Malls, TV Luring Court Watchers Away : Hobbies: A million people a day, however, are tuning in to Court TV. Such devotees are said to be transfixed because they like to watch what is essentially a “nonviolent fight” between two sides.

Long before the O. J. Simpson case, long before Court TV, people like Vincent Provenzano were hanging out at courthouses, watching America at its worst.

“You wouldn’t believe what kind of people are walking this world today--animals--rape, murder, shootings, killings,” Provenzano, a 72-year-old retiree who has been watching trials for 14 years, said recently in the echoing halls of the Suffolk County courthouse.

Court watchers are known by various names. In Boston, the court officers call them “outside jurors.” In New York, they’re “court buffs.”

They went to court before cases like the Simpson case, where 10 seats for the public will be coveted prizes, and they’ll be going afterward.

But the number who actually make the trek to the courthouse are dwindling in this age of malls, declining downtowns and television, including Court TV.

“It must be a dying hobby,” said William Hrabsky, a veteran murder prosecutor in New York City.

A million people a day are tuning in to Court TV, said Steven Brill, Court TV’s chief executive and founder.

“I think there’s probably more of courtroom watching,” he said. “It’s just not going down to the courthouse and going through the metal detector and up the elevator. People don’t go downtown the way they used to.”

Brill said people are transfixed by trials because they like to watch what is essentially a “nonviolent fight” between two sides.

Hrabsky said court watchers in New York’s Bronx used to give him advice. And sometimes he’d take it. “A lot of it is just old folks’ common sense. Sometimes you get so involved in a trial you lose your common sense,” he said.

One of those who watched in the Bronx was Mabel Wayne, who gave out packs of gum and was given an honorary court officer’s badge. She became part of a trial herself after her 1985 murder. Now, a street near the Bronx courthouse is named Mabel Wayne Way.

Hrabsky said court watchers in the Bronx have dwindled to only one or two regulars.

“This day and time, people don’t come in like they used to,” said J. D. McAdory, a former sheriff in Hinds County Circuit Court in Jackson, Miss. “People live a fast-lane life in this day and time.”

In the federal and local courts in Boston, court officers recently were able to point out only about a half-dozen court watchers.

“We just like to see justice done. That’s basically all we want,” said Louis Morrissey, 63, a retired shipyard worker, during a break in a corruption trial in federal court. He said he’s been watching cases for almost 40 years.

At the Suffolk County courthouse, 64-year-old court watcher George O’Hearn said, “The real thing, of course, is better than watching it on TV. But TV’s almost the same thing.”

“This is where I kill a few hours,” said Provenzano.

With that, the two men walked away quickly, back to Room 808 and a murder trial they were following.