Posted on: Monday, March 4, 2002

EDITORIAL
Warrant backlog reveals broken system

As many as 75,000 court warrants go unserved on O'ahu at any given time because of short staffing in the Sheriff's Division and an increase in other chores, say Department of Public Safety officials in a report by Advertiser staff writer Johnny Brannon.

These officials supply a very long list of reasons for the reduction in the division's capabilities, from budget cuts to new security duties in the wake of Sept. 11. The number of personnel in the warrant section has been reduced from 24 to 17 to 14.

While the department has asked for funds to hire more deputies, two things should be readily apparent:

• Lawmakers haven't figured out how to fund government services at current levels yet, and ultimately they may have to resort to layoffs. Money for new deputies is highly unlikely.

• Even an increase in deputies back to the original 24 won't be enough to eliminate the backlog of unserved warrants, not for months on end. Yet a little consideration of the nature of warrants suggests that they should always be served in a matter of days.

Some warrants are issued to bring in people indicted on serious charges, including murder. This means they are a menace to public safety as long as they remain on the streets.

The number of such defendants, however, is comparatively low. The vast majority pertain to unpaid traffic tickets that turn into warrants after a grace period. Clearly most of these don't represent a criminal element on the loose.

Yet even those offenders deserve prompt notification. The fact is that a substantial proportion of people receiving warrants, no matter the cause, eventually are adjudged not guilty. Many of these people don't know of the charges outstanding against them. Thus they have no opportunity to clear their names until the backlog is eliminated.

It's time for some outside-the-box thinking here, such as delivery of traffic offense warrants by registered mail. Tracking down a defendant to serve a warrant can be as difficult with a traffic offender as a bank robber.

We can't afford to do the job right the way we used to do it. We'll have to change.