COMMENT | Losing a trial is definitely a painful and agonising experience for any litigation lawyer. But, like it or not, the lawyer badly needs to subdue his or her disappointment.

Being a former trial lawyer myself, it is not difficult for me to empathise with the frustration felt by Najib Abdul Razak's lawyer - Shafee Abdullah - when the trial judge dismissed almost all his client's defences yesterday.

Unfortunately, he seemed to be unable to rein in his bitterness, so much so that his reaction yesterday made him look more like a sore loser.

For whatever reason, his statement, "In fact, although I’m sad for my client, in many ways, I’m happy because the more blunders I think a judge makes, the better our chances," is, with due respect, highly unprofessional and absolutely unwarranted.

Needless to say, such a sore-loser rhetoric is well out of line, to begin with.

With due respect, there was no justification at all for Shafee to...