Jurors, Jurists Alike Angry Over Unusual Court Setup : Jurisprudence: Reorganized system included requiring felony judges to handle preliminary hearings instead of having them heard in Municipal Court.

Robert Wehger does not mind doing his civic duty--except when it comes to jury service.

The 67-year-old Thousand Oaks man believes court officials have little regard for his time--a notion that was confirmed when he sat on a jury in a child-molestation case last month.

The two-week trial could have been heard in four days if court had not started so late every day, said Wehger, a retired musical-instrument sales manager.

“We didn’t start most days until 10 o’clock, 11, 11:30,” Wehger explained. “One day it was 1:30 in the afternoon.”

While it is not unusual for jurors to gripe about their time being wasted, court officials say such complaints in Ventura County have become more routine in recent months.

A reorganization of the county courts system, implemented April 4, has led to many jury trials lasting twice as long as normal, according to lawyers, judges and jurors.

The problem stems from a component of the new system that requires felony judges to conduct their own preliminary hearings--a rarity in other courts around the state.

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Before, felony judges in the Superior Court relied on their brethren in the lower Municipal Court to handle the time-consuming hearings.

The new setup has become such a drain on judges’ time that court officials have reversed themselves and will stop using the system Monday, said the presiding judge of the Superior Court, Melinda A. Johnson.

The time constraints not only affected jurors, but infuriated judges, said Johnson, an architect of the system.

“I thought it was something worth trying,” Johnson said. “I have no interest in making judges unhappy or driving them crazy. The job is already enough.”

When she assigned the preliminary hearings to felony judges, Johnson had no idea so much time would be stolen from trial work, she said.

Juror Wehger said the return of preliminary hearings to Municipal Court is the right decision.

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He said jury service can be a financial drain on citizens--especially those whose employers only pay them for their first five days of service.

“I know when I was working, there were times when I just had to beg off jury duty because there was no way I could do it,” Wehger said.

Another juror, August Hardy, 59, spent seven weeks hearing an emotionally charged child-abuse case that was originally estimated to last four weeks.

The case involved defendant Charlotte Russo, an affluent Westlake mother who was accused of forcing her daughter to live in the family’s back-yard racquetball court. She was convicted of misdemeanor child abuse and pleaded guilty to a felony child-abuse count.

Hardy credited Superior Court Judge Charles W. Campbell Jr. with running an efficient courtroom, but he still criticized late starting times. Never once did the trial begin before 10 a.m., said Hardy, who considers himself an early riser.

“I’m not a person who likes to start something late,” said Hardy, of Simi Valley. “If I’m going to court, I want to go early. I’d like it to be early in the morning. Period. That’s the way I see it.”

Prosecutors and defense attorneys also criticized the relatively late starting times for trials in recent months.

“It clearly was causing more problems than it was solving,” Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Kevin J. McGee said. “It was creating a nightmare for the court, for the jurors, for the attorneys, for everybody.”

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Defense attorneys said preliminary hearings have no business in felony courts on a regular basis.

“We were delayed in virtually every trial,” Deputy Public Defender Bryant Villagran said last week. “Since this has been in effect, I have been in court at least twice as long each morning. You can’t get the attorneys and judges in the same courtroom because the attorneys have had to cover their prelims.”

One of the most dramatic examples of the system gone awry occurred June 30. In that case, a jury trial never started all afternoon, as jurors waited patiently in a courthouse hallway for a preliminary hearing to end.

That jury was scheduled to report to Superior Court Judge Allan Steele’s courtroom to begin hearing the grand theft case at 1:30 p.m. Steele could not start the case in the morning because he was conducting a preliminary hearing in a fraud case.

The preliminary hearing, originally scheduled for two hours, lasted more than five. After 3 p.m., the judge--visibly irritated at the unexpected length of the hearing--finally sent his waiting jury home.

“This was estimated at two hours,” he angrily pointed out to the lawyers in the fraud hearing.

Prosecutor McGee said the trial delays could have caused some jurors to lose confidence in the local courts.

“To the person who is doing the jury duty,” he said, “it makes them wonder what’s going on and why things can’t go smoother.”

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In most other counties, preliminary hearings are generally kept far away from judges trying felony cases.

In Sacramento County, for instance, officials reserve two of their 48 courtrooms specifically for preliminary hearings. And “the system works marvelously,” said Frank Martinez, acting executive officer.

Now, Ventura County will reserve one of its 30 courtrooms for the same purpose.

Still, Public Defender Kenneth I. Clayman said local court officials are to be applauded for looking for ways to improve the system.

“It just seems to me that it was something where they tried to be more efficient but the obstacles were too great,” he said.