Why Are So Many South Carolina Magistrates Being Sanctioned?
Seven South Carolina magistrates have been sanctioned or suspended by the state supreme court since January, raising questions about why so many have landed in trouble.
Among their misdeeds have been using racial slurs, asking a clerk to videotape a sexual encounter, and referring to crack addiction as a “black man’s disease.”
Magistrates in the state don’t have to be lawyers. Requirements for the job include some college education, a passing grade on certification exams and 18 hours of legal training a year, Greenville Online reports.
South Carolina Chief Justice Jean Toal says so many magistrates are sanctioned because there are so many of them, Greenville Online reports in a separate story. The state has 311 magistrates, 46 circuit court judges and 52 family court judges. Magistrates hear cases with maximum sentences of 30 days in jail or $500. They also issue warrants, set bonds and conduct preliminary hearings.
Toal also said a problem is “unevenness is training.”
“We still have judges that engage in ex-parte contact or personal behavior that’s not up to snuff,” she told the publication. “That’s going to happen in any system. But I think increased training is the way to address demeanor, behavior and judicial issues.”
Toal has computerized many magistrate offices offices to allow better tracking of cases, the stories say. “We went into counties where everything was on file cards and indictments shoved in the back drawers,” she said.
She is also seeking to standardize the way magistrates manage money with rules on how they should take, deposit and track money.
Lesley Coggiola, disciplinary counsel for the Supreme Court, said handling of money is one reason there are so many magistrate discipline cases against magistrates. “It’s not necessarily that there’s any dishonesty going on,” she told Greenville Online, “but they are just not managing the money well and then checks bounce or they put the money in the wrong place or they carry it around in their car and forget to do the deposit.”
