justice denied

New Group Will Advocate For California Courts

October 18, 2013 By CCM Staff

A new non-profit group has been formed to, in the words of its press release this week, “… increase awareness about the relationship between adequate state funding for the administration of justice – at the state and local level – and the ability to deliver equal access to justice for all.” The “Foundation for Democracy and Justice” also says it plans to educate the public about the branches of government, with particular attention paid to the role of the judiciary.

In the wake of cutting a billion dollars from the courts budget over the last half-decade, many critics of the cuts have noted that some lawmakers have forgotten that the judiciary is an equal branch of government. The new organization’s initial membership seems to include fairly prominent civic leaders and some high-profile attorneys.

California Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye and state Attorney General Kamala Harris were announced as “honorary directors” of the group. The Sacramento Bee has a story here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: California, California Budget, california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, Judges, justice, justice denied, Justice Rationing, Kamala Harris

Monterey County Adapting To Justice Rationing

October 11, 2013 By CCM Staff

A story in the Monterey County Weekly documents adjustments to civil cases after years of budget cuts, including the hit to local small claims cases. Says the paper: “With the closure of the King City courthouse on Sept. 23, the calendars of the three other county courthouses – in Salinas, Marina and Monterey – are under pressure to pack in more cases.”

The report quotes Monterey County Superior Court Presiding Judge Marla Anderson: “With the same amount of filings, you have to do the same amount of work with fewer employees,” The Weekly says that labor expenses account for 79 percent of the county courts’ $21-million budget, which is now facing six years of cuts. Countywide, the Weekly adds, the court system has reduced its workforce by 52 positions since 2008.

Read how they are adapting here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, justice denied, Justice Rationing, LA County Court, lay-offs, Monterey County, unemployment

Judge Says Court Closures May Bring Violence

October 11, 2013 By CCM Staff

Reduced access to civil courts will mean that people take the law into their own hands, including using violence in their disputes, according to a Los Angeles Superior Court judge. Phil Mautino, who is the supervising judge for the Los Padrinos Juvenile Court, told a Republican Lincoln Club group that personal injury cases are going to take five years to get to trial while for traffic court “there’s a line that circles around the building.”

“It means if you’re not going to court, you settle (the issue privately). It means violence. It’s like the old days of vengeance where if you kill my brother, I’ll kill your sister,” the judge told the Whittier Daily News in a recent report. “If you‘re willing to stand in line for a day or two, the officer may not show up [and] if you’re retired and plead not guilty, you have might have a good chance of getting off.”

The Whittier courthouse was among the eight closed this year while two others have very limited services. All traffic court cases now are heard at the downtown Los Angeles and Beverly Hills court houses, small claims is limited to five courts (Downey for the Whittier area), and landlord-tenant evictions are divided between four courthouses.

See the story here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: California Corrections, california court cuts, california courts, court rationing, court safety, court violence, domestic violence, Gov. Jerry Brown, Judges, justice denied, Justice Rationing, violence

Sacramento County Superior Court faces ‘tremendous challenges’ according to newly elected Presiding Judge

October 7, 2013 By CCM Staff

Sacramento Superior Court Judge Robert C. Hight. (Photo credit: SUPERIOR COURT OF CALIFORNIA, COUNTY OF SACRAMENTO, COURT BULLETIN)

The Sacramento Bee reports that Sacramento Superior Court Judge Robert C. Hight has been elected as the court’s presiding judge, replacing the outgoing Presiding Judge Laurie M. Earl. The two-year term begins on January 1, 2014.

“Our court faces tremendous challenges,” Hight said in a news release. “Over the past four years, the Legislature reduced funding for the Judicial Branch by $1 billion. For our Sacramento County Superior Court, this was a reduction of almost 25 percent, resulting in the loss of almost 200 staff positions. Unless next year has projected budget changes, we face further cuts. Our judges and dedicated staff have been asked to do more with less. Our challenge is to continue providing the citizens of Sacramento with access to justice that is fair, timely and open to all.”

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: California Corrections, california court cuts, california courts, court rationing, Judges, justice denied, Justice Rationing, Superior Court

Sacramento Superior Court “stuck” with sheriff’s budget shortfall

September 11, 2013 By CCM Staff

According to a report by the Sacramento Bee, the Sheriff’s Department had notified Sacramento Superior Court in July that they expected a combination of funding shortfall and added costs totaling $2.2 million. Sheriff’s officials had told Superior Court managers that they’d have to pull as many as 15 deputies off the security detail to offset the shortfall.

According to the report, “Some judges reacted to the notification with zinging emails that forecast danger to themselves and the public if a reduction of that size became a reality. Chris Volkers, the court’s executive officer, threatened to sue if Sheriff Scott Jones went ahead with the cut.”

Court officials and the Sheriff’s Department came to a resolution… including $600,000 in increased funding from the state.

While the issue is resolved for now, the bailiff’s budget may continue to be a drain on the court system. According to the report, “Sacramento Superior Court Presiding Judge Laurie M. Earl said she expects a repeat of the security funding face-off with the Sheriff’s Department next year.” Earl also points out that “there’s no real audit procedures in place” to assure the funding is spent appropriately.

“We don’t have any leverage obviously because we don’t hold the money,” Earl said. “We’re stuck being an unintended victim of this, I think.”

Read the story here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, justice denied, lay-offs, Sacramento superior court, Sheriff

HuffPo Blogger Hits L.A. Courts Pretty Hard

August 30, 2013 By CCM Staff

Editor’s Note: The CCM will not be updated Monday due to the Labor Day holiday. See you Tuesday!

Writer Steve Bevilacqua is not too happy with the L.A. courts and much prefers the no-frills justice handed out by Judge Judy. In a Huffington Post blog, he first wonders “… is a Hollywood soundstage the best place to find true justice in Los Angeles? Based on my legal experience, both real and televised, the answer is a resounding yes.” Then he writes that “… our court system is in the hands of self-serving clowns who care about nothing more than their own performance record. Looking at history, I suppose this isn’t anything new, but in this age of access and information, maybe it’s time the courts tried a little harder to fulfill their original purpose of setting things right.”

After outlining his ongoing legal battles stemming from getting hit by a car, he adds that “amazingly enough, in one extremely loud afternoon, my fiasco was set right by the modern-day Solomon known as Judge Judy. The actual court system spent months squeezing every technicality in their agonized efforts to send me to prison at the expense of the obvious truth. Judge Judy was direct and ferociously sensible.”

It’s a compelling story, but you wonder if he knows the small claims court in Santa Monica, which was the basis for all those People’s Court shows, actually just closed?

Read it here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: California, California Budget, california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, Hollywood, Judge Judy, Judges, justice, justice denied, Justice Rationing

This ‘Third Branch’ Funding Story Sounds Familiar

August 27, 2013 By CCM Staff

Lawmakers who pretty much ignore budget reality. A chief executive with budget priorities that do not include some other branch of government. Massive cuts to the services that actually help citizens, but little pain for judges and prosecutors who are more or less locked into their jobs. If that sounds like California, and it does, then it’s worth noting that it also sounds like the federal government.

There’s a great piece by Andrew Cohen on the San Francisco “beyondchron” website that takes U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to task over recent lip service to the issue. And Cohen cuts to the chase with this: “… a Congress that tripped all over itself earlier this year to ensure that there would be no flight delays because of the sequester has been remarkably content to run our judiciary into the ground– and to then hide from the blame that comes with refusing to adequately fund the third branch of government. “

And how much does this sound like the conversation in California? The Cohen piece talks about a meeting between judges and Vice President Biden: “When cases lag, the Judiciary is seen as inefficient, or worse, unsympathetic to litigants ranging from pro-se litigants (who represent themselves) to individuals and companies seeking bankruptcy relief or the resolution of civil disputes to the government and defendants in criminal cases.” Cohen even calls for consideration of a slow-down strike, arguing “… if lawmakers are going to treat the judiciary like it’s a third-world operation perhaps its time to show those lawmakers what a third-world operation actually looks like.”

Except, one might argue, California is about to do that without the benefit of a strike. Read the Cohen piece here.

Filed Under: National Tagged With: branches of government, california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, Eric Holder, federal, judicial branch, justice denied, US Attorney General

‘System Failure’ Closes ‘Public’ Court Budget Meeting

August 16, 2013 By CCM Staff

State officials are blaming a “systems failure” for loss of an audiocast feed that effectively shut unions and others out of a key budget-allocation meeting this week. The failure took on added impact, union leadership noted, because they had not received timely notice about the meeting and were relying on the audio. While the Administrative Office of the Courts set up a conference line for some of the budget committee members, there were not enough lines for labor officials and even legislative aides who wanted to hear about how court money is being divided.

The Courthouse News quoted Michelle Castro with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) saying that “… we have a vested interest in trial court funding; how the funds get distributed and what purposes they are establishing priorities around,” Michelle Castro with the SEIU said in an interview. “We’re at a very critical juncture in the trial courts. We are going through extreme amounts of cuts on the backs of court workers.”

At issue are deliberations of a special advisory committee for trial court budgets that approved roughly $72 million for programs supporting the trial courts and technology projects. The Courthouse News reported that the “… allocations included $18 million to maintain interim versions of the now-defunct Court Case Management System and the Arizona server that hosts it.” That’s bound to raise eyebrows because the state legislature approved a last-minute $60 million for trail courts with the direction it be used to save jobs and keep courts open – there has been a concern that money might be directly spent on other areas or diverted to replace money that would have otherwise gone for those purposes.

“Our big issue is the Legislature said this $60 million was directly supposed to go to making sure the court doors were open. Is that really happening?” said a union official in the Courthouse News story. Read more here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: AFSCME, California Budget, california court cuts, court rationing, justice denied, lay-offs, open meetings, SEIU, transparency

Court Cuts Are ‘Back To The Future’ For Delays

August 15, 2013 By CCM Staff

A relatively older post (meaning pre-2013 state budget) by a West Hollywood attorney has been making the rounds (at least our rounds) because it notes that the looming delays in California’s civil courts are actually a return to the bad old days.

David S. White begins his history lesson by noting that “… thirty-six years ago, when I began practicing law in the Los Angeles Superior Court system, the backlog of cases was so immense that you had to wait ﬁve years to get to trial. A Master Calendar Department would then put the lawyers on Beepers (like some restaurants today use), and, when your Beeper buzzed you, it was time to gather up your boxes of documents and your witnesses, and come to the courtroom designated for your trial – if that courtroom was not already backed up, trying one or more cases.”

He then outlines how a “fast track” policy tried to get disputes to trial in a year or less, a goal that Mr. White feels was very nearly attained until the “bubble” of the early 2000’s burst in California real estate, followed soon by the national Great Recession and a Golden State deeply “upside down” financially.

His post at the Fox & Hounds website offers context, but also a lively comments section on civil tort reforms and the like. He is good at responding. Find the discussion here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: California, California Budget, california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, justice denied, Justice Rationing, speedy trial

Pushback, Frustration Mounts Against Slow Court Dockets

August 14, 2013 By CCM Staff

It will take a bit more time before the most recent civil court budget courts, and their resulting delays, become a routine part of lawsuit strategy. But, already you can see where people seeking their day in court are becoming increasingly frustrated – to the point of one attorney holding press conferences and citing a landmark NBC3 investigative report by Stephen Stock (see previous posts) to make his point.

The Michael Rooney law office, in an apparent Redwood City civil lawsuit between individuals, even issued a press release over a popular distribution network recently and scheduled a press conference on the courthouse steps – just to demand a case get a trial date. In the statement, the budget cuts are noted and the argument is made that people abusing the courts can “…further exploit the Courts’ apparent inability to handle cases by using every trick to delay their victims’ right to justice, while making themselves judgment-proof before a jury renders a judgment against them, once again outsmarting the legal system that they have abused for years.”

The NBC3 report comes into play (and you can bet it will again) by noting “… as San Mateo County Superior Court Presiding Judge Robert Foiles, recently stated in an interview by NBC3 Reporter, Stephen Stock: “justice delayed is justice denied… and we’re delaying justice!”

You can check out the PR Newswire release here.

Filed Under: Community, Courts Budget Tagged With: california court cuts, California State Budget, court rationing, Courts, Judges, justice denied, Justice Rationing, law, NBC, San Mateo