MONTGOMERY — Legislation to allow the Alabama chief justice to appoint visiting judges to specific cases at the request of district attorneys around the state received final approval in the Alabama Senate and was sent to Gov. Kay Ivey Tuesday.
House Bill 307 by Rep. Jim Hill, R-Odenville, creates the “Speedy Trial Fund” to pay the temporary judges at the request of prosecutors. The state attorney general, along with district attorneys, can request the additional judge “to temporarily serve in a given circuit as a visiting judge for a specific case or cases arising from one or more violent offenses…”
Sen. Will Barfoot, R-Pike Road, carried the bill in the Senate and said the genesis was the grisly 2022 killing of Alabama father Nathan Gemeinhart. The suspect in that killing has yet to stand trial, and three years later as Gemeinhart’s family awaits justice.
“This bill will give relief to victims who experience horrible, horrible crimes,” Barfoot said.
The bill originated from the Alabama Attorney General’s Office. Katherine Robertson, chief counsel for the AG, said it came from law enforcement coalition meetings last year to discuss challenges.
“Case backlogs, especially in violent crime cases, kept coming up,” Robertson said after the bill’s passage.
The chief justice could already appoint special judges, Robertson said, but there was no mechanism for district attorneys.
“It’s the prosecutors who are most closely looking at how long these cases are taking to move,” Robertson said. “It’s a very simple bill that we feel has a lot of capacity to do a lot of good.”
Chief Justice Sarah Stewart was supportive of the bill.
“Our administration is committed to reducing the criminal backlog and keeping our homes and communities safe,” Stewart said in a statement to Alabama Daily News. “This bill provides us another tool in our tool chest to deliver justice to the people we serve.”
State law says interim judges can be paid up to $39,000 per year.