Opinion ID: 2538127
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Power of District Court Judge

Text: Cooper asserts the 2010 Plan impinges on the judicial independence of the judges in the numerical minority, demotes a judge elected with general jurisdiction to one with specialized jurisdiction and, in effect, creates a specialized criminal court within the Fifteenth Judicial District. We find the defendant's arguments to be unpersuasive and factually inaccurate. [54] As previously stated, the state constitution mandates the state be divided into judicial districts. La. Const. art. 5, § 14. Thirteen judges are elected from the various precincts in this district to serve in separate divisions of court. [55] La. Const. art. 5, § 16 provides in pertinent part ... a district court shall have original jurisdiction of all civil and criminal matters. We made clear in Piper v. Olinde Hardware & Supply Co., Inc., 288 So.2d 626, 629 (La.1974), that each judicial district constitutes a single court, and the creation [of] different divisions does not operate to sever a single district court into multiple courts. Piper has been held to stand for the proposition that the statutory term `court' does not reach each of the internal divisions that make up a district court, but rather embraces the district court as a whole. [56] We agree. A district court judge elected with general authority has the power to adjudicate all civil and criminal matters within his district, but there is no requirement that the district court judge exercise the entirety of his authority at all times and in all parishes in the district. The fact that certain types of cases are assigned to other divisions does not result in a district court judge losing any aspect of his general jurisdiction. The trial court presented an excellent example to illustrate this point, although discussed in a different section of his ruling. [57] The trial court noted a judge is authorized to perform marriage ceremonies within his district. However, if he does not perform a single marriage ceremony for the entirety of his term of office, it cannot be said that the judge thereby lost some of his authority simply because that aspect of his authority was not exercised. In the same manner, the fact that certain types of cases, be they civil or criminal or a particular subset of either, are allotted to a different division of court has no effect whatsoever on the general jurisdiction of a district court judge. Nor do we see how a random allotment system, which divides up the judicial district into tracks and assigns judges to those tracks in a random manner, impacts the judicial independence of any of the district court judges, even those who may not agree with the allotment system. There is no indication, and certainly no evidence, that any pressure has been brought to bear on the numerical minority judges to adjudicate their cases in any particular way. Consequently, the district court judges are free to exercise their judicial discretion over the cases allotted to them. Finally, we find the 2010 Plan does not create a specialized criminal court. The random allotment plan does not create a court at all, as the only court being analyzed here is the Fifteenth Judicial District. The 2010 Plan merely provides a mechanism whereby the non-capital criminal cases are allotted to particular divisions within the district court. The defendant separately contends the 2010 Plan has the effect of violating the federal Voting Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1973. Cooper asserts two of the thirteen judicial divisions were created to increase racial minority representation on the Fifteenth Judicial District bench. He argues ... a majority of the 13 judges can negate the effect of the Voting Rights Act by marginalizing the newly elected minority judges. A majority of the judges can vote, whether intentionally or unintentionally, to place the minority judges in a subservient role by limiting them to presiding over certain specialized courts designated by vote of the majority. As the discussion above makes plain, there is no diminution in the general jurisdiction of a district court judge by operation of the 2010 Plan. Assuming Cooper has standing and could bring a claim under the Voting Rights Act in this criminal proceeding, he fails to establish any injury. [58]