MONTPELIER — On the heels of a Burlington pilot court praised by state officials, Gov. Phil Scott announced Wednesday that he plans to replicate the “accountability court” model in Rutland County.
In the Burlington pilot court, defendants were fast tracked-through the legal system if they faced many legal cases. And with social workers hired to sit in the courtroom, defendants were connected to services like temporary housing and recovery resources.
With the about three-month pilot sunsetting in Burlington, officials have touted the fact that a full-time judge and prosecutor dedicated to the courtroom made significant progress chipping away at the county’s backlog in criminal cases, resolving 702 of the 972 cases assigned to the pilot court.
Now, officials in the justice system hope to do the same in Rutland.
“We know that Rutland is in need,” Scott said at his weekly press conference Wednesday.
In January, Scott asked lawmakers in his budget proposal for half a million dollars to expand the pilot court in other counties. Now, Scott said he chose Rutland because it appeared to be “set up the best” to try the model next.
Peter Bevere, a deputy state’s attorney in Rutland County, will be prosecuting the cases in the new pilot court, according to Ian Sullivan, the county’s state’s attorney. In the meantime, other prosecutors in the office will take over the cases Bevere is currently assigned, Sullivan said.
“He is well situated to take this by the reins,” Sullivan said.
In Rutland, defendants will have their cases funneled into the pilot court if they have four or more pending legal cases, which is less than the five or more case threshold in Chittenden County’s pilot. That discrepancy is due to the fact that Rutland County has a much smaller population, and officials wanted to include as many defendants in the court as possible, Sullivan said.
Currently, 55 defendants in the county are set to have their cases heard in the court, according to Sullivan. Those people are facing about 370 cases total, which makes up almost 40% of all cases in the county, he said.
Many details about how the Rutland pilot will be rolled out remain unknown, though — like when the pilot will start.
“I think it could happen anytime at this point. We just want to make sure that the details were worked out,” Scott said. He’s struggling to see eye to eye with officials in the Vermont Judiciary, Scott said, and they’re trying to iron things out.
Officials in the judiciary initially wanted to run the pilot court only one day a week over three months, Scott said. But he doesn’t think that’s best.
“I don’t think that’s going to work. I think it’s not going to be as effective as we saw in Burlington, and it actually may fail,” Scott said.
Zach Weight, who prosecuted the cases in the Burlington pilot, said that having social workers sitting in the courtroom was key to the court’s success. Those social workers came from Vermont’s Agency of Human Services and partnerships with local social service organizations like the Howard Center and Pathways Vermont.
Lawmakers considering funding the court’s expansion have expressed concern that, compared to Burlington, many counties around the state have fewer social service organizations based locally, if any at all.
Sullivan said he was not yet sure what social work resources the state might provide, or partner with, to supply resources to people in the court.
