JCW has learned a little more about an AOC Watcher story about layoffs in the Alameda county court system. The only individuals targeted in Alameda county for layoffs were court reporters. Twenty one court reporters and two supervisors were given layoff notices by the Alameda county courts.
While court executive management does not wish it to be public knowledge that these were the only jobs targeted, our reliable contacts in the Alameda courts tell us that after layoffs, this leaves no court reporters in the Fremont Hall of Justice and only one court reporter in the Pleasanton Courthouse.
Worse, Alameda courts are alleged to not be anywhere near the same dire financial straits of other courts around the state so rank and file workers are wondering why any layoff notices went out at all, claiming that they are unnecessary, yet are happening anyways.
Judicial Council Watcher 
JusticeCalifornia
July 30, 2011
That is exactly what Kim Turner did in Marin–laid off court reporters.
No record? No appeal. Anything goes.
If it comes down to a party’s word against the other party, oh well.
Even worse, if it comes down to a party’s word against a judge– forget it.
I have transcripts of Marin bench officers lying on the record.
The Marin document destruction debacle started with a transcript of a mediator testifying in a child custody case that she did not know the most elementary facts of the case, because Kim Turner had told the mediators to destroy child custody evidence in the mediation files, even regarding pending custody proceedings. The need for a BSA audit of the Marin Court was fueled by transcripts of court mediators testifying that they did not know or follow state-mandated mediation laws and procedures.
And of course, court reporters hear and see everything.
One Who Knows
August 1, 2011
There’s a history with Alameda Superior and court reporters. That court is a notorious hater of the reporters. Dates back to the Ron O days and a little lawsuit about the illegal use of electronic recording devices. Ron O was the losing party in that case. Years later and this is Ron O’s and Pat Sweeten’s payback and F-you to the court reporters. Ronnie and Patty are so disgustingly transparent.
JusticeCalifornia
July 30, 2011
And wow. Fabulous news story.
What cracks me up is that the AOC is pushing CCMS, as if they know what they are talking about. But when faced with a simple question– was “retired” “temporarily assigned” Shasta County Judge Halpin on assignment in Shasta County as of December 31, 2010– AOC personnel issued two different schedules– one saying he was, the other saying he wasn’t.
That was after the AOC admitted he had been on “temporary” assignment there since January, 1994. You would think that if the AOC is telling everyone how the entire branch should be keeping their records, they would have their own recordkeeping system in order. What a joke.
Moreover, under Judicial Council member/CCMS committe e member Kim Turner’s watch
as CEO of the Marin court, minute orders and registers of actions have been altered, without notice in the record or to litigants or lawyers. One day a minute order will say one thing, and suddenly, months later, it will say another, and there is no record of the change. It just happens.
Check out the AOC’s own 2008 audit report about Turner’s lack of effective controls regarding Marin’s computer system:
Click to access 2.pdf
Secret minute order changes in Marin continued long after this 2008 audit report came out. So Kimmie ain’t minding her own failed but exhorbitantly expensive CMS system (Turner reportedly spends $2-2.5 million per year on her Marin mess), yet she is on Rose Bird Two’s handpicked CCMS committees and on July 22 was key in advising the Judicial Council to keep funding CCMS at the expense of the trial courts to show the legislature who is boss.
The blind leading the blind, and charging $3 billion, and closing courts, to do it.
(Some would say it is far more sinister than the blind leading the blind. Can you imagine document destroying idiots and charlatans – many would say criminals- like Kim Turner having the ability to access and change the records of ALL CA courts via the AOC-controlled CCMS system?)
Michael Paul
July 30, 2011
It would make John Judnick’s job easier. It would make AOC attorneys that represent the trial courts job easier. All they have to do is hit the delete key to make evidence disappear, just as they have done over the unlicensed contractor debacle. It is a scary thought putting all of that control in the hands of the AOC.
Kevin Grimm
July 30, 2011
“Worse, Alameda courts are alleged to not be anywhere near the same dire financial straits of other courts around the state”
Yeah, drag that the Alameda Superior Court isn’t in the same dire financial straits, thanks for that, Watcher.
But while we’re at it: Since the evil empire is just, well, evil, y’know, why isn’t the Alameda Superior court in such dire straits? Is the AOC death star favoring Alameda? Or, could it have anything to do with the fact that trial courts still exercise considerable discretion over their budgets? And if that’s the case, then, maybe the whole JC Watcher narrative about the big, bad, authoritarian, iron-fisted AOC begins to look a little foolish.
Convenient for Judge Feinstein in SF to point the finger at the Judicial Council / AOC, but someone please explain to me why other courts around the state, like Alameda, aren’t in the same dire straits? And, please, someone explain to me how a 7 percent cut in the SF budget translates into a 40 percent cut in staff.
Judicial Council Watcher
July 30, 2011
Alameda didn’t listen to the Judicial Council or AOC’s advice. The AOC told trial courts to use their reserves to avoid layoffs last go around.
Alameda and other courts like L.A. resorted to layoffs and has reserves as a result. What gets us is just one classification of employee being laid off. The one classification that represents accountability in the courtroom. We’re all for trial courts pushing back against the cuts and believe the cuts to be unnecessary to the trial courts. If trial courts would prefer not to push back and resort to layoffs, that is their choice. It isn’t what we would consider the best choice. However, Pat Sweeten would be considered by most an AOC insider and wouldn’t likely push back regardless of how large the cuts were.
crtwatchr
July 30, 2011
There are a number of reasons some courts have more reserves than others. It is true that courts retain considerable discrection over budget expenditures at the local level. However, the courts have little or no control of the amount of funding they receive.
This is the policy disconnect which prompted the ACJ to lobby for AB 1208. The JC decides how TCTF will be allocated between statewide programs (CCMS) and trial court operations. The JC also decides how to allocate GF money between the AOC and the Courts. Every dollar spent to support the regional offices, etc. is one less dollar for the courts.
Furthermore, there is the clawback issue; the AOC requires the Courts to use a particular service, e.g. CCTC and Phoenix financial and then requires the courts to pay for the service from its baseline budget. Not only are the courts budgets reduced, the courts have to use these AOC services whose costs remain constant.
Therefore, courts’ budgets are reduced another $135 million, while the JC allocates $74 million of TCTF money to support CCMS in 7 courts. This makes absolutely no sense as non-CCMS courts have to pay for to support their own case management systems from their own budgets.
Should SF have laid off employees last year or the year before, like LA and Alameda did? Probably. However, the fact remains that very few courts, if any, receive current year funnding sufficient to cover current year expenditures. Courts must either reduce expenses (80-85% of a trial court budget is salary and beneifts) by laying off staff or use reserves.
This reality might be easier to accpet if the JC did not continue to fund inefficient and wasteful projects like CCMS and facilities maintenance with money that could be used to mitigate the impact to the trial courts.
I never claimed there was an evil empire. I contend the JC exercised poor judgment when it allocated funds to the trial courts in the manner it did. Particularly in light of the opposition from the CJA, ACJ and the majority of courts throughout the state.
unionman575
July 31, 2011
I agree wtih crtwatcher 100%: “the fact remains that very few courts, if any, receive current year funnding sufficient to cover current year expenditures. Courts must either reduce expenses (80-85% of a trial court budget is salary and beneifts) by laying off staff or use reserves.”
katy cuellar
August 18, 2011
I had occasion to be at a child support hearing in Marin County Superior Court. Before the proceedings the Commissioner explained there would be no court reporter present, thus no record. During the hearing, as the paternal grandmother, I was sitting next to the maternal grandfather, and the Commissioner made several embarrassing and suggestive remarks to me and the maternal grandfather as to our relationship, which caused the mother to shout out that her father was already married to her mother. The Commissioner’s comments were not only embarrassing, but awkward, totally inappropriate, and irrelevant to the proceedings. I wished that a court reporter had been present, as I would have ordered the transcript and forwarded it to the proper authorities.
Kathy
October 13, 2011
Back in the day, a court reporter in Humboldt County would be sent to little justice courts in nearby towns to report the proceedings. Usually, the entity that hired would be the District Attorney. Why? Because “judges” in these courts weren’t even lawyers, they were very chummy with the jurors, being friends/neighbors/voters and all, and it was nearly impossible to keep the “judge” in line without a written impartial record that couldn’t be altered by the clerks, who were also “just folks.”
Donna
April 6, 2012
The AOC’s agenda to get rid of Court Reporters in this state is placing every litigant and every judge in a compromised position. The Judge needs the protection of the record, as do the litigants. The AOC will pay its cronies and waste millions on top-heavy court “administration,” but provide a RECORD of LEGAL PROCEEDINGS — no, they will not. They don’t want that layer of protection. In my opinion, the State of California wastes $$$ on INCOMPETENT and CORRUPT over-paid administrators. The AOC wasted over a BILLION DOLLARS on a computer system program that they just terminated.
Wake up voters. The AOC needs to go.
JusticeCalifornia
April 6, 2012
“The AOC’s agenda to get rid of Court Reporters in this state is placing every litigant and every judge in a compromised position. The Judge needs the protection of the record, as do the litigants.”
Yes. Without a record, no one is protected, except those who want to to hide. Our gambling barmaid’s ever so ethically compromised right hand thug, judicial councilmember/Marin CEO kim turner, has (for obvious reasons) made her antipathy for court reporters very, very clear.
And as a litigator I can honestly and forcefully say that, IMHO, any lawyer (or lawyer- legislator, or lawyer-jc member) who suggests that CCMS trumps the basics– a good judge, court clerk, and record of the proceedings– is either a) a sell out or b) an idiot.
ALL, AND I DO MEAN ALL, LAWYERS AND JUDGES KNOW YOU ARE SCREWED WITHOUT A RECORD.
Wendy Darling
April 6, 2012
As has been evidenced here on JCW, sometimes you’re even screwed with one, especially when anyone in the California judicial branch or the AOC is involved.
Recall the Chief Justice.
Long live the ACJ.
JusticeCalifornia
April 6, 2012
Agreed. But even when the record is ignored, a record is being made. That is what is so deadly about a record.
I am throwing out a challenge. Here is what I said:
“ALL, AND I DO MEAN ALL, LAWYERS AND JUDGES KNOW YOU ARE SCREWED WITHOUT A RECORD.”
I invite Judicial Council members Feuer and Evans, Matthai, Krinsky, Davis, and Robinson — and any member of any firm any of them have ever been with– to disagree.
In fact, I invite every JC member to disagree.
I invite Steinberg and Dunn and any member of any firm they have been with to disagree.
I invite any lawyer or judge or any member of any firm they have ever been with to disagree.
I invite any lawyer’s association — especially trial lawyers’ associations –to disagree.
I invite any law school professor to disagree.
They cannot.
The CJP is right. The lack of a record obstructs the administration of justice. So why the hell isn’t this a number one priority for the branch, and most especially top leadership and its ever so high-profile attorney-supporters who were all running around lobbying for CCMS?
anna
April 7, 2012
Because those who’s priority was CCMS” don’t want any record made, so it can never be reviewed. Period. They want the person who writes a summary of the record in their order to “be” the record.
They want no reviewing court to see the “actual” record, in order to cover up their lies.
JusticeCalifornia
April 7, 2012
I am going to take a Saturday morning detour for a moment. Please forgive me and skip this if you are not interested.
Shasta County residents have been burdened with a “temporarily assigned” “retired” judge for over 18 years. Jack Halpin reportedly retired on a Friday, and the next Monday morning he reported for duty as a “temporarily assigned” judge, now collecting his retirement pay and his substantial “temporary assigned judge pay”. Every 30-60 days thereafter, Shasta County presiding judges have reportedly submitted requests to the AOC for his reassignment, and the chief justices of this state for the last 18 years have been signing off on his assignments.
Shasta litigants have reportedly complained for years that now 80-something year old Halpin sometimes reeks of alcohol, that he does not read the file, that he is rude, forgetful, biased, doesn’t follow the law, secretly signs improper orders secretly presented by one side, and is absolutely brutal in taking children from good parents. Bailiffs have reportedly complained for years about his courtroom behavior, and have refused to work for him. ( I certainly invite the Shasta Court or the AOC to dispute this, and open up their records about the date, number and nature of complaints against him.)
Litigants are unable to take their complaints to the CJP, because it is the presiding judges and the AOC who have authority over complaints about “temporarily” assigned judges. So litigants are required to take their complaints to the presiding judge (who requested the assignment) and the AOC (who received the request for assignment and gave it to the CJ for approval) and hope for the best. “The best” has been that Halpin has been “temporarily” reassigned for 18 years and 4 months, notwithstanding the complaints.
After substantial activism and a widely reported protest, Shasta litigants got the news that as of April 30, 2012 (after the 18 years and 4 months “temporary” assignment) Halpin was no longer going to be assigned. Then the other shoe dropped– Shasta County announced that he might “come back” to deal with the family law cases he had previously ruled upon. Brad Campbell, of the AOC assigned judge’s program, has disavowed knowledge of this turn of events.
One of the problems Shasta residents have struggled with is the lack of court reporters to record Halpin’s travesties. Residents report that often, his demeanor changes–like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde– if someone actually has the wherewithal to get one. They report that he is often a rude, raging, retaliatory maniac without a reporter, and relatively calm (albeit still problematic) with one.
.
I have watched court reporters have this “calming” Jekyll/Hyde effect on a number of judges.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strange_Case_of_Dr_Jekyll_and_Mr_Hyde#Plot
Perhaps Judicial Councilmember/Shasta Judge Stephen Baker would like to take the lead in following up on the CJP report about the absolute necessity of a record of the proceedings. After all the suffering reportedly inflicted on Shasta litigants who could not and cannot afford reporters to memorialize Halpin travesties during his 18 year and 4 month “temporary” assignment, he could offer up his planned new courthouse, in order to fund court reporters and other necessities so important to the Shasta public. Heck, with all the money saved if he gave up that courthouse, maybe Shasta County could get a real, accountable judge, appointed by the Governor or elected by the public, subject to retention elections and oversight by the CJP.
It really comes back to the basics. A good judge, court clerk and record of the proceedings.
unionman575
April 7, 2012
FYI –
LASC plans to off a number of reporters in June from all of its civil unlimited courts. 60 to be released (unemployed) and an additional 60 will be converted to part time.
For now, reporters will remain in LASC family law, probate, juvenile & criminal courts.
Delilah
April 7, 2012
You mean all of its “limited” civil courts. Right?
unionman575
April 7, 2012
Hello! Limited courts have never had court reporters in LA.
FYI –
LASC plans to off a number of reporters in June from all of its civil unlimited courts. 60 to be released (unemployed) and an additional 60 will be converted to part time.
For now, reporters will remain in LASC family law, probate, juvenile & criminal courts.
L.A. Observer
April 7, 2012
@ Delilah.
My understanding is that like many other courts around the state, L.A., because of budget constraints, is not supplying any court reporters for any civil trials, limited or general. As was done in San Francisco they are being laid off and the parties will need to pay for their own reporters if they want a record of what was said.
In addition L.A. is laying off even more clerks and other courtroom personnel necessitating the closing of in excess of 50 courtrooms in civil, juvenile and criminal around the county. This is about 10% of their total courtrooms. This is because of the continuing budget shortfall of funds distributed by the AOC to the courts — after the AOC skims off money for their own use, such of mismanaged IT projects and mismanaged and over-priced court construction and maintenance.
Over the past years L.A. has attrited or laid off hundreds and hundreds of employees who work outside of the courtroom but the effects, until now, have not been directly felt in the courtrooms. L.A. is huge (over 560 judicial officers, 50 courthouses and about 5000 employees) but now L.A. says they no longer can spare the courtroom staff. They say because of the prior layoffs, there is mail for traffic fines which cannot be opened for months — no staff. They cannot support necessary functions in their jury system — no staff. They have shortened public counter hours — no staff. The work is piling up and filings cannot be timely processed — no staff. In some courts, it takes over a year to get a traffic ticket heard — no staff. The times to get family and civil cases to trial keeps increasing, because the inventories are growing due to the down-sizing.
The shortfall for L.A. has existed for a decade, almost since the inception of the grand vision of centralized budget and the growth of the AOC. As with many courts, L.A. is woefully underfunded, and then had to endure the pillaging of its funds for CCMS and questionable projects. Even mammoth L.A. has been brought to its knees.
Thank you AOC, Ron George and Bill Vickrey for all you have done to ruin a once great court.
Wendy Darling
April 7, 2012
And thank you AOC, Bill Vickrey, Ron Overholt, Ron George, and the current Chief Justice for all you have done, and are continuing to do, to ruin a once great California judicial branch.
Recall the Chief Justice.
Long live the ACJ.
JusticeCalifornia
April 7, 2012
It is a question of priorities.
I invite Judicial Council members to sacrifice their fancy, expensive planned new courts (which many view as party favors for those Judicial Council members towing the party line) to fund the basics statewide.
Or explain why you won’t.