Spanish, Haitian Creole, Cantonese Speakers Most in Demand : Interpreters Give Justice a Hand in U.S. Courtrooms

The phone rings in Rosa Olivera’s office. A law clerk is calling with an urgent request: A federal judge in Brooklyn needs an interpreter for a Chinese-speaking defendant--immediately.

Olivera, chief interpreter with the federal court in the Eastern District of New York, reaches for her index file on translators. She pulls a card and calls a free-lance Chinese interpreter in Hoboken, N. J.

“How soon can you get here? We need you in Judge Dearie’s courtroom,” she says and pauses. “Good, I’ll let them know.”

Her job is not always so easy.

“We could get a call at 2 p.m. asking for a Ga (African language) interpreter,” Olivera said in a recent interview. “It’s a problem when you have a language that’s so exotic it’s hard to find someone who can speak it, much less interpret it.”

Though New York is a veritable Tower of Babel, it is not the only place where court interpreters are in demand. About 60 languages are used each year in the 95 federal court districts around the nation, according to the Federal Court Interpreters Advisory Board.

Regional Demand Varies

The number of interpreters varies greatly by district. Courts in Idaho and Montana used none in 1986, while the Eastern District of New York, which includes John F. Kennedy International Airport, used interpreters more than 1,600 times, according to the advisory board.

The languages in demand also changes from region to region. Navajo interpreters are used often in federal courts in Arizona and New Mexico, while Creole is common in Miami.

Next to English, Spanish is by far the most common language spoken in the federal courts. Spanish interpreters were used 41,500 times in 1986, the board survey shows.

The second most requested language that year was Haitian Creole, 354 times; then Cantonese, 279; and Arabic, 277 times. Next was Sicilian, for which interpreters were requested 253 times; Italian followed, with 232.

Among the languages requested less frequently were Ibo, Apache, Serbo-Croatian, Hmong, Papiamento and Swahili. Sign language was used 20 times.

Guards Civil Rights

“It is constitutionally necessary that you be able to understand completely what is going on,” said Douglas Dodge, district executive for the Eastern District of New York, explaining the need for interpreters.

“There is a lot of legal language that most people, even if they are fairly fluent in English, would not encounter,” Dodge said. “We are trying to provide the translation in their native language.”

The Court Interpreters Act in 1978 states that the rights of non-English-speaking or hearing-impaired people in the federal justice system are best protected by the use of government-paid interpreters.

“No one goes to trial needing an interpeter without one, especially if the case is initiated by the United States,” said Christy Massie, legislative counsel to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.

The current pay rate for free-lance interpreters in the federal court system is $210 for a full day and $110 for half a day’s work, said Dodge. Several of the larger districts employ one or more staff interpreters, whose starting salary is $33,200.

Free-Lance Careers

Nearly all free-lancers who work for the courts do other work as well, such as at corporate conferences or translating documents, he said.

In court, the interpreter stands beside the defendant and quietly translates everything that is said during the proceeding.

This relationship has its pitfalls, according to Olivera, a certified Spanish interpreter. Once, she said, a federal prosecutor tried to solicit information from her about a confidential meeting between a public defender and a defendant.

And once, during a trial, a woman defendant turned to her while on the stand and asked how she should answer a question, Olivera said.

“Our role is not only practiced in the courtroom proper,” said Fouad Kheir, a free-lance interpreter of Arabic. “The court appearance before the judge may take only 10 minutes; the preparation may be three or four hours.”

He ticked off duties included in his job: lawyer-client meetings, parole board hearings, prison visits and psychiatric evaluations.

Fears of Foreigners

He spoke of the cultural differences that arise when a foreign defendant comes into contact with the American justice system.

An interpreter might have to explain certain constitutional rights to help a defendant shed anxieties and fears, Kheir said. A defendant may not initially trust a court-appointed lawyer because he or she may fear that the attorney is a government agent, he said.

Sometimes, he said, it seems that court interpreters are also needed to explain foreign attitudes to Americans.

Kheir said he has interpreted for defendants who were arrested at Kennedy Airport as unwitting “mules”--carriers for drug dealers. The explanation is reasonable within a foreign context, but it strains American credulity.

The dealers “may hear of somebody going to the United States and ask them to bring over some bread or good cheese for a distant cousin. Of course, they’ll say yes,” Kheir explained.