Tag: resources

Effort to speed up New Mexico criminal cases receives pushback

The chief judge of New Mexico’s First Judicial District (covering Santa Fe, Rio Arriba, and Los Alamos Counties) has proposed a case management order (CMO) aimed at speeding up the processing of criminal cases within the district. The order was intended to go into effect no later than January, but concerted pushback from attorneys and police and delaying implementation.

The need for faster case processing is evident: the average criminal case in the First Judicial District takes almost 300 days to reach a resolution, as compared to 224 days in the Second District (covering Albuquerque) and under 200 days in some rural districts. But prosecutors and defense attorneys jointly asserted that the real problem is a lack of resources, which no CMO can fix. They also complained that the proposed CMO imposed rules that were inconsistent with procedures in other parts of the state.

Both sides may be right about the challenges, but both should also continue working toward finding creative and viable solutions to reducing the average time to case resolution.

House votes to add 66 new federal judgeships; will Biden veto?

This week, the House of Representatives comfortably passed the JUDGES Act (S.4199), which would add 66 federal judgeships over the next ten years. The judgeships would be phased in over ten years, with the first two tranches coming in 2025 and 2027.

The Senate passed the same bill back in August, but House Republicans stalled a vote on the bill until after the election. Now that Donald Trump will return to the White House, the House Democrats decided that it was their turn to play politics with the judiciary and slow-played the vote until mid-December.

This is an excellent result for a resource-starved judiciary. But it appears that the drama will continue for a while, as President Biden has threatened to veto the bill on his way out the door. It’s worth unpacking the illogic and petulance of his threat.

Continue reading “House votes to add 66 new federal judgeships; will Biden veto?”

The state of state judiciaries

It’s the time of year for State of the Judiciary addresses in many states, an opportunity for the Chief Justice of the state to provide the new state legislature with an update on the court system, including its strategic plans and ongoing resource needs. Several State of the Judiciary speeches have been reported in the news, allowing us to get a broad sense of what state courts are planning/hoping for in the coming year. More after the jump. Continue reading “The state of state judiciaries”

Shutdown starting to affect federal court operations

Although the federal court system managed to find sufficient “no year” funding to stay open one more week (until January 18), the ongoing federal government shutdown has begun to affect the system’s daily operations. Several district courts are reportedly staying some civil cases, especially those involving the U. S. government as a party. Courts are also cutting back on operational spending such as travel, supplies, and new equipment.

All court employees are continuing to receive full pay as of now, but if the shutdown continues beyond the 18th, non-essential employees would be furloughed and essential employees will continue to work without a paycheck. In small district courts like the Northern District of Iowa, staffing is already sufficiently thin that all employees would be considered essential even if funds were to run out.

As bad as this news is for the courts, it dramatically illustrates the importance and wisdom of the AO’s internal budgeting operations. As I have discussed elsewhere, it was not until the late 1930s that the federal court system obtained control over its own budget. Even though the courts cannot control how much money they receive from Congress, the ability to manage that money with forethought is exactly why they have been able to weather the shutdown (at least for now) while other federal government offices have closed or reduced operations.

Consider, for example, the dire situation at the Justice Department, where the Antitrust and Civil Divisions already have reportedly furloughed more than half of their staffs. As a Bloomberg story explains:

A continued shutdown could seriously hamper some of the civil division’s broad and crucial mandates that range from ensuring healthy market competition and weeding out Medicare fraud to defending the U.S. in lawsuits and recouping money for the Treasury. The effect could then spill over into the department’s criminal division and federal courts, a scenario that could jeopardize law enforcement nationwide.

Not good news. Not good at all.