Wasting Time in Court.

State V. Kristen Lane
Let me tell you a story first then I will tell you why you care about this story.
A little while before 01:00 A.M. on February 15 2009 the Topeka Police Dept. arrested Miss Lane while she was on her way to the Quick Shop in North Topeka to buy cigarettes. She was operating an automobile without a license and with a Blood Alcohol of over .10. Miss lane was in the vehicle with two men and a minor girl. According to the testimony of Miss Lane and the two men she had been in the passenger seat and when the driver Mr. Buschbom realized that he had attracted the attention of the police he suddenly climbed over Miss Lanes lap forcing her to assume control of the vehicle in order to avoid a collision. Mr. Buschbom had a suspended license and was on probation so to preserve his ability to regain his license and to avoid a probation violation Miss Lane was used as the patsy. Nice bunch.
Miss Lane was charged with DUI No. 2 and driving with a revoked license. The case came to trial just this last week.
The case was tried by a legal intern with the assistance of an assistant D.A. before a retired judge was and a six person jury. Tying up an assistant D.A. and a judge and six jury members, a court reporter and a courtroom for a day and a half. Not to mention the time spent by the D.A.‘s office preparing for this case and time spent by the legal clerk and clerical time et al. Just to send a misdemeanor DUI to jail for a week and garner some kind of fines for the DUI and the “driving without a license” charge. No effort made to offer a deal to drop the “driving without a license” charge in exchange for a guilty plea was made though it reportedly would have been accepted.
All of this takes money. Money that the State of Kansas does not have. This has been happening just about every week at the rate of 4 to 6 a week. Even to the point of calling in retired judges to sit on these misdemeanor trials.

The D.A.’s office receives the case report then investigates and decides what charges to file in the case. This D.A. office due to sloppy investigation winds up filing lists of charges in a single case and many times charges that have to be changed at the last minute. Like in State V. Lane the original charge was DUI No. 1 until at the last minute the D.A. found out that Miss Lane had been on a diversion at one time for her 1st DUI. Had this been DUI No 3 a Felony would have been warranted and not charged.

The worst example is in Domestic. You know how it goes Joe gets off work and has his pay on Friday evening. He’s worked hard all week so he goes by the Bar and Grill with the Lads and chugs down a few cold ones. He goes home and his wife wants to know where he’s been and why he didn’t come home for supper and one thing leads to another and before long the wife has a black eye and the police want to know why. Joe goes to jail. The report get’s filed the D.A. investigates and the wife visits Joe. The unhappy couple makes up and the wife no longer wants to see her beloved Joey in the slammer. She begins to hemhaw around and any normal D.A. knows that when this thing goes to court she’s not going to sound like she did when she was angry. She’s “in love” with her darling Joe and the babies miss their Daddy and they need the paycheck. If you push these things you will lose. No matter how much we know about how Sweet Little Joey is probably going to show up again a few weeks later drunk and in trouble, it just doesn’t matter. If the victim is unwilling to proceed with the prosecution, you stop. Do not waste your time and Court resources. It’s a hard fact but true all the same. If you proceed you will lose. Along the way you spent time preparing the case and you’ve wasted a day or two of time for a judge and a six man jury and a court reporter and a D.A assistant and a court room and more. So why would the D.A. proceed with a case like this if he has no chance of winning and waste so much of the State’s resources just to lose?

Well the D.A. is looking for numbers. When time comes to decide whether or not to change D.A.’s the numbers will look good when he points to how many DUI and Domestic cases his office has prosecuted and he looks real good to people who only care whether he prosecuted the cases. At a time when we don’t have the money to throw away on cases that have no merit or can be plead to save court resources, this prosecutor is more concerned with his political future than with the economic welfare of Kansas.