The Court Could Learn a Thing or Two from Dentists

Have you ever missed a dentist’s appointment? I sure haven’t. Why not? Because dentists text us relentlessly. And if we don’t respond to their texts in a timely fashion, their office will start emailing or calling us. In their minds, your dental appointment is a life or death matter. It’s that important. They must teach this in dental school — but really it’s a business principle; be as efficient & effective as possible.

So why don’t we treat court dates the same way? Why don’t we send text & email reminders to criminal defendants?

Another thing I’ve noticed about the dental practice is that when you arrive at the dentist’s office it is never really that full like an emergency room or the dreaded DMV. They do a pretty good job, for the most part, staggering their appointments. I’ve never really had to wait that long before being called back for my cleaning. Sure, there are times I’ve had to wait more than 30 minutes. But all in all they are pretty good about getting you in and out as painlessly as possible (with the exception of the actual dental work, of course.)

A Court Date is Much More Important than a Dentist’s Appointment.

In my last post, I described what it was like running a criminal docket as a prosecutor. There were many days when my docket exceeded 100 cases and everyone was required to appear at 9 a.m. Inevitably, some defendants would fail to appear or leave before their case was called, resulting in the Judge issuing a warrant for their arrest.

Granted, there were plenty of defendants who simply refused to appear. But a number of defendants simply forgot about the court date or they couldn’t make it to court because they needed to care for a loved one (like a child), didn’t have a ride or needed to get to work. And to make matters worse, the court would be packed for hours, with folks lingering in the halls, creating security issues. Unfortunately, days like this are still common in many courts across the country.

Reimagine the Criminal Justice System With a Dentist’s Mindset

When I first took the bench in 2013, I came into office with a dentist’s mindset and asked myself, how can I improve the criminal justice system, today? The answer for me was replace the “Big Red Book” with an ONLINE CALENDAR! It is one of the easiest, most inexpensive ways to improve the criminal justice system. And it’s something you can implement this week. You don’t need anyone’s permission. You only need $150/yr and the will to change. Online calendars provide countless benefits. Here are the top 2 that I hope will convince you to implement an online calendar.

Benefit #1: Text & Email Reminders. Online calendars offer built-in text & email reminders so courts should see a drop in failure-to-appear (FTA) rates. If you are in the criminal justice system, you know full well the benefits to our communities when FTA rates decline. In fact, there are many scholarly papers out there on this topic that I suggest you read. There is not enough room in this short post for such a discussion.

Benefit #2: Staggered Dockets. Online calendars enable courts to stagger their dockets. This is a benefit to all involved; the Court, lawyers, bailiffs and defendants. There is no court in America, including mine, that can handle 100 cases at 9 a.m. So, I allow the defendants to select the time they’d like to appear (9, 10 or 11) after I’ve selected the date. You know, like your dentist does. I’m not giving up control like some might suggest. I’m recognizing that defendants might have to take a child to school, get off of work, or take public transportation. Plus, it eliminates the 100 folks showing up all at the same time that I talked about earlier.

Staggered dockets help in the civil system as well, a topic I’ll cover in a future post. Why should all those civil attorneys bill their clients to watch other lawyers stumble through or try to impress the Court with their argument of the day?

We also found, during the pandemic, that staggered dockets were critical during the height of social distancing requirements. I was so grateful that we had already adopted this off-the-shelf technology.

Online Calendars Offer Many More Benefits to the Justice System.

In my next few posts, I will discuss how online calendars can be used with defendants on probation and then get into a discussion about how online calendars can be used to improve the civil justice system too.