LOS ANGELES - The Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California issued an order denying a fellow U.S. District judge’s request to summon jurors for a pending case.
“The court as reflected in the general order has already decided unanimously that we are not going to summon jurors so the crux of my minute order is simply enforcing what the court has already unanimously decided,” Chief Judge Philip Gutierrez told the Southern California Record.
As previously reported, Judge Gutierrez signed a general order on Aug. 6 suspending jury trials indefinitely due to COVID-19 after a unanimous vote by Central District judges.
“There's no one rushing to knock down the door to try cases,” said Judge Gutierrez in an interview. “It’s not happening. People are very cautious. I get phone calls regularly about wanting to proceed cautiously. Granted, if an individual defendant wants to exercise his right, of course, the lawyer has to exercise that right but absent that there are no individual lawyers knocking down the courthouse door to start a jury trial tomorrow. They're very concerned. They’re scared, in fact.”
While U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney was reportedly among the judges who voted in favor of suspending jury trials, he challenged the federal court’s Aug. 6 suspension of jury trials in U.S. v. Recinos, a pending case. Judge Carney declined to comment at this time due to the ongoing litigation.
“Although this District has suspended jury trials indefinitely, other court functions continue with precautions in place, including face coverings, plexiglass shields, and physical distancing,” wrote Carney in his Aug. 18 Amended Order requesting the chief judge to direct the jury department to issue jury summons. “In light of these developments, the Court finds that the COVID-19 pandemic does not justify excluding further delays to Mr. Recinos’s Speedy Trial rights.”
In denying Judge Carney's request for a jury trial on Oct. 6, Judge Gutierrez said in his Aug. 19 minute order:
"The Central District of California has been devastatingly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. There have been over 7,700 deaths as a result of COVID-19 in the Central District. The virus continues to spread throughout the District. Just two days ago, there were 1,182 new cases of COVID-19 in Los Angeles County, 393 new cases in Riverside County, 318 new cases in Orange County, 281 new cases in San Bernardino County, 82 new cases in Ventura County, 70 new cases in Santa Barbara County, and 35 new cases in San Luis Obispo County. Each county in the Central District is on California’s County Data Monitoring List because the county is not meeting the State’s objective threshold criteria related to community transmission."
The door is now open for defendant Recinos’ attorney to file a motion to dismiss the indictment, but Judge Gutierrez said he’s not convinced that there’s a crisis at all.
“I cannot comment on a specific case but generally a judge could find excludable time and not dismiss the case,” he said. “That's up to the individual judge and their judgment. The U.S. Attorney could probably also refile the case or the U.S. Attorney could appeal the case. In fact, maybe in any particular case, the party is actually interested in resolving the case with a conditional plea.”
The number of coronavirus cases has surged in recent months.
Statewide, there have been 668,615 cases reported and 12,152 deaths. In Los Angeles County, where two Central District courthouses are located, the number of cases reached 231,833 with 5,545 fatalities as of Aug. 24, according to the Department of Public Health dashboard.
When asked whether he was concerned about liabilities down the road, Judge Gutierrez said he is more concerned with jurors coming to court because they are compelled, not voluntarily.
“Some may do so more willingly than others but the bottom line is the only person who's there voluntarily is the judge,” he said. “That's it. Everyone else is compelled to be there and they're compelled to be there during a jury trial, which is different from other kinds of hearings, for five or six hours. At the same time, you're asking folks to come to court who have lost jobs and are looking for job interviews.”
For attorneys concerned about the number of cases racking up over time while jury trials are suspended, Judge Gutierrez said: “What backlog? Once the courthouse opens and courtrooms are opened, the backlog goes away.”