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Home My WebLink About02-26-00 CCMLAKE ELMO CITY COUNCIL WORKSHOP FEBRUARY 26, 2000 Mayor Hunt called the workshop to order at 9:00 a.m. to discuss criminal prosecution procedures. PRESENT: Dunn, Hunt, Armstrong, DeLapp, City Attorney Fills, Administrator Kueffner and Washington County Sgt. Jay Kimble. Attorney Filla reported he does a good deal of the Lake Elmo related prosecutions work because he lives in this area. The following rates are the same for all cities they represent: $70/Hr. attorney, $50/11r. paralegal, charge for copies and service process. The dollar cost per hour has not changed since late fall, 1992. Number of cases: 1993--207 cases, 1999--391 cases, 1995-474 cases. During 1993 prosecution costs were $27,000, 1996 $52,000; some ordinance violations in `95 and `96. In 1999, $44,900--Number of cases varied. In February, 2000, open 56 Lake Elmo prosecutions. Rate 360-380 cases on yearly basis. As officers are added more tickets are written for violations. Lake Elmo, now, has four officers. Now the City Attorney has to appear at arraignment sessions. He has worked out a deal with the Oakdale prosecutor. Lake Elmo and Oakdale share a calendar. Lake Elmo generates 20% of caseload on calendar. Filla takes one -fifth and Rich Illka takes the other four -fifths session a month so he appears at arraignment one Thursday morning a month. Appearance at Omnibus Hearings on Monday or Wednesday morning, not many per year. He asked judge to combine pretrial dates and omnibus hearing dates. Court Trial dates are on Monday afternoons. Not many court trials. Jury trial days are Monday mornings, one or two scheduled. He does not schedule police officers for morning, but schedules for after 1:00 to try to be efficient because most cases don't need them and don't want to have them standing around. Policy on Plea Bargaining: Drunk Driving - .1% or more is in violation, the intoxilizer test has a margin error of about 10%, do not prosecute first time drunk driving if its .I I% or less because he can't prove it beyond reasonable doubt. His policy is he reduces those in circumstances where they have no prior violations and where there is no accident involved. If you are caught with .2% or more, even if it's a first time violation, it is a gross misdemeanor..2 or .21%with no prior or accident, he reduces to a Gross Misdemeanor and not careless driving. No insurance violations: If they show up with current insurance, no accident involved, give them the same penalty dollar wise if he had a convinction on his record. Give him the chance not to have a conviction on his license. First time after revocation: If a person shows up, with current DL, does the same thing. First time speeders: will continue for dismissal. Trends of 7-8 years: Lake Elmo has more police officers so they write more tickets. In 90% of the cases people are showing up in court and paying their fines. 10% are becoming repeat offenders... no insurance, drunk driving cases take time. See more and more gross misdemeanors. Last 2 or 3 years, generate cases, don't make court payments lose their licenses so you see a lot of driving after revocation. Filla spends most of his time on gross misdemeanors and repeat offenders. In Lake Elmo more repeat offenders. Forfeit vehicles on drunk driving cases: 1998 $1,500, 1999 $4,000 legal fees, the cars that are forfeited are junk cars. Cases opened: Cases come to their office when people plead not guilty after arraignment session. Clerk of courts photocopy and send them to their office. He open files, date, and time of court appearance. The other way files are opened, the Sheriff will send them to court on gross misdemeanors violations because they prepare the formal complaint. He does not control the number of cases that are originated. Cases are direct correlation with number of officers, numbers of tags, and numbers of prosecutions. Sees a direct correlation between the severity of the crime and the amount of prosecution time between people who are represented by public offenders and prosecution time. Conclusion: We do a good job on prosecutions. Has lots of experience on prosecutions and not changed the cost of service. What has changed is the amount of service required... more prosecutions, more complicated kinds of cases, more gross misdemeanors. Last three years can't do anything different than the way their office is doing now. ($43,000. $44,000. $45,000.) As far as going out for bids, it's real easy for someone to come in here, do their homework, and look at the stuff we provide the City. We give more detail to this City than most cities would ever get on prosecutions, what, time, rate, who. Can conclude we spend $44,900 and this is how we spent it. They can say we can do it for $38,000 or $40,000. Anybody can come in and underbid. Filla wants to continue to work with the City and is certainly willing to make accommodations the City chooses to make. Sgt. Jay Kimble, Washington County Sheriff s Dept, was filling in for Captain Johnson: The officers assigned to the Lake Elmo contract are all young officers. You will find that with the exuberance of youth, law enforcement officers tend to write more traffic citations the first five years of their employment than they will write during the balance of their career. With more experience level, less citations are written. It is not for the officers to evaluate what the Court decides. The officer's job is the enforcement. Capt. Johnson reported there is cooperation, finds our prosecuting attorney, ready, willing, and able, diligent in his pursuit. No complaint or concern by the County. The reputation of Lake Elmo's prosecuting attorney is that he is pretty tough. From a cop side, we like that. If your prosecutor dismisses or continues speeding tickets, the sheriff's dept has no opinion on that in the act of enforcement. Our objective is to change the driving behavior of the public. The Sheriff's Dept. supports the prosecutor's view on what is taken to trial. Vehicle Forfeiture: the County built a building to tow these vehicles. It is not cost effective for the time the dept. spends on vehicle forfeiture for what the dept gets out of it. The objective is to get drunks off streets if you follow the law. Council member Dunn: These increased costs are what residents have to pay. Lake Elmo doesn't grow without cost associated. The placement of a speed trailer has a positive effect. Sgt. Kimble responded Lake Elmo is not any different than other cities. Attorney Filla explained you are a rural community so you have the same range of crime as other suburban communities. Don't have much commercial area so would not have theft. Fines distribution: Pay third to state, county, city. Officers hear speeding concerns by Council at meetings and go out and write tickets. Attorney Filla indicated in the agreement whatever City generates the ticket; the City gets the funds regardless of who is the prosecutor. Most of the prosecution costs are not court appearance related, but are preparation related. Council member Armstrong asked if you could see reductions? Attorney Filla stated the number of prosecution cases peaked in 1995 and has been on the decline since then and so has the correlation for cases and costs. Sgt. Kimble: Tickets are written for 10miles and over speedlimit otherwise 5 miles gets a warning. Lake Elmo does not get people in court because they are upset on they way they are treated. Lake Elmo is on the cutting edge on effort for keeping costs down, cost versus results. The Council asked that this issue be added to the March 8°i Council agenda r E 0 City of Lake Elmo 777-5510 3800 Laverne Avenue North / Lake Elmo, Minnesota 55042 LAKE ELMO CITY COUNCIL WORKSHOP SATURDAY, EEBRUARY 26, 2000 LAKE ELMO CITY HALL 9:00 A.M. TO NOON THE LAKE ELMO CITY COUNCIL WILL HOLD A WORKSHOP WITH THE CITY ATTORNEY, WASHINGTON COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPT. TO DISCUSS CRIMINAL PROSECUTION PROCEDURES �= printed cn recycled paper