Pubdate: Tue, 15 Jan 2002 Source: New York Times (NY) Section: New York Region Copyright: 2002 The New York Times Company Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298 Author: James C. McKinley Jr. Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?140 (Rockefeller Drug Laws) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/hr.htm (Harm Reduction) CHIEF JUDGE URGES AMENDING CONSTITUTION TO REALIGN COURTS ALBANY --- The state's chief judge, Judith S. Kaye, called today for a constitutional amendment to streamline the state's tangled court system, a plea she has made in the past without success. "I think we continue to fail the public," Judge Kaye said during her annual address on the state of the judiciary. She said the existence of nine kinds of trial courts is inefficient and an obstacle to people seeking to use the courts. "We can no longer cling to this cumbersome court structure." Judge Kaye, who is also the head of the Court of Appeals, the state's highest court, also urged the Legislature to revamp the state's Rockefeller-era drug laws and to raise the pay of court-appointed lawyers. The chief judge spoke just before a ceremony honoring 23 court officers who helped rescue people during the attack on the World Trade Center, including three who died. Judge Kaye said she would soon send the Legislature a proposed amendment to the State Constitution that would expand a pilot program she introduced last year. Under the program, a single Supreme Court justice has been handling all the myriad cases involving each troubled family, from assaults to divorce proceedings to child custody disputes. The idea is to have one judge handle the problems of a single family. The chief judge said she would like to do the same kind of case consolidation in all courts across the state, a move she said would save about $130 million over five years. She described the proposal as a way to expedite handling of spouse-beating cases, but her aides said it would have the effect of consolidating seven of the nine courts into two tiers. The upper tier would absorb the courts with overlapping jurisdiction on domestic violence cases -- the Supreme Court, Family Court and County Court. The lower tier would take in city, town and village courts, which primarily handle misdemeanors and small-scale civil cases. What would happen to the Surrogate's Court, which administers estates, and the Court of Claims, which handles suits against the state, was not clear. Judge Kaye, a Democrat who was appointed by Gov. Mario M. Cuomo in 1983, said the success of special courts set up to handle drug cases had been jeopardized by the Legislature's failure to overhaul what she called "draconian Rockefeller drug laws. "The unreasonably strict limitations on judicial sentencing discretion mean that many nonviolent offenders who are otherwise good candidates are not eligible for court-supervised drug treatment," she said. The chief judge also lamented the Legislature's failure last year to raise the pay scale for court-appointed lawyers for indigent defendants in criminal cases. Those lawyers now earn $25 an hour for work outside court and $40 an hour during a trial. Those fees are among the lowest in the nation, she said. Fewer and fewer lawyers each year agree to accept the assignments, she said, causing overwhelming caseloads for those who are left. - --- MAP posted-by: Jackl