I went to see Judge Norman on the bench on Thursday. She wasn't there. A bailiff, who once was fired by the judge but was reinstated by the Jefferson County Personnel Board, told me the judge hadn't shown up regularly since August. Another court employee countered that the judge did come in two or three weeks ago to handle a handful of cases. Judge Norman's dockets, I was told, are slim to non-existent most days, meaning that the court's two other downtown judges, David Barnes and Raymond Chambliss, may have to handle hundreds of traffic and misdemeanor cases per day.
Defendants thus have to wait even longer than usual to see a judge.
And if you've ever been to city court, you know the wait never has been short. But documents filed in a pending race discrimination lawsuit against the judge, who is one of three black judges at the downtown court, tell a more chilling story. In a sworn statement, one black court employee, the bailiff mentioned above, said Judge Norman made it clear to him that she did not like white people and did not want white employees working near her. He said he feared to be friendly toward white employees in Norman's presence, for fear of turning the judge against him. An attorney who in 1981 helped establish a mediation program in municipal court stated under oath that the program disintegrated after Norman became presiding judge, because the mediators and their clients would show up at the appointed time but could no longer get access to their case files.