Canadian Lawyer

turning 50," he says. He found himself reading Anthony Robbins' book Awaken the Giant Within. It challenged him to think of what to do if he had no commitments. "I decided to make a documentary about the work that JES was doing." By that fall, an opportunity appeared. Legal support material for JES' Vietnam program was needed in the form of an educational tool for trainers advising two groups of individuals: farmers with land disputes and women wanting court access to obtain a divorce. "The project involved working with the communist government in Vietnam to provide the education," he says, but it also took him into the rice fields of the rural areas to film. Herman admits he was so inexperienced at that time he was literally reading Filmmaking for Dummies as the plane touched down in Hanoi. Herman shot video over a 10-day period including interviews with local judges, women's community groups, farmers, and individuals involved in the training process. Four months later, a video training tool Justice Through Knowledge: A New Vision for Public Legal Education in Vietnam was finished. The video's success prompted JES to look at what could be done using video to publicize its work internationally. "Even lawyers who had heard of JES thought they just gave tours of the courthouse (which they do), but were unaware of their work in the international community," says Herman. By May 2011, Herman was scheduled to travel with Neaman to Ethiopia, where Canadians had been actively teaching crime scene investigation techniques for police and prosecutors. He spent two weeks shooting a film that looked at Canada's role. Herman says while the British and American teams had carried out similar work, the Canadian contribution was different. It supplied the components and let the local justice system deal with how best to integrate the knowledge. "No one had come to set up a program in Ethiopia to do that," he says. The film captured the contributions made by many individuals such as the retired RCMP officers who brought cutting-edge investigative techniques to local police and prosecutors. A year later, the video Crime Scene Investigation Ethiopia: The Genesis was shown in Vancouver's Vancity theatre and provided the first comprehensive look at Canada's role in supporting Ethiopia's move to an improved democratic justice system. The first two videos are available on the JES web site. The Most Violent Place on Earth video, finished in April 2013, remains offline, as Herman hopes to show it at a film festival. Currently, it's to be shown at the International Association of Prosecutors conference in Moscow Sept. 8-12. ntitled-7 1 Herman is looking forward to doing a fourth video in the future, enjoying the creative process that enables him to combine both his fascinations with the law with his passion for film making. And, at the same time, travel with his wife. "We work as a team," he says, adding the hours and hours of vetting film clips together have been some of the "the most intensive couples therapy. We have had some of our best fights over which clips to keep or cut," he laughs. A Noticeable Difference ™ TORONTO I BARRIE I HAMILTON I KITCHENER 1-866-685-3311 I www.mcleishorlando.com www.CANADIAN L a w ye r m a g . c o m September 2013 27 13-08-13 1:16 PM

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