Agenda - Council - 01/10/1989 - Laserfiche WebLink

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January 4, ].989 To: From: Re: City Council. Chief Auspos Officer/City Attorney Court Appearances I was recently informed by the City Attorney's office, specifi- cally Tom Fitzpatrick, that all court trials for persons arrested by this department are going to be held i.n the courtrooms in Columbia tleights as of January 3~ 1989. This ruling has come from the Clekk or Court, Jane Morrow, and affects all cities in the county with the exception of the city of Anoka whose court trials will still be held in the Anoka Courthouse. The reason advanced for this action is that there are not enough courtrooms in the courthouse to handle the current load and that by moving court trials to Columbia Heights this will alleviate the over- crowding. I am told that the county has plans to construct another annex, in Anoka~ and this will solve the problem by bringing all types of trials to the Anoka area. Currently, when a court trial is scheduled~ the City Attorney contacts our officers to advise them of the date and time. Unless the trial is definitely going to take place, the officers have worked out with Mr. Fitzpatrick to set up a system whereby they remain on- call. at home and if the City Attorney can not work out a plea with the defendant the officers are called to come in. Because they are not far from the courthouse they can appear in a short time and the need for overtime is greatly reduced since there is a minimum two hour call-out time by contract~ If this new requirement stays in place we will find it totally impractical to have the officers on standby because of the time and d~stacne involved i.n going to .Columbia Heights. If they are sched- uled to appear at 9:0OAM and they show up at that time their two hour minimum is in effect. If the trial(s} proceed, in whatever order the court establishes, the officers wait unitl their turn and this can be three or four hours or more. As it is, we will probably be looking, in the near future, at some sort of request for standby pay in a contract negotiation but even that won't be as ex- pensive, if given, as will the overtime for appearances in Colum- bia lleights. The Clerk of Court suggested that the prosecuting attorneys could appear at the arraignments in Columbia Heights (arraignments are the first hearing, held prior to a scheduled court trial) and perhaps negotiate some of the cases to guilty pleas thereby negating the need for a court trial in the future. ~nile this may be pos- sible to do it would mean t~at our City Attorney would have to ap- pear in Columbia Heights four times a month at $~ per hour (start- ing from when he leaves the office) and then~ most likely~ would still have to be at court trials two dates a month to prosecute those cases not negotiated at arraignment. While the construction of a new facility will end the current space crunch, realistically that will be 1990 or later. ! feel that there are other solutions that may be more reasonable and; I might add~ more equitable (the city of Anoka probably generates more court need than Ramsey, St. Francis and the Sheriff's contract areas com- bined!). One way may be to have the areas in the Sourthern half of