The fact that such recordings are being used more and more in criminal court cases is of tremendous importance to the field of law for the process has the potential for shaking some of the traditions of court procedure. Attorneys for defendants accused of bribery, extortion, and solicitation of murder have turned to linguists for help in analyzing the recorded evidence to determine what the conversational structure of the recordings might tell them that the average nonlinguist may not see or hear. In all court cases involving tape recorded conversation, accuracy of the transcript is an important issue. Topic analysis is also important in determining and understanding intent. Once a topic is introduced, conventional rules of conversation require that the other party make comments, preferably related to what has just been said. Any conversational analysis must take into account not only the topic of the conversation from one person to another, but also what is understood by those involved. 3 references.