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| Virginia Court Clerk Blames Delays on Budget Cuts |
| By Hampton Roads Daily Press |
| Published: 03/18/2003 |
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Some people sat in jail for days, others for weeks, and, in at least one case, six weeks before getting their day in Hampton Circuit Court - all longer than the day or two it was supposed to take. It was those delays that led the four circuit judges in Hampton last month to issue a formal court order demanding that clerk James Bohnaker speed up scheduling of court dates for people served with a bench warrant. A bench warrant is issued by a judge when a person fails to appear in court or has been accused of violating their probation. The judges' order requiring Bohnaker to fix the problem came after two informal attempts, said Chief Judge Christopher W. Hutton. 'It's not a tremendous task to receive the paperwork from the sheriff saying we've got this person and take that paperwork and docket it on the next available date,' Hutton said. That's what the clerk of court is supposed to do. Bohnaker said he wasn't able to meet that charge because he didn't have enough people. He said he didn't have enough staff because state budget cuts had forced him to reassign the person who had been doing the scheduling. That employee was spending more time doing other work at the courthouse. On Jan. 10, the judges instructed Bohnaker through an e-mail that he had seven days to start getting people into court faster. The judges noticed that they had seen only a few people brought to court on bench warrants in December, Hutton said. They also started getting letters from people in jail wondering when their court dates were going to come up. State code mandates that people arrested on a bench warrant appear in court on the next day court is open after their arrest. That law is backed by a city court policy put in place in March 2002. Bohnaker said that November's state budget cuts forced him to eliminate four positions from his staff, reducing it to 17 people. Two of the eliminated positions were upper management roles. The state says an office the size of Hampton should have about 27 people to handle the workload, Bohnaker said. The cuts caused delays, he admits, but he said they were unavoidable given the staffing reductions. But the judges said the delays were unacceptable. 'It was too long,' Hutton said. The judges have no way of calculating exactly how many people were delayed, Hutton said, or how long they waited in jail for court dates. But, he said, in at least one case he handled recently, the man was arrested Dec. 2 and waited in jail until Jan. 16 before getting a court date. After the first e-mail notification, Bohnaker said, he responded that 'we'd do the best we could under the circumstances.' At that point, he said, he did not reassign any staff to make changes. By Jan. 21, 'we saw no significant change,' Hutton said, which prompted the judges to write Bohnaker a letter that all four judges signed demanding that people get scheduled for court faster. Bohnaker didn't respond to that letter, Hutton said, which prompted the official court order on Jan. 31. Given that he'd already responded to the e-mail, Bohnaker said he didn't respond to the written letter. He said the letter didn't specifically ask him to end the delays with bench warrants but said basically 'be mindful of your duties.' Bohnaker said there have been ongoing discussions among court officials about whose responsibility it is to set up the court schedule because his staff is small. There have been requests to city officials in Hampton to pay for a docket clerk, whose only job would be to schedule court appearances, but that position has not been funded. Until the city or state provides someone to schedule the docket, the responsibility is that of the clerk's office. And because the criminal docket is arguably one of the most important tasks handled by the clerk, it should be given a higher priority, Hutton said. 'We are cognizant that all kinds of offices have budget problems,' Hutton said. 'Then you reallocate the resources you need to take care of the highest priorities.' Bohnaker was elected as clerk in 1995 and his term expires this year. Prior to his election, he worked as an assistant commonwealth's attorney, a role he had when Hutton was the head of that office. |
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