What you get with no accountability; complaints are ignored

I have a request in for an appointment with Kerri Keenan who is in charge of the Humboldt County Superior Court staff. There are some good people that work in court staff but there are numerous problems in two areas. I have written about the court tech department whose incompetence continues.

The other problem area is the criminal clerks at 4th and I street. The civil clerks are great, the family law clerks are great. Ms. Keenan reports to no one locally so going to the Board of Supervisors or anyone to get resolution is not an option. I heard the Judges can have some say but they are busy with court and try getting a request in to have a Judge look at which is unrelated to a case.

The only person who has been helpful and responsive is Sara Biasca.

This morning, when I saw that there was a motion for a new trial in the Bodhi Tree case, I wanted to look at the documents for the reason. Sometimes you can access documents on the public computers. I went to the I street office and was told they could not locate the file. It did not say it was with court staff or Judge in the computer and the clerk verified that. They also told me they could not print the document. I had the case number, the date, the name of the document. This was approximately around 9 a.m. I went back and asked them for the file and I also told them that in the past they had printed documents. Now I was told that the file is with the Judge and they do not scan documents. This was at 10:19a.m. Since they can update the system whenever they like, they could change it to reflect anything after the post.

The clerk also told me that the Judge had the file because the case was on yesterday. The 9/15 date was vacated at the last court hearing on September 5 when the new sentencing date of October 10 was scheduled. There was no court date for the Bodhi Tree case and if there was, the computer system and calendar did not reflect that. What the clerk said was the date was in the computer.

The clerk argued with me that the case was heard yesterday. I went back and checked the computer even though I know that was not true. So she flat out lied. The only reason she even answered her window was no one else was waiting in line, which is rare.

This particular criminal clerk has an attitude. I know they are over worked and not properly trained but this kind of behavior is normal on I street. This is what you get when you tenure people who know that they can "just get by" with incompetence; this is what you get when you have a person in charge not accountable to anyone who can ignore citizen complaints.

I am not the only one who has problems with this, attorneys have, other citizens do. I had to go through security three times to check stuff, even though I knew she was lying and then go back out. Fortunately a public computer was available.

Jobs are scarce in this County. Not all government workers can be painted with the same brush but this tenure mentality breeds an attitude. I am safe unless someone can spends time and money proving egregious behavior.

Being in public service is hard. The Humboldt County Superior Court gives worse customer service than a fast food joint.  These jobs pay well. The fault is not of the staff but the person in charge who allows this kind of behavior to go on.

I think department heads that do not give a damn about the public do not deserve a job paid for by tax dollars.