in Steve’s landmark book, Hell is Not for Angels, in which the real murderers were named - and which was banned until after their trial.
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 Steve’s regular clients include a motley collection of characters, some more likeable and more presentable than others, caricatured in a series of hilarious books: Boozers, Ballcocks and Bail; Plonkers, Plaintiffs and Pleas; Junkies, Judges and Jail; and Muggers, Mobsters and Me. Subject to suitable alliteration being found, a fifth volume is forthcoming. Smith’s comic writings have been compared to those of James Herriot and, according to Gervase Phinn, ‘...lift the spirit and make the reader laugh aloud’. I can certainly confirm this to be correct, having read Smith on successive holidays and nearly got arrested on four contrasting occasions: on a plane, at a welcome party, on a beach and in a restaurant.
Over the years, largely through his charity work, Steve has met and become friends with a number of showbiz and sporting personalities, including Jeremy Beadle, the late Adam Faith (whom he has also represented) and Charlie Williams (the subject of Steve’s biography, Charlie), Norman Collier, Bobby Knutt, Duggie Brown, Jim Bowen and Gervase Phinn. Recently, he was recruited to act for the boxer Prince Naseem Hamed in a highly publicised case. Typically, as I write, Steve has obtained several items of Dolly Parton memorabilia for a charity auction.
Steve is an accomplished musician and entertainer, much in demand as an after-dinner speaker (locally, nationally and internationally), and is the producer of numerous stage shows. A recent charity event with Gervase Phinn, at the Lyric Theatre, Dinnington, was so successful that further collaborations are inevitable. Many of us will remember the Capstick and Smith ‘World Tour of South Yorkshire’ which played to sell-out audiences at local theatres.
It is the fund raising aspects of his productions that are so important to Steve, in aid of a variety of local charities, such as PACT (Parents Association for Children with Tumours and Leukeumia), Safe At Last (young persons at risk after having to leave home), the Bluebell Wood Children’s Hospice Appeal and Macmillan Cancer Support.
It was mainly for local charity work that Steve was honoured with an MBE in 2006. He was both moved and surprised when he attended Buckingham Palace for the ceremony. Although it was obviously a great honour and an occasion that his late parents would have been immensely proud, he told me that he could not help thinking of others who were more deserving than himself, people like local cancer charity worker Sheila Jackson whose own family was devastated by the disease; and also spoke about the young man with Downs Syndrome, put at ease by The Queen during the presentation. Steve also admitted that when his moment came to meet His Majesty he was almost lost for words - a great rarity, as many who know him will testify. Confidence developed in a more informal context later when he considered asking HM about a knighthood...
Because of our mutual literary interests I have known Steve for several years - and also through our time spent as volunteer contributors on BBC Radio Sheffield. I’m sure that many readers will remember that popular period, not too long ago, when the Tony Capstick afternoon show included chats with a variety of ‘experts’. Tony and his guests became pals, the interchanges were memorable and the listener response was fantastic. Tony is sadly missed by all of us. Funnily enough, I had never had a long conversation with Steve, so really looked forward to meeting him at his Hemingfield home. Steve and his wife, Jennifer, made me most welcome and we got through several pots of tea on a very wet Saturday afternoon.
Straight away, I discovered new aspects of Steve’s interests. Despite the weather, we had a walk in his garden which includes a small area of woodland. Here, he has helped create a veritable oasis of calm, with considerable emphasis given to wildlife features. Working such long hours, it was obvious that the physical and relaxation benefits of this tranquil spot were extremely important to him.
I’m no psychologist, but it soon became clear, too, that there are a number of underlying influences that have, and continue to motivate his extremely busy life. Steve’s family background never seems far away from his thoughts. In fact I would venture to say that his late parents are always remembered, particularly at times of his successes; and also his brother, Neville, killed, along with sister-in-law, Heather, in a terrible car crash.
Douglas, Steve’s dad, worked for the Co-op as a butcher, moving from shop to shop, so formative years were spent in the salubrious suburbs of Sheffield, South Kirkby, Scunthorpe and, eventually, Barnsley. Mother, Ethel, who worked in a Sheffield munitions works during the war, initially found work in the Barnsley area at a polythene factory in Darton, and later, alongside Douglas, at Farrands, an early Barnsley supermarket. Douglas’s move to private sector employment also meant the loss of the house, so the family found a council house on the new Athersley North estate, at 55 Chatsworth Road. Steve told me that living there was one of the most important influences in his early life. It taught him how to deal with ‘tricky and difficult situations’. You played conkers with hammers and ‘stretch’ with Bowie knives. In Athersley in those days you had to either run or fight - and no one could catch young Smithy.
Stephen Smith left Barnsley’s Longcar Central School at the age of sixteen with five bottom-grade ‘O’ levels and a budgerigar - and no prospects. His ambition was to be a professional musician. In the age of the Swinging Sixties, The Beatles and Merseysound the electric guitar was king. Steve chose the piano accordion.
But excellent tuition and encouragement from Horace Crossland helped the young man to progress to championship standard, he found his forte, and a mischievous stage career began.
Sport, also an interest at school, led young Smith into a most unexpected legal career. A pal, Tony Wood, worked as an office boy for Bury & Walkers, the well known Barnsley solicitors. Tony recruited Steve to play in their soccer team. On his debut, Steve scored a hat-trick and followed this with a 4-goal tally in a cup game. The 5 goals that he scored in the semi-final (in which he received a free meal and ten bob) coincided with an interview for a job - much to his relieved parents - at Barclays Bank. Not wishing to lose their star performer for the final, Bury & Walkers gave Steve a prestigious job - as an assistant office boy, at £4.10s a week - and the rest, as they say, is history. But not quite. His parents were so proud of him that Steve was kitted out with a new sports jacket and cavalry twill trousers, but was totally out of place in the suit-dominated office. Dismissal followed within twelve months and ‘Lord Byron’ was to blame, or at least an antique desk which did not fully survive intact when Steve conveyed it down to the basement, its detached legs eventually made use of by an opportunistic caretaker - to feed the stove. When Sotherby’s arrived to value ‘Lord Byron’ (Steve thought they were Sutherland’s, the potted meat people) the senior partner was not amused by its decimated condition. Steve’s order was for two million office toilet rolls (rather that two gross - its easy to tick a wrong box) so this was the last straw. The present-day solicitors are probably using the same stock, so Steve has really saved them a fortune.
Not deterred, Steve found employment with other practices and a serious passion for the law began. Qualifying was an uphill task as he did not have the usual academic background but hard work and perseverance paid off and, in 1971, the year of his marriage, he found the area and people he liked - in Rotherham. Steve passed his exams at Leeds University and in 1979 began a court career, appearing in Magistrates’ and Crown Courts nationwide. Stephen Smith’s Rotherham-based legal practice with partner Steven ‘the stable one’ Wilford has now survived for more than a quarter of a century - without a formal agreement. Trust can work in legal practices.
The adversity, snobbishness, bullying and injustice that Steve has experienced in the legal profession and elsewhere, continues to drive and frame his work ethic. If I get into bother I hope he will act for me.
For more information please see Steve’s excellent website: www.steve-d-smith.co.uk
Published Spring 2007. All information correct at time of print.
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