Whatcom County Superior Court delays jury trials until November due to pandemic
Whatcom County Superior Court has delayed jury trials until November. This marks nearly the 10th time that jury trials have been delayed since March 2020.
In an administrative order dated Sept. 28, Whatcom County Superior Court Presiding Judge Rob Olson delayed jury trials until Nov. 1 due to the ongoing effects of COVID-19 and the Delta variant.
The order comes as Whatcom County wrapped its worst month of the 19-month long pandemic, The Bellingham Herald reported Monday, Oct. 4. Current COVID-related hospitalizations grew by seven over the weekend, for a total of 27 patients being treated.
Jury trials were previously delayed until Oct. 4, The Herald reported. Jury trials had reopened in March 2021 after a nearly year-long hiatus due to the pandemic.
The delay in jury trials has added to the growing backlog of unresolved cases across Whatcom County’s court system.
While the overall number of cases filed in Superior Court in 2020 was down about 25% from 2019, felony criminal case filings were up by nearly 4%, according to data from the Washington State Administrative Office of the Courts previously analyzed by The Herald. At the same time, case resolutions and trials decreased by nearly a third compared to the previous year, the data shows.
When jury trials came to a halt last year, the number of cases that would normally resolve at trial, by dismissal or plea bargain began to decrease. Across all case types, there was a nearly 29% decrease in case resolutions in Superior Court in 2020 compared to 2019. And for criminal cases, roughly 36% fewer cases were resolved last year than the previous year, The Herald previously reported.
This means higher caseloads for prosecuting attorneys and public defenders are reaching unmanageable caseload levels.
In mid-September, the Whatcom County Council approved spending nearly $600,000 of federal relief funds in an attempt to address the backlog facing the county’s court system.
