KEY POINTS:
This is how justice is dispensed. The names of the accused are listed on a wall, directing them to one of a dozen different courts. On this Wednesday, about 200 people will cross paths with justice in the Manukau District Court.
Most will appear in Court 1, to
answer charges of drink-driving, common assault, breach of bail, driving while disqualified, breach of community service, minor fraud ...
Maybe they deserve what's in store. Maybe they are innocent.
They wait for their name to be called, vaguely alphabetically, two at a time. Newcombe followed by Newton. And they wait for two hours, four hours, six hours ...
They study the drab fawn carpet with black triangles and thick stripes, the pulpboard wall panels, the functional furniture. The doors may as well be revolving; lawyers come and go, nodding to the bench, as regularly as the unfortunate punters.
More are waiting outside in the courtyard - grey metal seats on grey paving stones, a pohutukawa presiding as trucks roar by on busy Wiri Station Rd.
Only a handful of those hauled before the judge will get justice delivered; the rest get justice postponed. Many of the hiccups are procedural: they haven't seen a lawyer, their lawyer hasn't seen the police file, they want bail conditions altered ...
A lawyer seeks an adjournment, blaming lack of disclosure (access to police evidence against his client). The prosecutor retorts that the lawyer has what he needs but the accused gets a two-week delay.
In legal circles, they call it churn.
The police blame lawyers, lawyers blame the police and, occasionally, judges; the judges blame lawyers and the police.
The system lacks incentives to speed things up - both prosecutors and lawyers are paid on the basis of time spent in court.
The need to oil the wheels of justice was highlighted in the Auckland District Court last month when Judge Mary Sharp granted a stay of proceedings to three students accused of kidnapping and injuring with intent. Their case had not reached trial nearly four years after their alleged offending.
Ministry of Justice figures show 69 stays have been granted in the past six years, although Justice officials dispute political charges that most are due to court "systemic" problems. Prosecutors and most lawyers say things are no worse than normal. But has anyone asked the accused?
At Manukau, the access to justice issue starts with parking - apart from a few spaces on a side road with 90-minute parking there is nowhere. Those who park in the shopping centre carpark opposite risk being towed for exceeding time limits. They could end up in court again.
The four-square brick courthouse opened in 2001 as the $23 million answer to pressure on the district courts at Auckland and Otahuhu. Despite 12 courtrooms, the four-storey building stood accused from opening day of being too small. There are plans to add a floor.
Meanwhile, cases which began in September are rolling on.
Ministry figures show delays are getting worse in key areas - including the backlog of High Court jury trials (which deal with the most serious charges and are hugely expensive) which rose from 136 to 220 in 2005/06. High Court trials are also lasting longer.
Most criminal cases are dealt with in district courts, where the 176,000 cases heard last year represented an increase of 10 per cent over two years.
Lawyers say delays - and associated costs - are prompting people to plead guilty to charges for which they have a defence.
"If you want to have the case resolved on the day you appear you have to plead guilty, otherwise you're put off for another day," says South Auckland barrister Catriona MacLennan.
After two or three deferrals, clients under pressure from their boss will often plead guilty to minor charges they should be defending.
MacLennan says Manukau is stretched to breaking point. She cites a recent case in which a judge threw out charges against a woman arrested at 1 am and held in the cells until after 4 pm because her police file was not ready. In another case, a woman due to give birth, arrested on a five-year-old warrant for a minor offence, sat in the cells for hours because her file was not available.
People arriving at 9 am often wait four to six hours; some are still waiting to be called at 5pm.
Police and court staff are badly under-resourced, says MacLennan.
"Prosecutors arrive with 60 to 70 files they haven't had time to look at and have to stand up and say something sensible and at the same time lawyers are trying to get disclosure from them."
MacLennan says lawyers can wait up to 20 minutes to obtain a police summary of facts and list of previous convictions.
"Most defendants cannot tell us exactly what charges they face. They also cannot tell us with any accuracy what their previous convictions are. That information is critical to determining whether or not the defendant will be granted legal aid."
There are many reasons why more people are coming before the courts: more active policing of domestic violence; increases in people driving while disqualified or breaching bail conditions; victims seeking reparations; family breakups; more laws and regulations.
An increase in High Court jury trials reflects the number of people caught using or manufacturing P (high potency methamphetamine). Drug trials can go on for weeks, because police need to establish a pattern of behaviour over months of surveillance.
Auckland District Law Society president Andrew Gilchrist says complex leaky home disputes are adding to the logjam at the High Court at Auckland.
"It's always easier to get a booking for a case taking three days than a case likely to drag on for eight weeks. Even if the case ends up being settled out of court it still creates booking havoc."
The Government is considering calls to ease the pressure on the High Court by allowing district courts to hear methamphetamine cases. Courts Minister Rick Barker says the judiciary would decide whether cases went to the district or high court.
Whether the district courts would cope with the extra workload is another matter.
The performance of our court system has provided fertile ground in Parliament for National's justice spokesman Simon Power, associate justice spokeswoman Kate Wilkinson and shadow attorney-general Chris Finlayson - all three former lawyers.
Wilkinson released figures last September showing the median waiting time for a district court jury trial was 224 days.
Power says the courts are failing because they are under-resourced; Barker's well-worn defence is that the Government inherited a run-down, paper-based system from National. Courts are disposing of more cases but more keep coming in, he says.
The Government has indeed thrown money at the problem: boosting the number of judges, building new courts, introducing video-conferencing, setting up specialist family violence courts and raising baseline funding in 2004 by $156 million.
Further changes are in store. The Criminal Procedures Bill promises to reduce the need for oral evidence at depositions (committal) hearings and ensure earlier disclosure of prosecution evidence.
But will these do enough for Manukau and the country's other overburdened, main-centre courts?
The obvious verdict is that a day in Court 1 is a waste of time and money for almost everyone involved, from the high-cost judges and lawyers to the police prosecutors and poorly paid court staff to defendants and victims.
Law Commission deputy president Warren Young says a substantial proportion of cases are adjourned from one appearance to the next - "that's an enormous waste of the judiciary's time".
But the commission's call in 2003 for a new tier of "community courts" below district courts to undertake much of the filtering was rejected by the Government as too costly and a risk to justice.
The Government has, however, acted on the commission's more recent report into pre-trial processes.
Young says more needs to be done "to identify much earlier those wanting to plead guilty and those who dispute facts".
"If cases take 18 months or two years to resolve that's in no one's interest."
MacLennan last week sent a memorandum to the liaison judge for Manukau, Judge Charles Blackie, suggesting 19 improvements to procedures involving lawyers, police and court staff. The memo highlights a system under such stress that breakdowns occur at the most basic levels.
Her suggested improvements include leaving early disclosure packages in the cells for duty solicitors; police lists for duty solicitors to include the charges faced; overnight arrests to be brought to the cells earlier; a later start to court 1; the court master list provided earlier to duty solicitors; setting court dates for those appearing on domestic violence charges on a Saturday immediately, instead of requiring them to come back on Monday or Tuesday.
These are solutions to problems so basic as to make a time and motion expert at a cattle auction weep, which may be the best comparison.
Barker agrees court processes need more work. "We have to streamline and improve efficiency without detracting in any way from people's rights to proper and due process."
Procedural Improvements
South Auckland barrister Catriona MacLennan charge sheet includes:
* Police short-staffing in holding cells delaying lawyers' access to defendants.
* Late arrival of police prosecutors delaying disclosure and legal aid applications.
* Lawyers waiting in the public counter queue to obtain court lists (providing details of defendants to be called) so they can complete legal aid applications.
* Increased bureaucracy delaying legal aid processing.
* Arrest warrants being issued, then cancelled, after defendants are sent to the wrong area.
