An unusual collaboration has made it possible to be in state court and federal court at the same time, in the same building, in both Batesville and Heber Springs.
In a Friday morning ceremony at the Independence County Courthouse in Batesville, state and federal judges joined the president of the Independence County Bar Association in formally unveiling an agreement that has been in the works for a couple of years but was put into place just last month.
It allows federal judges from the Eastern District of Arkansas to continue holding court in Batesville despite the closing of the Batesville federal courthouse last year as part of a national cost-cutting move. It will also make space available in the Cleburne County Courthouse for federal judges to hold court in Heber Springs, where there has never been a federal courthouse.
The idea of inviting federal judges to hold court in state courthouses was the brainchild of Independence County Judge Robert Griffin, who said Friday that he merely "opened the door" and then the bar association president, Barrett Moore, "carried the ball" to allow the idea to come to fruition.
The federal courts have had a presence in Batesville for close to 200 years, and the closing of the federal courts building disappointed both federal judges and area officials.
In 2008, when a special committee prepared to study the practicality and consequences of closing courtroom doors in Batesville and other places, U.S. District Judge Leon Holmes, then the chief judge in the Eastern District, said the judges didn't consider such a move to be in the best interests of the public.
"Because Arkansas is a poor state, it's important for the courts to go to the people, because it's often hard for people to get to the courts," he said.
Another concern of the judges is that Title 28, Section 83 of the U.S. Code, which created the five divisions comprising the Eastern District, says the Northern Division "shall" hold court in Batesville. The Northern Division includes Fulton, Izard, Sharp, Stone, Independence and Cleburne counties.
The Eastern District is comprised of 41 counties gathered into five divisions: the Northern Division; the Western Division, which encompasses Pulaski County and 10 other counties; the Eastern Division, headquartered in Helena-West Helena; the Jonesboro Division; and the Pine Bluff Division.
Last summer, the federal courts' leases on the spaces it used in Pine Bluff and Batesville expired and weren't renewed. That left the only remaining courthouses in the district, outside of Little Rock, in Jonesboro and Helena-West Helena. The judges rotate holding court in the outer reaches of the district.
Since federal judges hold court in Batesville for only about six weeks stretched across a year, making buying a facility cost-prohibitive and at odds with the national cost-cutting measure, Griffin said a solution was needed, "So I asked, what if the county provides you with a free courtroom?"
The state circuit judges throughout the division soon got to work examining their dockets and were able to carve out six specific weeks in 2018 -- four in Batesville and two in Heber Springs -- where a courtroom will be available for federal judges.
Another federal statute allows the judges to sit anywhere in the Northern Division in a "special session," so Chief U.S. District Judge Brian Miller signed an order a couple of months ago declaring that the Heber Springs sessions will be "special sessions."
After Friday's ceremony, which was moderated by Circuit Judge Lee Harrod of the state's 16th Judicial Circuit and included remarks from Dan Kemp, chief justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, Griffin said he was thrilled about the cooperative effort that offers "the ability to keep justice served locally."
He noted that the county courthouses are also benefiting from the sharing arrangement, which allows them to use equipment salvaged from the former federal court space in Batesville, such as video screens, technology and fixtures. He said a circuit judge's cooperation fund was tapped to help modernize the Batesville and Heber Springs courthouses to accommodate federal-court needs, such as real-time court reporting.
Griffin said the situation is unique in that no other place in the state, and only one other place in the nation, holds state and federal court hearings side by side.
"This is what our nation should be, where we bring everyone together," he said.
Meanwhile, sources say the Eastern District judges are also looking into a possible court-sharing agreement in Jefferson County to ensure that federal hearings can resume in the Pine Bluff Division.
Metro on 02/24/2018