The Boston Globe reports that the economic meltdown could have a devastating impact on the American justice system, as courts are forced to lay off employees and cut down on court hours, according to Massachusetts’ top judge.
“I shall be blunt: Our state courts are in crisis,” Supreme Judicial Court Chief Justice Margaret H. Marshall told members of the American Bar Association at its midyear meeting…
New Hampshire’s judicial branch will halt civil and criminal jury trials for a month to save on per diem payments to jurors. It will also postpone filling seven of the state’s 59 vacant judgeships this year. Budget cuts in Florida have left 280 court employees without jobs and more layoffs are expected. In Maine, the courts have loosened security, no longer staffing magnetic security machine checkpoints at local courthouses…
Courts may have to close civil or criminal sessions or consider consolidating. Those changes could reverberate through the system, she said, slowing the courts down again.
And she noted that about half the state’s courthouses are staffed at “below minimal levels” as determined by an objective national staffing model…
She quoted legal scholar Reginald Heber Smith, calling the denial of justice “the shortcut to anarchy.”
Via Boston Globe.
Under Chief Justice Marshall’s leadership public confidence in the Massachusetts judiciary is at a historic low. “High costs, slow action, and poor service to the community characterize our state courts. The public wants reasonably priced, quick, courteous service, but often receives the opposite.” The state-commissioned Monan Report decried the judiciary’s bloated budget, which had risen more than 70 percent since 1994, from $261.6 million to $475.5 million in 2001 an increase of 82 percent. The committee called for change, yet the only change has been the budget for the judiciary, nearly doubling yet again in 2008. This, while case loads have remained stagnant or decreased since 1996. Our judiciary is operating in a complete absence of accountability, transparency, and sound leadership. In fact, under Chief Justice Marshall’s leadership trials are held with jurors dressed in Halloween costumes (See Boston Herald of Oct. 31, 2004). It’s time we ELECT our judges in Massachusetts.