By Evelyn Pyburn

Some time this summer Yellowstone County will initiate an arraignment court.

The need for an arraignment court in Yellowstone County has been growing and it will become essential once the proposed short-term holding facility becomes a reality, according to Yellowstone County’s Justice of the Peace David Carter.

Judge Carter is currently in the process of gathering data about how many defendants pass through the courts  – municipal courts of Billings or Laurel, justice court, and district courts  — each week. “We are trying to see what the work load will look like and how to manage it on a daily basis,” said Judge Carter.

“This is significant change,” said Carter, pointing out that it will affect almost all aspects of how the court system operates, requiring a lot of changes of judges, clerks, detectives and law enforcement officers.  “We are going to try it this summer. There will be some trial and error,” he said.

This will be the first arraignment court in Montana. It is meant to address the needs of the short term holding facility that the county and city have collaborated to build. The county accepted applications this week for a general contractor to oversee its construction, which is anticipated to take about a year. The facility will hold inmates for only 72 hours. It is viewed as one of the solutions to the over-crowed jail that serves Yellowstone County. It will enable law enforcement to arrest and hold those perpetrating minor offenses, for whom in the past they have not been able to jail because of having no place to hold them.

A primary goal of having an arraignment court is to relieve some of the pressure on the processing requirements in the other courts.

What’s an arraignment court?

It’s a defendant’s first appearance in court – the first time they appear before a judge. Judge Carter said anyone having seen the television show “Night Court” may have an idea what it is, but the arraignment court for Yellowstone County is not going to be held at night – nor will it have Judge Harry Stone or a “Bull” Shannon.

In many larger court systems the defendant is arraigned before they ever go to jail, but if that doesn’t happen, the arraignment still must happen within a reasonable period of time after arrest, usually within 48 to 72 hours. The short term holding facility creates a need for the arraignment to happen very promptly.

During the arraignment, a defendant is formally advised of the criminal charges against him, informed of his rights, and may be asked to enter a plea to the charges. The court may also decide at arraignment whether the defendant will be released pending trial.

It involves a process of sorting out the charges against a defendant in accordance with state laws or local ordinances, looking at their criminal record and determining, if there are other outstanding charges, misdemeanors or felons. Quite often a defendant does have other pending charges and perhaps outstanding warrants, or instances of having failed to appear in court, explained Carter. “Someone may be on probation, have felonies or is a fugitive. A lot of people arrested in Billings have warrants from other cities or from outside the state,” explained Judge Carter. Determining those facts dictates in which court – municipal, justice or district — they are charged and what the charges will be, making sure there are no contradictions in the records.

Oversight of an arraignment court must be an attorney who is either elected or appointed by the County Commissioners. Besides deciding the charges and the court, they decide  such things as whether there will be a bond and if so how much, or will the defendant be required to have a GPS ankle bracelet or will there be alcohol monitoring, etc.

The goal is to harmonize their appearance in court and to communicate what they have to do, set a schedule and to direct the right pace to go,” said Judge Carter.  The point is “to cycle people through quickly and not to have wasted space.”