In May, the North Carolina Statewide Court Appearance Project Committee released their Final Report with recommendations to promote court appearance and provide alternative responses to missed appearances. The Committee included representatives from the court system, law enforcement, and local criminal justice services agencies. You can learn more about the Committee, here.
The Final Report is the culmination of twelve months of in-depth research and robust discussion to identify statewide solutions to improve court appearance issues. The Committee’s unanimous recommendations include actions that can be quickly implemented at the local level along with long-term strategies requiring additional stakeholder support and resources.
The Report is presented in three main sections. First, the Data Findings section which includes contextual court system data and data on court appearance in North Carolina. There are at least 250,000 missed appearances annually across the state, and missed appearances are most common among administrative traffic offenses that don’t involve roadway safety concerns. Cost estimates in the Report suggest that every missed appearance results in $1,500 in administrative costs for the criminal justice system.
In addition to statewide data, the Committee reviewed jail data from four counties, which showed that missed appearances are a significant driver of jail bookings. Across the four counties, the proportion of jail bookings solely for failure to appear (FTA) ranged between 14% and 22% of all pretrial bookings in a three-year period. The majority of these FTA-only bookings were for failure to appear on a misdemeanor.
Second is a section presenting the Committee’s recommendations for strategies to promote court appearance. These recommendations include the following:
Ensure Efficiency with Every Court Date through uniform continuance rules and new time standards for case dispositions;
Improve Court Scheduling, including efficient court sessions for low-level traffic offenses that account for most non-appearances, and implementing alternative scheduling practices, like block scheduling, to reduce court wait times;
Promote Virtual Court and Online Case Resolution, focusing on virtual traffic court and promoting tools that allow people to quickly resolve select criminal matters online, avoiding the need to appear in court;
Make Court Information More Accessible with improvements to key court forms and webpages;
Expand and Enhance Pretrial Services, including the development of pretrial services programs and instituting statewide pretrial risk assessments to provide judicial officials with information about a person’s risk of non-appearance;
Develop and Enhance Court Date Reminders, including a new statewide reminder system with automatic enrollment for defendants who provide a phone number;
Expand the Use of Appearance Waivers for superior court calendar calls to reduce the number of required appearances;
Provide Resources for High Needs Court Users through court navigator positions that support people who may struggle with understanding and complying with court processes;
Address Ability to Pay Considerations, including developing statewide indigency standards and increasing awareness of avenues for relief from monetary obligations;
Launch Initiatives to Foster Community Trust that further strengthen public perceptions of the state court system; and
Support Transportation to Court with options such as transportation vouchers and careful planning for courthouse access, including parking and public transit route;
Lastly is a section presenting the Committee’s recommendations for alternative system responses to missed appearances when they occur. These recommendations include the following:
Implement Alternatives to the Immediate Issuance of Orders for Arrest (OFAs), including ensuring that relevant circumstances are considered before OFAs are issued, such as documented excuses, and implementing OFA grace periods in appropriate cases;
Minimize Appearance Barriers from the Loss of a Driver’s License, including affording more time for people to address missed appearances, reducing the FTA fee, and supporting driver’s license restoration programs; and
Implement Procedures for the Resolution of Outstanding OFAs without Arrest such as recalls by magistrates and clerks in appropriate circumstances and instituting strike order courts.
The work of the Committee built on previous efforts from county-level teams in the North Carolina Court Appearance Project, which has been featured on the blog in the past.
The Committee was supported by staff from the North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts (NCAOC) and the UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab (the Lab). Questions about the report can be directed to Hannah Turner, Lab Senior Project Manager, at hturner@sog.unc.edu or Sean Callan, NCAOC Senior Research and Policy Associate, at sean.p.callan@nccourts.org. If any of these recommended practices are already in place in your jurisdiction, or if you’re interested to implement them in the future, we would love to connect!