Pa. Jurists’ Focus: Fixing City Courts
Fair Courts E-lert
Bibliographic Info:
Author: Nancy Phillips and Craig R. McCoy
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
Date: 1/24/2010
“State Supreme Court Justice Seamus P. McCaffery has begun meeting with top Philadelphia judges, court administrators, and the district attorney to implement an ambitious reform agenda for the city’s troubled criminal justice system,” according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. Philadelphia courts have the lowest felony conviction rate in the country, among the nation’s highest fugitive rates, and a problem of “widespread intimidation of victims and witnesses.” At the New York Times, William Glaberson reports on another ambitious effort to reform an ailing state judiciary – this one in New York, where a “vast network of small-town courts,” presided over by over 1,450 judges who are not lawyers, “handle[s] about two million cases annually, including traffic infractions, small civil cases, and [certain] misdemeanor trials.” Although they are addled by corruption, procedural shoddiness, and mismanagement, these town and village courts represent an entrenched political interest that state legislators are finding hard to overcome.
See also William Glaberson, Reform of New York’s Courts Stalls, New York Times, January 7, 2010.