Northern Judicial Circuit DA Asks Counties for More Help

By MJ Kneiser, WLHR Radio, Lavonia

Northern Judicial District Attorney Parks White is asking all five counties in the circuit to pay for extra assistant district attorneys.

In a presentation to the Hart County Board of Commissioners Tuesday evening, White said crime in the district is increasing and his office needs the extra attorneys to handle that increased case load.

“There’s been some expression by some people on some of the commissions that I knew the budget when I took the job,” White said. “But I was elected by a referendum to do a better job than the guy before me who for 16 years didn’t ask for any more money than what he was getting from the county. He didn’t ask for any more assistance. So, while every Sheriff’s office in this circuit has gotten additional investigators and additional deputies making additional cases, the District Attorney’s office has had to work with the same five ADA’s for that same period of time.”

White pointed out that surrounding counties with fewer populations have more ADA’s than the Northern Circuit – most he said have between 10 and 16.

White said since he took office in 2013, 2,677 cases of the more than 3,000 cases that were still waiting to be adjudicated have been cleared.  However, there are still some 2,400 new cases outstanding.

“What I need is for Hart County to step up and pay for another assistant district attorney, the whole thing. I need it from you, I need it from Madison, I need it from Franklin,” he told the board.

White noted he has come before the five boards before asking for increased funding and gotten his hand slapped.

“We want to be better than where we are now. We want to break that plateau of 2,400 (cases) that we’ve reached, but we need additional attorneys in the office,” he said.

Currently, White said his five Assistant District Attorneys are handling 482 cases each a year, more than most ADA’s in other circuits.

White noted the average pay for an ADA is around $43,000 a year whereas an attorney in private practice just out of law school makes around $130,000 a year. 

“These people don’t do this so much for the money but more because they want to serve,” White said.

White noted that most cases now are being turned around within 90 days,  most of them through plea deals.

“We have nothing waiting in our office more than 90 days before it gets in Superior Court on the docket, whether  accused or indicted,” he said. “I don’t know if that’s ever happened before in this circuit. That turnaround is extremely fast.”

Hart County Administrator Jon Caime agreed.

“Those facts are especially critical for those folks sitting in our jail,” Caime said. “If we don’t have to cover their expenses, including medical and dental, that saves the county money.”

White said his office is focusing on jail cases first.

“What we want to do is create more of a rocket docket,” White said. “We want to get the speed in which we move cases through Superior Court up and move them more quickly, but right now we don’t have the staff to do that.”

Prior to White taking over as DA, many cases sat for years waiting to be cleared.  White said earlier when he took office some of the 3,000 open cases that he found stacked in boxes in the DA’s office had gone back as far as ten years.

White called the need for more Assistant District Attorneys a question of public safety.

“Public safety is not a discretionary part of government, it is one of the only legitimate parts of government,” White said. “And public safety is not just the cops. It’s also the District Attorneys.”

White said victims also have a right to a speedy resolution to criminal cases.

“Imagine if you had been robbed. You want the person responsible to be caught and tried as quickly as possible,” he said.

County Attorney Walter Gordon agreed with White and recommended the Board consider helping to fund extra attorneys for the DA’s office.

After hearing from White, the Board thanked him for his presentation, but made no decision on his request.

– See more at: http://www.921wlhr.com/da-white-asks-for-more-adas-to-handle-increasing-caseload/#sthash.a1764rZ1.dpuf