The Role of Magistrates Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

The Role of Magistrates - Essay Example Thus, magistrates' assignments and the organization of their workloads can vary, sometimes dramatically, not only from district to district and courthouse to courthouse, but also among magistrates with offices along the same hallway in a single courthouse. (Carroll, 2003) Although they receive task assignments from district judges, magistrates, as judicial officers with their own legal and support staffs, retain at least some degree of autonomy in designing the organization of their workload. In fact, because they generally are not as involved with the time-consuming business of presiding over trials, events which require definitive scheduling in order to have parties, attorneys, witnesses, jurors, and other actors simultaneously present in one room, the subordinate judges frequently have significant autonomy in deciding when to address particular assigned tasks during their workdays. The magistrates generally are not responsible for prisoner cases. Habeas corpus and civil rights cases by prisoners are reviewed by two staff attorneys assigned to the district court. An experienced senior magistrate supervises these staff attorneys. Although this magistrate was laden with additional responsibilities, unlike in some other districts, he was not rewarded with the title "chief magistrate." After the initial screening by the staff attorneys, prisoner cases meeting procedural and legal requirements may be assigned by judges to their paired magistrates. A "duty magistrate" system developed for handling preliminary criminal matters. In the large court, magistrates are "on duty" for separate, rotating, one-week periods in which they have exclusive responsibility for processing the criminal cases. Thus, the magistrates normally handle criminal matters only once every five weeks. In the large court, criminal pre-trial matters, such as arraignments, bail reviews, detention hearings, initial appearances, search warrants, and arrest warrants, arise virtually every day. In addition, some of the judges have magistrates handle criminal pre-trial conferences to coordinate and settle evidentiary and other matters prior to trial. Magistrates in Action The following incident observed at the courthouse provides a picture of the magistrates at work as subordinate yet authoritative judicial officers. In the large courthouse, there is a daily "Duty Call" scheduled at one o'clock each afternoon to handle preliminary criminal matters. On this particular day, the district's magistrates held their regular monthly luncheon meeting, which did not conclude until 1:15. Afterwards, the duty magistrate talked with the author about the magistrates' roles for ten more minutes prior to entering the courtroom. Magistrates, like judges, recognize that lawyers and witnesses are frequently late in getting to court. Therefore, court proceedings generally do not begin and the magistrate or judge will not enter the courtroom until all other relevant actors are present. The magistrate's lack of concern about beginning precisely on time did not indicate