The community organization La Defensa relaunched the program Court Watch to make the work of judges in Los Angeles County transparent, and that Angelenos know who is not complying with imposing bail according to the economic circumstances of each person.
“We want to bring people into the courts to see what is happening and keep the judges transparent because they are not following the law or protecting the rights of the community,” said Ivette Alé-Ferlito, co-founder and executive director of The defense.
In May, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge issued a preliminary injunction preventing the city and county from requiring cash bail for people arrested who have not yet been arraigned.
Judge Lawrence Riff ruled in the Urquidí lawsuit against Los Angeles in favor of ending the use of cash bail. After issuing the preliminary injunction, Riff said that holding someone because he can’t pay likely violates his constitutional rights.
Alé-Ferlito further explained that based on the Humphrey case, judges must consider a person’s ability to pay when setting bail.
“That was a decision by the state of California, but judges are not following the law or considering a person’s circumstances.”
As a consequence, he made it clear that many legally innocent people are being sent to jail, who have not been convicted of what they are accused of; and because they cannot pay the bail, they are locked up.
“Almost 50% of the people incarcerated have no sentence, but they are deprived of their liberty due to the decisions that judges make every day.”
Gabriela Vázquez, deputy director of The defense said that he Court Watch is a program started by National Lawyers Guild about three or four years ago.
“In January they asked us if we could continue with the program and we said yes. We had already created the page ratemyjudge.la before so that people could leave their comments and anonymous complaints about how judges treat them.
Part of the work to publicize the website Rate my Judge LA was to go to court to talk to people about the page. That’s where they met the volunteers from Court Watch.
“They had the feeling that The defense I had to continue with this program.”
Photo: Impremedia
Alé-Ferlito says that the relaunch of this program through The defenseis a new page in the history of Court Watch.
“The defense We are an organization that the now councilor Eunisses Hernández and I founded at the end of 2019 to inform the community of what judges do and to communicate their experiences and take action.”
Vazquez explains Court Watch It will work through volunteers who will be trained to enter the courts, and take note of the work of the judges.
“They may not use phones, computers or recording, but they may bring pen and paper to document the behavior of the judges.”
It specifies that the program will begin on July 21 with more than 25 volunteers from the School of Law.
Alé-Ferlito says that the purpose is to obtain information from each judge, in order to identify those who are behaving badly and are not following the law.
“Most people don’t know that through voting we can choose our judges; and next year we are going to have the next elections and we want to give people information so they can make a good decision when it comes to voting.”
Vásquez adds that with the results of Court Watch They are going to create a report on how judges treat the community.
“We have almost 500 judges, but we want to identify the 10 worst judges who send people to jail the most and do not look for alternatives; or they say this person needs mental health support”.
And he acknowledges that the county is huge. “We have 38 courts in the county, but in a first stage we are going to focus on criminal matters.”
Alé-Ferlito says he wants to expand the program Court Watch to the federal immigration courts where there are many abuses.
“The work of Court Watch He is going to be very critical of the conditions inside the prisons. 50% of those incarcerated have not been sentenced; and one person a week dies from violence, mistreatment, overdose and lack of medication”.
He claims that at the end of the day it is the responsibility of the Los Angeles sheriff to protect people and their human rights.
“In jail Men’s Central Jail tWe have a humanitarian crisis due to violence and medical negligence. More than one court has sent a decision that they have to close that building. It is not suitable for keeping humans. It’s a torture site.”
And remember that before the pandemic, they had around 17,000 detainees in jails run by the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department, but by order, they reduced the population to 12,000.
However, they are repopulating and already have a population of almost 15,000.
Photo: Impremedia
The ultimate goal is to close Men’s Central Jail and move people with mental health needs to a medical site.
“We also have to get people out who are innocent. No one should be in jail because they can’t pay for their freedom.”
And he points out that more than 80% of those incarcerated are Latinos and people of Afro descent.
Vázquez stresses that the mission of The defense It is the transparency of the judges.
“We have to know who they are because they are within our communities.”
In California, the vast majority of Superior Court judges are appointed by the governor, but after serving their terms they must be re-elected by the voters.