MEETING MINUTES

April 4, 2006
By C. Edward S. Mitchell, Chairman

Attendance

Present were: Judge William Kieser, Judge Dudley Anderson, Judge Richard Gray, Kevin Way, Jennifer Ayers, Robert Elion, Marc Lovecchio, Ed Mitchell, and Cliff Rieders.

There was an extensive discussion concerning the Court's efforts to reduce the criminal backlog. The results to have early conferences with counsel in an effort to achieve early disposition of those less serious cases which will not require trial is encouraging.

Frustration was expressed by both the Court and counsel concerning the inability of assistant district attorneys to make disposition decisions during those conferences. There was also extensive discussion concerning the staffing problems within both the District Attorney's Office and the Public Defender's Office. Both are understaffed. The understaffing is due in part to the refusal of the Commissioners to authorize funding for needed positions.

The attorneys involved in civil trials requested the Court to make the juror numbers of the jurors who will be used for jury selection known to the attorneys participating in jury selection at an earlier time than 5:30 pm on the day before jury selection. The judges present and the Court Administrator saw no reason why this could not be done.

The Court Administrator also discussed the reasons given by the jury commissioner for the large number of perspective jurors with the same last name which occurred during the March jury selection. The explanation was not understandable, but the jury commissioner communicated that the selection was random.

Questions were raised concerning how jurors are actually selected from the panel for individual cases. No one could answer the question. It was suggested that an inquiry should be made of the Prothonotary concerning how this selection is made.

The meetings for the rest of the year will be: August 7 and December 4, 2006. These dates are on the Court calendar.