Filed Monday, March 04, 2024 by Barrar Law
A May 31 ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that pretrial defendants can’t be routinely shackled in court doesn’t apply to Clark County Superior and District Court, a Clark County judge said Tuesday.
The 9th Circuit, based in San Francisco, has jurisdiction over federal courts in Washington, Oregon, Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana and Nevada.
In the widely-reported ruling, a majority found that routine pretrial shackling used in courtrooms in the Southern District of California was a violation of a person’s Fifth Amendment right to be free of unwarranted restraints and that defendants should not be routinely shackled "like a bear on a chain."
The ruling said judges must determine, on a case-by-case basis, which defendants need to be shackled for security purposes and can’t just turn over the decision to officers who provide security in the courtroom.
In Clark County, Clark County Sheriff’s Office custody officers routinely use full restraints on defendants when they escort them from jail to court. As described in the 9th Circuit’s opinion, “full restraints” means “that a defendant’s hands are closely handcuffed together, these handcuffs are connected by chain to another chain running around the defendant’s waist, and the defendant’s feet are shackled and chained together.”
On June 12, defense attorney Jeff Barrar raised the “no-shackling” issue with Clark County District Court Judge Darvin Zimmerman at the start of the afternoon docket. Zimmerman ordered custody officers to unshackle everyone. Custody officers then decided to bring inmates over from jail one at a time and the docket ran longer than normal.
By the next morning, Zimmerman changed his approach to the issue. One of our attorneys, Hannah McCausland, asked him about the shackling of defendants, and Zimmerman said he met with other judges and they decided that the ruling didn’t apply in Clark County.
In the 9th Circuit ruling, the author of the majority opinion wrote, “At the heart of our criminal justice system is the well-worn phrase, innocent until proven guilty. And while the phrase may be well-worn, it must also be worn well: We must guard against any gradual erosion of the principle it represents, whether in practice or appearance. This principle safeguards our most basic constitutional liberties, including the right to be free from unwarranted restraints.”
Barrar argued the 9th Circuit ruling should be binding because it’s about the fundamental issue of constitutional rights.
Zimmerman, however, said he and other judges decided that the 9th Circuit ruling doesn’t apply to Washington state courts. He said ordering the Clark County Sheriff’s Office to comply with the federal court ruling would be too much of a hassle and it would be impossible given the layout of the courthouse and lack of ability to do all dockets via video, as some District Court dockets are done. He noted that other U.S. Circuit Courts have ruled the other way on pretrial shackling, and the 9th Circuit ruling was a 6-5 decision.
