“Justice delayed is justice denied.” Wm. E. Gladstone (1809-1898)
Leila Watson December 1st, 2008Subscribe to rss news feed
“Justice delayed is justice denied.” Wm. E. Gladstone (1809-1898)
Imagine being traumatically harmed by a defective product or in a tractor trailer accident and seeking redress by the only means available – by the filing of a lawsuit against the business or person responsible. Imagine the bills arriving every week for thousands of dollars for the hospitals, doctors, rehabilitation, and nursing services required to recover from the injuries, and imagine the days and months of unemployment and no paychecks to pay for medical care, utilities, food, and all the necessities of life. And while this onslaught is crashing over you, you are waiting for a trial date, waiting for resolution and compensation from the responsible party, so you can move on with your recovery and your life.
As plaintiff lawyers we are charged with the filing of the lawsuit as soon as feasible. We are charged with the responsibility of moving the case forward, and we accept that willingly. We represent people whose lives have been horribly and suddenly changed, who have limited financial resources to accommodate the changes thrust upon them. We need swift trial settings because that is the only thing that forces a defendant to evaluate their responsibility and settle the case, or in the event of no settlement, it is the only route left for redress and justice.
We recognize there is delay inherent in the local court system because ours is not the only case and there is work that must be done on each individual case and schedules of other lawyers, expert witnesses, police officers, doctors and numerous other necessary witnesses to be accommodated. Delay necessitated by these things is explainable and consequently, tolerable.
However, this week, I was witness to delays caused by the highest appellate court in Alabama, Alabama Supreme Court, without any explanation or apology. The Alabama Supreme Court does not have a caseload of thousands of cases, all needing trial dates. In 2007, that Court received only 1,828 cases. The 2007 Annual Report from the Court proudly announced that it disposed of 1,804 cases. However, the Court only wrote an opinion in 274 cases – it disposed of 1,714 cases without explaining their decisions. And what about the 24 cases left dangling in the Annual Report?
Among the cases decided in 2008 was a tragedy of delay. On January 11, 2003, Patricia Holt was driving her granddaughter to school when her car slid on an icy curve, went down an embankment, overturned and landed upside down in the creek at the bottom of the bank. She had injuries requiring hospitalization for 25 days. She filed suit against Lauderdale County and alleged that it had failed to maintain the bridge and roadside guardrails, and had the county fulfilled its duty, she would not have been injured. The trial court ruled that she had failed to prove the county had a duty to maintain guardrails and dismissed her case. She filed an appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court on March 7, 2006. There was no lengthy trial transcript to prepare because her case was dismissed by the local judge without a trial. On November 7, 2008, thirty-two months after she filed her appeal, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled in her favor and reinstated the case and she should now be able to proceed to trial.
I cannot imagine what Mrs. Holt and her family did for 32 months to get by. This unbelievable delay was not the fault of Mrs. Holt, her lawyer, or even Lauderdale County. It rests with the court, and in particular one justice, Justice Tom Parker, who was assigned to this case and wrote the opinion. In April 2006, he was publicly criticized in newspapers statewide for having written only one opinion the entire year of 2005, and holding 73 other cases hostage in his office. I had believed that Justice Parker had improved his track record since the public criticism, but this shameful, unapologetic delay is proof otherwise.
Another decision released on November 21, 2008, from the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed a judgment for the plaintiff without a written opinion. The argument presented by the plaintiff’s attorney was that the appeal was frivolous in the first place, and done merely by the defendant to delay paying the judgment money. He had filed his brief in April 2006, thirty-one months ago. His client has finally received his justice. You would think that if the Alabama Supreme Court is not going to write an opinion that it certainly would not take thirty-one months to issue their decision.
These justices are public officials, elected by statewide election to this highest court in Alabama to interpret and enforce the laws and Constitution of Alabama. The people that come to the courts for redress are there because they have no other place to go. I promise my clients that I will do everything I can to get the fair and just compensation they deserve, and that I will act swiftly to protect their interests and I will not cause needless delay in their lives. Perhaps the courts should take the same interest in people that the lawyers do, because “justice delayed is justice denied,” and we have nowhere else to go to seek justice.