Caseload swamps DA’s office

Graphic by Andy Mooney, Salisbury Post.

By Jessie Burchette

jburchette@salisburypost.com

Bill Kenerly has long suspected the Rowan County District Attorney’s Office is one of the most understaffed DA offices in the state.

Now, he has proof.

A state court system document that evaluates staffing and workload puts District 19 C (Rowan County) at the bottom of the state’s nearly 50 judicial districts in overall staff vs. caseload.

“It’s official, we are the most overloaded DA’s office in the state,” Kenerly said last week.

Kenerly has eight assistant DAs. Counting Kenerly, the office has a staff of 15. The state document shows Rowan needs a staff of 19.6. Using a complex formula, the state shows Rowan is at 71 percent of what’s needed.

The overloaded DA’s office and an equally overloaded Clerk of Court’s Office continue to cause a backup of cases — and contribute to overcrowding in the Rowan County Detention Center.

In a political season, more voters, candidates and law enforcement officers are pointing to the backlog of cases and slow wheels of justice in Rowan County.

“We do have a bad backlog of cases. We don’t have enough DAs, we don’t have enough clerks,” Kenerly said, pointing to the wide disparity in staffing at DA offices across the state.

For example, Cabarrus County, District 19-A, has a total of 19 people, including 10 assistant DAs. The state puts Cabarrus at 90 percent at what’s needed.

In 1991, when Republican Kenerly succeeded longtime Concord District Attorney and Democrat Bob Roberts and became the DA in both Cabarrus and Rowan counties, he had six assistant DAs and three administrative staffers.

Now there are 19 in the Cabarrus Office and 15 in Rowan. “There are 34 people doing what 10 did in 1991 — and that’s still not enough,” he said.”Our caseload has exploded in the last 15 years.”

The veteran prosecutor accepts some of the responsibility. He admits that he’s probably not political enough in a state system where the most political DAs are closer to the top of the funding pile.

Some DA’s offices are overstaffed, according to the staffing assessment document.

At the very top is District 9A — Person and Caswell counties. The district has 14 staffers in office where the state estimates 10.5 are needed.

The Person-Caswell district recently made news statewide. Joel Brewer, who resigned as district attorney earlier this year amid sexual abuse allegations, pleaded guilty to nine charges including inappropriate touching of women, assault on a female and impersonating an officer.

Kenerly points to that district and others at the top of the funding pile. “Look at the best staffed (offices). They have twice as much staff for the same caseload.”

And right now Kenerly’s office is feeling overloaded even more than usual. An assistant DA, Michelle Monk, resigned a month ago to go into practice with her husband in Charlotte.

Kenerly was notified that he won’t be able to fill the position until Sept. 30 — and there could be an additional three-month delay.

“We take one step forward and two steps back,” Kenerly said. “I understand times are tight … I understand spending money is a political decision, but people need to understand what we are living with. It has a practical effect on what we do every day.”

And the impact of the understaffing and case backlog is felt throughout the court system, jail and county.

“Part of the jail overcrowding directly relates to our inability to get people through the courts.”

If the DA’s office had the staff to handle more cases and speed up the trial process, the detention center would not be crowded, he said.

The county is under state orders to provide more jail beds and is planning to build a new facility on Grace Church Road. For two years or more, the county is spending thousands of dollars a month to house excess prisoners in other counties.

The staffing issues goes further than getting more assistant DAs.

At this point, getting five more people in the DA’s office would solve part of the problem.

Kenerly said the system can’t run more sessions of Superior Court without more people in the Clerk of Court’s Office. And that would also require more space.

He doesn’t expect to see much improvement during his tenure, but he is hopeful state funding will be more equitable — with the money going to the counties with the biggest caseloads.

In about six months, Kenerly will hand off the keys and the challenges of the DA’s office to either Karen Biernacki, one of his assistants, or Brandy Cook, a Rowan resident who is an assistant DA in Cabarrus County.

The election is Nov. 2.