Judge Michael Corrigan managed one major change in the juvenile justice system in 1976. As the juvenile judge of the county court, Corrigan led the transition when the Kansas Supreme Court folded his job into a division of the district court.
“But this is probably the biggest change I’ve seen,” Corrigan, now chief judge of Sedgwick County District Court, told me this morning about the recent ruling by the Kansas Supreme Court that grants juveniles the right to a jury trial.
Corrigan spent Monday talking to his judges about how they were going to manage what could be as many as 100 new trials a year. He spent Tuesday talking to the County Commission about how it’s going to be funded.
The new juvenile courts facility, just completed, doesn’t have room for juries — yet. Plans originally called for a jury courtroom in the juvenile facility, but the county didn’t approve that expense. After all, until last week juveniles didn’t have jury trials.
Two new judge positions approved by the Supreme Court and funded by state lawmakers won’t take effect until January. But the first jury trial in a juvenile criminal case could come as soon as next month. Corrigan said for the first six months, juvenile jury trials will be managed from the adult courthouse. More summonses will be sent each week and jury clerk Linda Marvin will continue to oversee all jury trials.
Judges from the main courthouse will handle the cases. Corrigan said he may appoint a “pro-tem,” or temporary judge to handle the extra caseload until January.
“That’s if we have one extra jury trial,” Corrigan said. “If we have two, I don’t know what we’ll do.”
Meanwhile, Corrigan said judges and lawyers who have been handling juvenile cases have some college-style cramming to do. Jury trials operate under different rules than cases where the trial is decided by a judge.