Day Three - "House of D" - Suyeon's Take
Fun at the House of D
On Friday, I went over to the House of Detention to interview a client whose file was missing his indigency determination form. The same unsmiling man was behind the desk at the entrance again, and again he took my ID and added it to the stack already there. I told him who I was coming to visit, and he called up to bring our client to the meeting room. He gave me a laminated “Attorney” name tag and I dropped off my bag under his desk. I walked up the steps to the second floor, and the stairwell opened up into an empty room, with some benches pushed into the corner and locked doors leading to seemingly unused rooms. At one far corner, a sign on a door announced in all capitals: “You are now in a prison. Your person and belongings may be searched at any time.” I pushed through it and entered the visiting area. A long and narrow space, A row of cubicles facing a glass partition and looking into an empty room, and On the right, doors opening into individual meeting rooms. Although long waits are the norm, as the guards escort inmates from other floors and even buildings, my client showed up almost immediately. He was a middle-aged black man with a shaved head. We picked up our phones and I introduced myself. I asked him whether he needed someone to post bond for him. He replied that he was in prison to take a break to think about his life and straighten himself out, and to think about his two children, so he wasn’t really trying to get out. During the interview, I also found out that he had been in Minnesota since Katrina, and had just got to town a week before and was living in a hotel. He had three sisters in town, with whom he seemed to have lukewarm relationships with, but he gave me their names and contact numbers. Our discussion took fifteen minutes, and it took about that long to get the form signed by the client, involving an intricate choregraphy between myself and the deputy.
On Good Friday, the courthouse was closed. But arraignments continued regardless of the holiday schedule and the Cardozo team covered arraignments and first appearances. We asked Andy whether he thought it would be busy over the Easter Weekend, and he said, “Well, it depends on how many people get killed on Friday and Saturday night.”
We’re getting well-acquainted with the House of D and the arraignment process. The prisoners file in, shackled at the ankles, and they sit on folding chairs, or lean on the wall, or lie on the floor in some cases. Volunteers fan out with indigency determination forms, which we needed to fill out in order to qualify them for a public defender. Sitting in close, we spend just three or four minutes filling in their name, date of birth, address, contact information, the name ofand number os someone who can post their bond, and then their basic financial information. If they make less than a certain amount, they qualify. Most of our clients pass the bar with flying colors. We collect the forms, create file folders, and then wait for arraignments, where we quickly write down the bond amounts given by the judge during their court appearance bty webcame. Then we make courtesy phone calls to the given contact to let them know that their friend or son or husband is in prison, and needs to be bonded out.
Today, Andy stood at the front and announces in his Louisiana drawl that, "Everything is gonna go real quick, so you need to listen to the judge for your bond amount." And it does go quickly. "Possession for armed robbery, ten thousand, drug paraphernalia, two thousand, possession of illegal weapon with narcotic, five thousand. The judge recites like he‘s reading a train schedule, and moves on to the next person. The judge did dismiss a few cases for lack of probable cause, but we couldn’t hear why from the HOD side. And it's again worth mentioning that for the third arraignment in a row, the one person whose case was dismissed was white.
