November 1, 2025
A legal transcript proofreader’s primary tool is punctuation. It’s how we turn a word salad into a meal.
Proofreading legal transcripts isn’t like cleaning up a report or polishing web copy. It’s a balancing act between clarity and fidelity—making sense of what was said without changing what was meant. You’re not the author; you’re the witness to the witnesses.
In most writing, a proofreader looks for flow, tone, and readability. In transcripts, you’re listening for accuracy—not just in the words, but in how they land. Every comma, dash, and ellipsis has a job: to capture hesitation, interruption, or emotion. It’s the difference between “I didn’t say he stole the money” and “I didn’t say he stole the money.” Same words. Different meaning. Punctuation is the record of intent.
It’s the same exercise acting coaches love—shifting the emphasis in a line to change its meaning entirely. Try it with “I didn’t order the anal probe.” (The guys at South Park built an empire on that one.)
Unlike in traditional editing, you can’t smooth over awkward phrasing, fix grammar, or “improve” a speaker’s word choice. You can’t decide that “gonna” should become “going to.” You document it exactly as it was said—even when it makes you wince.
Legal transcript proofreaders live in a constant state of tension: we crave clean writing, but our job is to protect messy truth. Our success is invisible—no one notices the commas that prevent confusion or the dashes that capture a witness’s breath. But when it’s done right, accuracy reads effortlessly.