Courtroom Sketches of the Famous and Felonious

The New York Times just published a piece on Marilyn Church, a courtroom sketch artist who, since 1974, has been tasked with depicting some remarkably high-profile cases, some of which have featured truly famous defendants—from Martha Stewart to Woody Allen to Mark David Chapman (who killed John Lennon).

Sketching trials is not a life many choose. Not everyone wants to spend weeks among suspects and lawyers where prison time or reputations are at stake and where emotions are at their rawest. Not everyone would have wanted to sit through a custody case in which Mia Farrow, angry that Woody Allen had run off with an adopted daughter, accused him of molesting their 7-year-old daughter.

Trials can be deadly dull, the Perry Mason moments outstripped by a medical examiner’s meticulous description of a skull’s architecture. Still, Ms. Church savors the life.

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See more a collection of Church's work here.

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