Carson judges among state's busiest

Carson City's two district judges are among the state's busiest according to the annual report on Nevada's judiciary issued by the Nevada Supreme Court.

With 2,966 cases filed in 2003, Judges Mike Griffin and Bill Maddox are behind Clark and Washoe County judges.

But at 1,483 cases apiece, each has double the caseload of their Douglas County counterparts Michael Gibbons and David Gamble. The Ninth Judicial District in Douglas had one of the smallest caseloads per judge in the state at 800 non-traffic cases in 2003.

Only the rural Sixth District in Humboldt, Lander and Pershing counties and the Seventh District in Eureka, Lincoln and White Pine counties have lower caseloads - 610 and 308 cases per judge filed last year.

In the First Judicial District, which covers Carson City and Storey County, only 348 of the cases were criminal. Civil cases totaled 704 and 978 are classified as "family" cases. The remaining 1,066 were juvenile cases.

In Douglas, there were 123 criminal cases, 410 civil and 737 family cases. Douglas judges also handled 329 juvenile cases for a total non-traffic caseload of 1,599 split between two judges.

In Lyon and Churchill, there were 179 criminal cases, 114 civil and 530 family cases. The trio of judges also handled 1,100 juvenile cases for a total non-traffic caseload of 1,923.

The busiest courts per judge in Nevada are in Clark County where the total non-traffic caseload is 2,449 per judge. Second is Washoe with 1,956 cases per judge.

While caseloads statewide were up by nearly 7 percent, the number of criminal cases actually decreased from fiscal 2002 from 12,191 to 12,001.

That was true of the criminal caseloads in the first Judicial District as well with total filings at 377 in 2002 dropping to 348 in 2003.

Douglas County, however, reported an increase in criminal filings from 108 to 123.

Washoe County reported the highest number of cases per capita with one filing for every 16 residents in 2003 and a criminal case for every 118 people in the county.

By comparison, the First Judicial District had one court filing for every 19 residents and one criminal filing for every 168 people in Carson City and Storey County, Douglas had one case for every 28 residents and a criminal case for every 359 county residents.

Contact Geoff Dornan at nevadaappeal@sbcglobal.net or 687-8750.