In contrast to the constant buzz of traffic streaming down Front Street, walking into Richard Ground's office is like stepping into an oasis of calm.

The odd car horn or revving engine from Bermuda's main thoroughfare might occasionally break the peace. But the noisy interruptions from the nearby road are nothing compared to the cacophony of protest in some quarters that greeted his appointment as Chief Justice two years ago.

The decision to give a non Bermudian the top legal job triggered anger from many in Government circles. Premier Alex Scott made little secret of the fact that he backed Puisne Judge Norma Wade-Miller, who has Bermuda status, ahead of the British candidate. That put the PLP on a very public collision course with Governor Sir John Vereker, who by backing Mr. Ground kick-started a heated debate about the degree of autonomy Bermuda should have from the United Kingdom.

Now, 24 months into his job, how does Mr. Ground feel looking back on the saga? What impact did it have on the way he started his new role, back on an Island where he served as a judge for six years in the '90s? Obviously unwilling to re-ignite a major political row with three years of a five-year contract left, he's unwilling to comment publicly in detail about the issue.

But he does offer some brief thoughts on the appointment controversy. "I do not think it affected the way I did my job," said the Chief Justice, swiftly playing down the significance of the diplomatic row that occurred before he even got his feet under his desk.

"That argument was had before I arrived."

He added: "I'm very happy to say that since I arrived everyone put it behind them. Since my arrival those arguments have not arisen again.

"I think that is to everybody's credit that it has happened that way."

Significantly, the public debate about a non Bermudian occupying the top legal post has not resurfaced during his tenure. Does he see that as an endorsement of the job he has done so far?

"One would like to think so but I do not know," he replied cautiously. "I would not like to speculate on the reasons, but that was over by the time I came."

Asked about his working relationship with the Premier, Mr. Ground again appeared to choose his words carefully.

"I do not have to deal with him very much," he said. "But whenever I do he's always most cordial."

During his time working as a barrister the well-travelled Chief Justice, with three decades of legal experience under his belt, specialised in media and commercial litigation. This included defamation work. So it's safe to assume he probably kept a close eye on what was written about him in the run-up to his return to Bermuda.

When some other thorny issues are raised during the course of the 90-minute interview, the Chief Justice says he is unable, for professional reasons, to comment on them. They include recent reported upheavals at the Department of Public Prosecutions or his views on the ongoing failure of the Bermuda courts to secure a murder conviction in the Rebecca Middleton case, ten years old next month.

But there are long-running contentious topics the Chief Justice is more than happy to speak about, from security concerns in the Island's courtrooms through to the urgent need for an all-purpose Supreme Court to replace the old fashioned buildings currently scattered over several sites in Hamilton. Despite the arguments about his local credentials, Mr. Ground is certainly no stranger to working in sun-kissed financial centres in the middle of Atlantic. Immediately before heading back to Bermuda in 2004, he spent four years heading the Turks and Caicos Islands' justice system. Boasting a population of 25,000 and with skies packed with hawks, hummingbirds and falcons, he said it was a "great place" for his main passion outside work: bird photography.

Time in the Turks was preceded by a stint as a Puisne Judge in Bermuda, between 1992 and 1998, and a nine-year stay in the Cayman Islands where he started as Crown Counsel in 1983 and rose rapidly through the ranks to Attorney General.

He had already started to make his mark in London legal circles, however, when he left the UK back in 1983. As a junior in the early 80s, Mr. Ground worked on the longest libel action in British legal history. The Daily Mail newspaper accused the Moonies religious group of brainwashing and kidnapping. Sadly for Mr. Ground, the Daily Mail won after a landmark six-month trial.

The Chief Justice also did advisory work for English newspapers, poring over the pages of The Guardian three nights a week checking for defamation dangers before they went to print. Time spent at the more sensational tabloids The Sun and the News of the World, however, were "truly nightmarish", he recalls.

So what made the Oxford-educated lawyer leave the comfort of a London law career and move to warmer climes in the early '80s?

"After seven years at Chambers, I wasn't sure if I wanted to spend the rest of my life sitting in some office in central London.

"I applied for a job as a Magistrate in the Solomon Islands. At 33, I was told I was too young, but there was a job in the Cayman Islands."

He added: "I had no idea where that was but I went out there in March 1983 and stayed for nine years."

On arrival back in Bermuda in 2004, however, he faced a major case backlog. Big trials were taking years to arrive for trial. Under Mr. Ground's watch, however, the judicial traffic jam has been more than halved. Clearing this logjam has been his biggest challenge in the top job, he later tells .

"When I first came here in my first arraignment session in April 2004 there were 79 cases awaiting trial," he explained. "As of today there are 34, and 30 of those have got trial dates within the next six months." He puts the reason for this down to "everyone working very hard over the last two years". A policy of nearly always running two criminal trials at the same time in separate courts, not common practice in Bermuda before he came to office, has also played a part.

"I do not want to criticise my predecessor but I think that I have upped the pace and I think that everyone is working harder." He praised Judges, court staff, the DPP and over-stretched defence lawyers for slashing the backlog.

The current level of 34 is "considerably better than before" ? but still not good enough.

"I would like to get it a lot smaller. We have 30 listed until the end of November but I would really like to get it down so that when you are committed to the Supreme Court you are tried within three months.

"Justice should be swift," he added, pointing to the problems trial delays cause, including witnesses memories' fading and sometimes innocent defendants being kept behind bars before acquittals.

The subject swiftly turns to the question of court facilities in Bermuda, recently branded "Third World" by visiting London-based QC Courtenay Griffiths, who represented one of the defendants in one of Bermuda's biggest criminal cases, the Cooper twins murder trial.

In theory, the system boasts five courts including two in Booth Hall, in the shadow of the House of Assembly. Yet that building is only leased on a month-by-month basis. If the landlord decided he wanted to sell up, Mr. Ground would have to start quickly looking for two new courts.

The Chief Justice denied the facilities were as bad as Mr. Griffiths claimed. But he admitted standards were "not good" and left court officials working with their hands tied.

"The buildings present a major challenge at the moment. We need a new, purpose-built Supreme Court building. I have been lobbying for that since I arrived. But we can't retro-fit these buildings."

He said that because of the monthly tenancy it would be futile to pump money into refurbishing Booth Hall. There was a rolling programme of minor maintenance at other courtrooms, but a major refit would be costly and "because of the nature of the buildings, very difficult".

He continued: "We share courts one and two with the legislature so we can't start knocking walls down. It's an old building and major refurbishment, I think, would be prohibitively expensive and very disruptive."

Plans were passed before his appointment for a new joint Police station and Magistrates' Court building. Work on that has yet to start, raising fears of lengthy delays, although Mr. Ground said he looked forward to work starting soon.

Government recently raised the idea of including Supreme Court facilities in this new 'super court' HQ. Mr. Ground declined to comment on any specific proposal or when a new building was likely to see the light of day, but said that he had lobbied for improved facilities and Attorney General Larry Mussenden was sympathetic.

Dozens of people including most of the media were locked out of Court One at the end of the Cooper Twins trial, amid chaotic scenes involving large crowds. Asked if the current set-up was hindering the administration of justice, the Chief Justice replied: "We could do better with better buildings but we are managing just fine."

He also questioned whether the archaic confines of Court Four at Booth Hall ? currently the hub of the six-month-old Commercial Court and, at the time of the interview, used for a lengthy civil case involving leading London barristers ? was the image the Island wanted to portray to high-flying potential clients. "They (the people using this court) are major international concerns, and they know quality when they see it. It does not project a very good impression to go into Booth Hall.

"I have a dream of this plate glass building, or at least a floor in a building, with potted palm trees, a receptionist and a plaque outside saying "Commercial Court of Bermuda", exuding an air of opulence and efficiency.

"We do need a dedicated facility for the commercial court. In the short term that might not be a new building; it could go in office space somewhere within Hamilton, close to the Front Street registry."

The question of security, a long-running problem for the Bermuda justice system, was also highlighted. The process of bringing defendants from custody into court through the public gallery, in Supreme Courts One and Three (the only courts where criminal trials can take place because they have jury facilities), was flagged up as one worry.

And the fact that juries have to walk through often tense public galleries, packed with relatives of victims and the accused, in high-profile trials was raised. He added: "That must be a very intimidating prospect for them...We are lucky that nothing has gone wrong so far."

Mr. Ground admitted despite improvements at Magistrates' Court, the present set-up caused security problems. "The courts are not very secure," he stated. We now have a metal detector for the Magistrates' Court and that's made everyone in that building feel a bit better about things.

"We do not have those in Supreme Court. Our courts are through three buildings and we can't afford three security points.

"We have to pay two or three security guards to man it (Magistrates' Court). We just can't afford that (at the other courts)."

Again stressing the need for a single Supreme Court building, he added: "If we had a unified building with one point of entry we could take much better security precautions."

Major reforms have been pushed into place as part of a Government justice system review. Its scope ranged from criminal law reform, steps to tackle case backlogs through to increasing the size of the judiciary. Other reforms are in the pipeline, and although Mr. Ground welcomed the changes so far, he declined to comment on specific legislation he would like to see reviewed or introduced. "There's a lot that needs looking at," he said.

One element the Chief Justice was swift to praise was the introduction of mandatory three-year-jail terms in a bid to combat the rising tide of weapon attacks in Bermuda.

A recent spate of sickening stabbing cases in Britain has triggered calls for change there and Mr. Ground added: "I think we are ahead of the pack on that one. They are now thinking of that in the UK," he commented."So I think we are leading the way there."

Away from the drama of overseeing major murder and drug trials, Bermuda's Chief Justice is a keen wildlife photographer. Framed pictures of his wildlife photographs adorn one of his office walls ? striking shots of elegant birds in full flight, good enough to have graced a series of glossy magazine front covers ? neatly encapsulate the serene atmosphere in his office.

He later admits that the task of overseeing the judicial system, now leaves him little if any time to turn his attention from the Supreme Court to the skies.

"I've hardly taken any pictures at all since I became chief justice," remarked Mr. Ground. "I'm in my office between 8 and 6 and often have to work weekends, particularly if there's a trial going on."

So what's been the biggest disappointment of his time in Bermuda?

After a long pause, the bird-lover steers clear of any law-related response and returns to an animated conversation he had with photographer Chris Burville as he took pictures during the early stages of the interview.

"Not getting as good a picture of the longtails as Chris did recently," joked the Chief Justice equally at home with shutters and flash speeds as sentences and subpoenas, referring to one of the snapper's recent front page shots.

Reports suggesting that he had a 15-year term were wrong, he tells although the man with three years left on his contract was unwilling to speculate on how long he would stay in Bermuda with wife Dace. He's clearly enjoying the professional challenge, though.

"It's top quality in terms of the challenge and the competency of the counsel that appear in front of you. You can't find anywhere better than here."

Asked about a possible successor, Bermudian or otherwise, he stays tight-lipped.

That, you sense, is another story for another day.