Pa. to review Phila. court system

The chief justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court said today he would order a comprehensive review of Philadelphia's troubled criminal justice system in response to what he called "alarming and serious trends."

At the same time, Ronald D. Castille expressed skepticism about some of the findings and statistical calculations in an Inquirer series that documented a falling conviction rate, growing witness intimidation, a massive number of fugitives and a heavy proportion of dismissed and withdrawn cases.

"The series points out some serious problems," the chief justice said. "I'm going to start getting some answers here."

He singled out the high number of robbery cases that collapse in Philadelphia's lower Municipal Court. "That's a huge question there," he said.

In a wide-ranging interview, Castille, a former Republican district attorney in Philadelphia, complained about what he said were "tabloid" headlines of The Inquirer series and also released a four-page memo that questioned some of the paper's statistical findings.

Nonetheless, after studying The Inquirer's reporting and talking with top Philadelphia judges and court administrators, Castille said he would now:

Order Philadelphia's courts to hire outside experts, perhaps from a university or from the National Center for State Courts, a research organization based in Williamsburg, Va., to dig deeper into the paper's statistical findings. Their task would be to "come in and analyze the raw numbers and point out problems."

Appoint a fellow state Supreme Court justice, Seamus P. McCaffery, to work as special liaison with Municipal Court to shake up its operation. McCaffery, a former president judge of Municipal Court, has long been a vigorous critic of the high number of dismissals there.

Push the 25 judges in Municipal Court to streamline how they handle preliminary hearings, in which they decide if enough evidence exists to hold a suspect for a full trial in the higher Common Pleas Court. Critics, including McCaffery, say that the judges have turned these hearings into protracted "mini-trials" – leading to far too many dismissed cases.

Strip the Clerk of Quarter Sessions Office, a key record-keeping arm of the court, of much of its functions. Castille said he found it unacceptable that the clerk's office had kept no computerized records of $1 billion in bail owed by fugitives from court.

In the four-day series published last month, The Inquirer reported on the results of its statistical analysis of 31,000 violent-crime cases filed since 2006.

The paper found that nearly two-thirds of all defendants charged with violent crimes were escaping conviction on all charges.

The newspaper also reported that Philadelphia had the highest crime rates among the nation's 10 most populous cities for murder, rape, robbery, and serious assault - even as its conviction rate was at rock bottom among large urban counties.

The memo Castille sent to top court officials and made public today contained harsh criticism and raised a series of questions about the paper's statistics.

"While the raw numbers may be accurate, the important procedure is how you interpret the raw numbers," the memo said. "What the Inquirer fails to take into account is what happens to cases as they progress through the court system. . . ."

However, in some cases, the memo misconstrues the paper's findings, which were based on following cases to their conclusion. Notably, in the first page of his memo, Castille confused the number of robberies that take place each year in the city with the number of court cases stemming from arrests. Police solve only about one in four of all robbery cases.

In the interview today, conducted after he wrote the memo, Castille seemed to soften his criticism and acknowledged that the newspaper had highlighted significant issues.

Reached last night, McCaffery, a Democrat, said he welcomed his role in leading the push for reform. He said he was encouraged that the chief justice recognized the need to examine and work to improve a system that McCaffery has described as "on the brink of overall collapse."

"The attention of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is now focused on this problem," said McCaffery. "It's great to see that the state Supreme Court is going to take a careful look and make changes where needed because the citizens of Philadelphia deserve better."

District Attorney Seth Williams, who took office only this week, said he was "ecstatic" that Castille had taken a personal interest in the city's beleaguered courts.

"I'm elated that the chief justice is doing this," he said. "We do have the lowest conviction rate, and we do have to evaluate things, and I'm sure there are many ways we can improve things that do not cost money."

Williams said he favored streamlining preliminary hearings by expanding the use of hearsay so that victims and witnesses do not have to appear in court as often. As an example, he cited a stolen-car case he handled today when he went to the police district at 55th and Pine Streets in West Philadelphia to assist two junior prosecutors at preliminary hearings.

The victim was a local physician who could not make it to court because he had patients scheduled for appointments all morning. Williams had to ask the judge to delay and reschedule the case.

In the rest of the state, Williams said, the testimony of the police officer would have been enough evidence to hold the case for trial. In Philadelphia, where preliminary hearings have evolved into more elaborate proceedings, the case could not go forward in the absence of the victim.

Williams said it makes no sense to require the victim to appear at a preliminary hearing.

"I would like them to be done the way they are in the rest of the state," Williams said, "not how they evolved into mini-trials."

In the interview, Castille said the outside experts could examine a number of the issues raised in the paper's series, and further unravel why cases were falling apart.

Among other issues, Castille said, the researchers could further probe the conviction rates for robbery and aggravated assaults. He said that perhaps this might show that the "worst offenders" were among those being convicted.

The Inquirer analysis found little evidence of that. In fact, the paper found that it made no difference in conviction rates whether someone was charged with robbery or assault with a gun - or without a firearm.

Castille also said he was somewhat less troubled by the low conviction rate for aggravated assault. He said this likely reflected the fact that in many domestic assault cases, spouses won't cooperate with a prosecution.

He also noted that, under state law, many relatively minor tangles with police are deemed aggravated assaults. He said it may be tough for prosecutors to win convictions in such cases.

In general, Castille said, "The Inquirer's analysis was disturbing," but now he wanted to mandate more research. "It calls for a deeper analysis," he said.

The chief justice has met with top court officials, including Administrative Judge D. Webster Keogh and President Judge Pamela Pryor Dembe of Common Pleas Court, as well as court administrator David C. Lawrence, to discuss the Inquirer coverage. He said he planned to meet soon with Municipal Court President Judge Marsha H. Neifield.

Like those judges, Castille downplayed the impact of the fugitive issue in the city. The paper, citing figures provided by court administrator Lawrence, reported that there were about 47,000 fugitives loose at last count.

However, Castille said many of these fugitives had skipped court decades ago and he predicted that a large number were dead.

The Inquirer analysis, however, found that most of the fugitives had skipped court in this decade or the last. The newspaper also cited a comparative federal study, based on a review of 2004 cases, that found that Philadelphia tied with Essex County, N.J. – home of Newark- for having the nation's largest percentage of fugitives.

Criticism aside, Castille said, the paper's work did unearth "serious problems in the court system, some of which could be resolved by the courts, some by the DA, some by the police and some by more funding."

In its analysis, The Inquirer found that of cases that end without a conviction, 82 percent die in Municipal Court. Many are dismissed or withdrawn at the preliminary hearing stage.

In his memo, Castille specifically raised the Inquirer's reporting about the collapsed robbery cases in Municipal Court.

"Notwithstanding all of the above [criticisms], the seminal question is: What happens in Municipal Court where only 43 percent of robbberies advance to Common Pleas Court? That I hope to find out from President Judge Neifield."

Castille said he wants Municipal Court to expand the use of hearsay evidence at preliminary hearings so that witnesses don't have to come in to testify until later at the full trial.

"At preliminary hearings, hearsay is permissible. Our [appelate] cases say you can do that. I don't know why they don't do that," he said.

In a rare shot at judges, Castille did say he might consider urging judges to spend more time on the bench. "I get reports that you walk into some of these courtrooms at two o'clock, there's nobody on the bench," Castille said.

While Castille seemed largely unfazed by the number of fugitives, he said he was troubled by the fact that the staff of Clerk of Quarter Sessions Vivian T. Miller had no computerized database of the bail debt run up by people who skipped court.

Of Miller's operation, he said bluntly, "We're going to be looking to absorb that. Once it comes into our office, it will be run efficiently."

He acknowledged that Miller is an elected official, but said that would not dissuade him from absorbing the operations of her office. "We could say, well, fine, you still are who you are, but we're taking over the function of your office.

In an interview today, Robin T. Jones, Miller's first deputy and daughter, said the office does the best it can with limited funds.

"I mean, we are at the point where we have exhausted all of our resources," Jones said.

Catille, who served as the city's top prosecutor from 1986 to 1991, noted that he was both a Philadelphia resident and a judge. He wanted a city without a crime problem, he said.

"We're in charge of the court system. That's our bailiwick, Castille summed up. "There's no doubt the numbers demonstrate a problem."

Castille added:

"We want to run an efficient court system. We want everyone to pull their oar - D.A., judge, public defender, defense lawyers who have a duty to the court - to dispense justice. By taking the right people off the street, we're going to make this a much safer city to walk around in."