Wednesday, January 24, 2001
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Wednesday, January 24, 2001 |
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For justice's sake, city courts ought not be profit centers There is a statement in a letter attributed to our county commissioners that I find so outrageous I cannot leave it unchallenged. In its online edition of last week, The Citizen published the text of a Jan. 11 letter reportedly signed by all five commissioners, apparently intended for all the mayors of cities within Fayette County, which included the following statement: "I don't believe anyone would seriously challenge the premise that one of the primary purposes (if not the primary purpose) of establishing a municipal court is to produce significant revenues for that particular city." Let me explain to those who don't understand this, and it seems that there might be far too many, that the purpose of courts is to do justice, to promote order within society, and to ensure compliance with the law. It is never, absolutely never, to produce revenues. Those who would use courts to produce revenues are morally bankrupt and unfit for public office. When a public official takes an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, he pledges to support the Bill of Rights, which guarantees to all citizens, rich and poor, unbiased and impartial courts and judges whose job never is, never has been, and never ought to be, to raise money for the government. Even the suspicion that a judge might be influenced by money considerations is enough to disqualify a judge. At one time, when our Georgia magistrates (then called justices of the peace) considered applications for an arrest or search warrant, they were paid $5 when they agreed to issue it and nothing when they refused. In the 1977 case of Connally v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that this manner of paying judges violated the Constitution. Other cases make it clear that a judge cannot have an interest in the financial affairs of the government which employs him that, in the court's words, might make him forget the burden of proof (beyond a reasonable doubt) required to convict the defendant. Some other report in The Citizen indicated that one local municipal court judge had sentenced a person to six months in jail unless he paid a $650 fine. We don't have the whole story there, and we should get to the bottom of this. Anyone who can afford to pay the $650, and is willing to spend six months in jail instead, probably belongs in a mental institution rather than a jail; anyone too poor to pay the $650 does not deserve to go to jail for being poor. The sheriff should make sure that that person has full access to one of the lawyers who provide legal services to indigent criminal defendants. It seems the county commissioners can only think about the $7,200 it will cost the county taxpayers to help one of our cities squeeze $650 out of some hapless prisoner, but (if the story is true) I ask myself what kind of judge would participate in a despicable squeeze play of that sort. It is good in a way that the moral bankruptcy of some of our public officials should be exposed through the political skirmishes we witness about the jail and public money. It might give us the opportunity to do something about it. It's hard to believe that those of our citizens whose church attendance exposes them to the story of Christ chasing the money changers from the temple of God would not readily grasp that money changers have also no business in the temple of justice. Those who understand the Constitution of the United States and respect it will never agree that a primary purpose of establishing a municipal court is to produce significant revenues for the city. We should expose all those who think that way, and chase them from the temple of justice! Instead of turning a blind eye to abuses in our justice system, our legislators ought to (1) consider enacting a uniform schedule of fines for traffic offenses to be used in all municipal courts in the state, (2) provide for 75 percent of the fines to be turned over to the state itself, and (3) establish selection standards for municipal court judges that don't revolve around money. Claude Y. Paquin Fayette County cypaquin@msn.com
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