The Land of Mary Poppins Stands Behind Its Nanny

As a Massachusetts judge weighs the fate of Louise Woodward, the land of Mary Poppins has already made up its mind about the 19-year-old nanny. Overwhelmingly, Britons believe that one of their own has been victimized by a harsh American justice system.

Superior Court Judge Hiller Zobel’s decision on whether to modify Woodward’s murder conviction in the death of her 8-month-old charge could come as early as today, and British passions are running high.

“We invented the concept of the efficient Mary Poppins, so it’s obvious we would feel insulted when an American mother accused a sweet-looking British girl of murdering her child,” columnist Alice Thompson said in the conservative Daily Telegraph. “The coverage of the trial has gone beyond mere anger of America seemingly snubbing the motherland. This is war.”

Two years ago, Britain watched the O.J. Simpson murder trial as a sobering glimpse into the heart of a violent, flawed modern American society. Now, once again glued to the TV--ratings quintupled for one channel showing the Woodward trial live--many people have seized on the conviction as a national affront to Britain by the same justice system that acquitted Simpson.

“I think the reaction is partly from the idea that she is being tried in a strange land by foreigners,” said Helene Joffee, a psychologist at the University of London. “There is general disbelief that a young girl sent abroad would be a murderer. If it had been a male au pair, I don’t think there would be such an outcry.”

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Janet Stockdale, who teaches social psychology at the London School of Economics, said, “I find it difficult to understand where the anger is directed, whether against the jury or the defense or the prosecution, but I think we are not entirely happy about how easily people turn to litigation in the United States.”

Britain is not a litigious country by American standards, and its courts tend to be low-key and their deliberations resolutely not televised. Once an arrest is made, the British press is not permitted to comment on a case until it comes to trial, and then it can report only what is said in court.

The U.S. system, familiar to TV viewers through endless American movies and the Simpson trial, is not a convincing alternative for many.

“I am disgusted with the verdict which makes the U.S. system look so laughable. What a pity that Louise was not a high-profile sportsman like O.J. Simpson,” Robert Hawkins wrote in a letter to one newspaper here.

In its contribution to a ferocious pro-Woodward media campaign, the Mirror, the country’s largest-circulation newspaper, spoke for many people last week with these words accompanying a front-page picture of the Statue of Liberty: “If this statue means anything to America, Louise Woodward would be given back her liberty.”

Perhaps as a legacy of empire, the British press often focuses on troubles encountered by its citizens abroad--and is often sympathetic to their plight.

In recent weeks, newspapers have argued the case of two British nurses accused of murder in Saudi Arabia, and of British soccer fans clubbed by riot police in Rome. As summer ended, British tabloids also tried and convicted France in general and the paparazzi as a tribe for the death of Princess Diana.

“Have mercy on Louise,” one tabloid begged Judge Zobel, and Woodward’s 71-year-old grandmother wrote him an open letter in another newspaper: “You are the only man on Earth who has the power to end this nightmare for us.”

When the jury’s verdict came on Halloween, television showed wrenching pictures of Woodward’s shocked neighbors gathered in their village pub as the news was delivered. “You could hear the crunch of dashed hopes,” one reporter said.

Since then, the village of Elton in northwest England has been a frequent guest in the national media, borrowing an American tradition of displaying yellow ribbons for its missing daughter.

Cameras and reporters at every turn recorded contributions to a Louise Woodward Fund and the candlelight vigil attended by Woodward’s sister Vicky, 18. The tabloid Sun distributed yellow “Free Louise” T-shirts.

In the flood, contrarians swim. Anne Robinson, columnist for the Express, laments the loss of a sense of proportion in judging the Woodward case. “What is happening to our British sense of fair play?” Robinson wondered, noting that Woodward was inexperienced and out of her depth and that, tragically, a baby in her care died. “But Louise Woodward is not a Beirut hostage, a person snatched and imprisoned by fanatics. She is not about to be stoned to death.”