AOC Press Releases

---

(03/05/2001)

Portrait of Judge Joseph Jones to be Unveiled Wednesday

An oil portrait of Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Joseph B. Jones, who was presiding judge when he died in 1998, will be unveiled at 1 p.m. Wednesday in a ceremony at the Supreme Court Building in Jackson.

Jones, of Memphis, was appointed to the appellate court in 1986 by Gov. Lamar Alexander. He was elected in 1988 and reelected to an eight-year term in 1990. He died May 1, 1998, at age 58 of complications from an infection.

The portrait by Cordova artist Tom Donahue was commissioned by Jones’ family, colleagues on the court and former law clerks.

“The artist did a beautiful job,” Glenda Jones said of her late husband’s portrait. “It looks like Joe should talk to you.”

(02/22/2001)

Revamped Website Provides Better Court Information

New features, more information, easier access and an updated look are among improvements on the Tennessee court system website.

“The website is part of our commitment to make court-related information and material as accessible as possible,” said Connie Clark, administrative director of the courts. “We now have a webmaster to help make the Internet site an evolving valuable resource for all ages and levels of interest in the judicial system.”

The website was introduced in 1995, primarily as a tool for the legal community. Appellate court decisions have been posted since its inception and other material has been added. But the new web page - with the same Internet address - has additional features, improved disability access and is easier to use, said Webmaster Durwood Edwards.

The area for children, accessed through the “Fun Stuff” button on the home page, includes a game with scrambled words relating to courts and the law; biographies of appellate court judges with information about their hobbies and other outside interests; “Our Courts In a Nutshell,” a simple guide to the judicial system; and a link to definitions of legal terms as well as other material for children and teens.

The Annual Report of the Tennessee Judiciary is among publications on the court website, some available in English and Spanish.Several court forms, including orders of protection, are posted in Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, Laotian, Russian and Vietnamese. All of the documents are in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format and can be printed.

New features include a “Press Room,” with news releases, a list of telephone numbers and addresses of interest to the media as well as other information and links. Websites for the U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit and court systems nationwide can be accessed along with other legal and government websites.

The site also has an adult version of the Guide to Tennessee Courts in English and Spanish; information on the history of capital punishment and the legal process in capital cases; court filings in certain high-profile cases; information on the Parenting Plan; employment opportunities; and a link to a publishing site providing an unannotated version of the Tennessee Code.

(02/15/2001)

Court System Project Helps Provide Equal Access to Justice

The Tennessee court system is taking steps to eliminate communication barriers in legal proceedings involving defendants and others whose primary languages are not English.

The Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) is providing judges with court forms translated by the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute into Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, Lao, Russian and

Vietnamese - languages increasingly heard in the state's courtrooms. The forms are available on the court system website at www.tsc.state.tn.us, along with Spanish versions of a Guide to Tennessee Courts, basic forms used for the state's Parenting Plan and the handbook for parents and guardians

in child abuse and neglect cases. All of the documents and publications are in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format and can be printed.

Grants from the National Center for State Courts and the Office of Criminal Justice Programs,

a division of Finance and Administration, are being used to translate or produce the legal documents as well as video and audio tapes. The tapes, when produced, will explain basic legal rights to parties and defendants who do not understand English.

"Our goal is to ensure that language barriers are not barriers to equal justice," said Cornelia

Clark, administrative director of the courts. "Tennessee, like many other states, is becoming more culturally diverse every day and we need to protect the rights of all people who use the court system." In 2000, the AOC determined that the number of Circuit Court defendants who do not speak

English as a primary language had increased by about 285 percent since 1990. But the greatest

need for the forms and tapes is in General Sessions Courts where the volume of cases is high, Clark said. General Sessions Court judges handle such matters as traffic violations, misdemeanors and preliminary hearings in felony cases. Many of the judges also have domestic relations, juvenile and probate jurisdiction as well.

Forms currently available include orders of protection in Spanish; state rules of probation in

Spanish, Arabic, Russian and Vietnamese; and the uniform affidavit of indigency, petition for acceptance of a guilty plea, order for accepting a guilty plea and a notice of DUI punishment in Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, Lao, Russian and Vietnamese.

Another equal access project is establishing qualifications for court interpreters in Tennessee.

The project, funded by a grant from the Office of Criminal Justice Programs and operated jointly with the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute, is providing workshops across the state to help prepare potential court interpreters for certification when it becomes available.

(02/06/2001)

Election Focuses Attention On Judicial System

As the presidential election focused a national spotlight on state and federal courts, delegations led by chief justices from 17 states, including Tennessee, were drafting a "Call to Action" dealing with how the judges themselves are elected.

Chief Justice Riley Anderson was chosen to represent Tennessee at a meeting between state legislators and judicial leaders held in Chicago in December. Others in the Tennessee delegation were state Sen. Joe Haynes, D-Goodlettsville; Rep. Jere Hargrove, D- Cookeville; and Kathryn Reed Edge, president of the Tennessee Bar Association. The National Summit on Improving Judicial Selection, sponsored by the National Center for State Courts, has resulted in a blueprint - a list of suggestions relating to the cost and processes used to elect judges.

"An overwhelming majority of the 95 participants endorsed a list of 20 recommendations, but there was recognition that each state’s judicial selection process is unique and all recommendations may not apply," Anderson said. "Judicial elections differ in many ways from elections for other offices because judges are prohibited by their codes of conduct from certain common campaign practices, such as making campaign promises. Also, there generally is less media attention on judicial elections so voters sometimes go to the polls knowing very little about the candidates."

Anderson said the summit was important to explore ways to protect the integrity and independence of the judiciary.

"While not everyone agreed on all suggestions, there was complete agreement among participants that we want to do whatever is reasonable to enhance public confidence in the administration of justice," Anderson said. "We rejected the notion that nothing can be done to accomplish that worthy goal."

In Tennessee, trial judges are elected every eight years in local popular elections. The state’s 29 judges on the Supreme Court, Court of Appeals and Court of Criminal Appeals are under the Tennessee Plan calling for retention elections in which voters decide whether to retain judges on a yes-no ballot. When a vacancy occurs between elections, the state’s 15- member Judicial Selection Commission recommends three applicants to the governor, who then appoints a judge.

The summit’s recommendations for consideration by the states in which 87 percent of the nation’s trial and appellate judges face contested or retention elections are:

• All judicial elections, whether direct or retention, should be conducted in a nonpartisan manner.
• States with relatively short judicial terms of office should consider increasing the length of those terms. Term limits, whatever their merits for representative positions, are not appropriate for judicial office.
• All judges appointed to fill a vacant judicial position should serve a substantial period in office before initial election. After initial election, all judges should serve a full term before a second election.
• Educational programs on state election laws, judicial canons, and sanctions for violations should be conducted for all judicial candidates, together with their campaign staff, consultants, and interested family members. The Legislature or Judiciary, as appropriate, should mandate attendance at such programs and ensure that they are adequately funded.
• “Hotlines”” should be established by the Legislature, the Judiciary, or the appropriate judicial discipline body to respond expeditiously to questions about campaign conduct, campaign finance, judicial ethics, or related issues. A judge, candidate, campaign worker or contributor who adheres to the advice provided by this procedure should be accorded a prima facie defense to any subsequent legal action or disciplinary procedure.
• Non-governmental monitoring groups should be established to encourage fair and ethical judicial campaigns. Such groups should include respected and diverse individuals representing state and local bar associations and other credible community organizations. These monitoring groups should take all appropriate means to secure voluntary compliance with high standards of conduct, exceeding those mandated by law. For example, they should be willing, if requested, to conduct advance review of paid advertisements to ensure accuracy and fairness. They should offer mediation and arbitration procedures for campaign disputes. They should develop processes for informing the public about the degree of cooperation and compliance they receive from the campaigns. They should endeavor to secure cooperation in all their endeavors from independent advocacy groups as well as from candidates and political parties. Finally, if necessary, they should be available to comment publicly on the conduct of candidates, political parties or outside groups.

• Canons of judicial conduct and state laws regarding judicial campaign activity should be reexamined to assure that they promote fair elections while safeguarding the right to free speech. To advance this process, one or more organizations committed to judicial integrity, impartiality, and independence should convene a Symposium on Judicial Campaign Conduct and the First Amendment composed of distinguished scholars, lawyers and judges to consider these issues. In addition, the ABA should consider revising the provisions of the Model Code of Judicial Conduct regarding inappropriate activity by judicial candidates.
• Procedures should be studied for resolving professional discipline complaints arising from campaign conduct before the election. Expedited procedures cannot come at the expense, however, of limiting the due process rights of the parties involved.
• State and local governments should prepare and disseminate judicial candidate voter guides by print and electronic means to all registered voters before any judicial election at no cost to judicial candidates. Such guides should provide information that will be useful to voters in comparing the candidates.
• Congress should provide a free federal mailing frank to any voters' guide sponsored by a state or local government.
• Bar associations, either alone or working with a larger and balanced group of concerned citizens and organizations, should conduct evaluations of judges. Evaluation results should be disseminated as appropriate.
• The judiciary should consider establishing independent and objective judicial performance evaluation processes with appropriate safeguards. Participation in these evaluations should include members of the bar and community. Such evaluations have been used in states with retention elections. Evaluation results should be disseminated as appropriate.
• Media outlets should broadcast debates between judicial candidates, and should sponsor such debates if other appropriate groups are not doing so.
• The judiciary, the bar, and other interested groups should devise ongoing programs to educate the public about the judicial process. Special attention should be given to informing educators, students and media representatives about the judicial process. Judges should increase their efforts to explain the judicial role to the public. Where permitted by law, court should be held in venues other than the courthouse, particularly in schools. When feasible, appellate courts should conduct occasional sessions away from their regular sites.

• Courts should use their websites to explain the judicial role to the public. Courts should make as much public information available online as possible, consistent with legitimate privacy concerns. In particular, court dockets and court opinion should be published online as contemporaneously as is consistent with accuracy.
• States in which candidates compete for judicial positions should consider adopting public funding for at least some judicial elections. Even in states that reject public funding for representative officials, the nature of the judicial function makes public funding particularly appropriate for judicial elections. Any public funding system should be sufficiently generous to encourage participating candidates to forego all other sources of campaign funds. The system should be designed to discourage frivolous candidates and to restrict overall spending while allowing appropriate response to independent expenditures.
• States should adopt systems for disclosing campaign contributions and expenditures that provide timely and ready access to relevant information without being unreasonably burdensome.
• By statute or judicial conduct code provisions, states should set appropriate limits on the size of campaign contributions to judicial campaigns.
• States should consider adoption of the 1999 amendments to the ABA Model Code of Judicial Conduct respecting judicial campaign finance, as appropriate in each jurisdiction.
• Some activities of special interest groups in recent judicial elections, particularly those groups located outside the state where the election is being held, have been pernicious. The Symposium on Judicial Campaign Conduct and the First Amendment should also include discussion of creative ways, consistent with the right of free speech, in which state rules as to contribution limits and financial disclosure can be applied to outside groups and individuals as well as candidates and political parties.