Courthouse Security - A Matter To Be Taken Seriously
March 16, 2007
First published in Chicago Lawyer.
Halloween 1994, was a dark and horrid day, with storms like those you had not seen in years. The Bears played at home that Monday night against the Packers. But it was the morning I remember vividly. I saw a man walk inside a building at 9:00 a.m. He came peacefully and intended to stay but a few minutes. He meant no harm.
Within minutes they caught him.
"Bring your weapon back to your car."
"What?" he asked.
"Bring your weapon back to your car!"
`My weapon?"
"I am not going to argue with you. Bring your weapon back to the car or it will be confiscated. I WILL NOT TELL YOU AGAIN."
And, upon receiving that third warning from the court security guard, the undertaker walked back four blocks to put his nail clippers in the hearse.
I happened to be standing there when he returned soaking wet and told the security guard, "Buddy, the people I'm after are already dead."
Thirty minutes earlier I too had been sent back in shame.
The weapon: a dictaphone.
It's fun to tease about the court security guards, but the underlying subject matter is the most serious for our profession. No attorney or judge leaves home in the morning thinking this could be the last day of his or her life. But sadly, it's happened too often.
There was news recently about reducing the number of security personnel at the Cook County court buildings for budgetary reasons. Without commenting on the budget, any discussion about reducing security at court buildings deserves a little history.
After all, we're right at the two-year anniversary of two of the worst attacks on comrades in our profession.
On March 11, 2005, a man in custody on rape charges overpowered a sheriff's deputy in an Atlanta courthouse and then used her gun to kill a judge, a court stenographer, and a second sheriff's deputy. Judge Rowland Barnes died on his bench that morning.
That was 11 days after the horrendous murders of the husband and mother of federal Judge Joan Lefkow. That crime took place in her home, not unlike the history of tragedies involving judges around the nation.
In 1979, federal Judge John Wood was slain outside his home in Texas. In 1987, Judge George Aronwald was shot near his home while picking up laundry. That same year, in Biloxi, Judge Vincent Sherry and his wife Margaret were murdered in their home. In 1988, federal Judge Richard Daronco was shot in his backyard in New York by the father of a plaintiff in a dismissed sexual discrimination case. Federal appeals court Judge Robert Vance was killed by a parcel bomb at his Birmingham, Ala., home in 1989.
In 2003, attorney Jerry Curry was shot and killed outside a California court.
Whether it is in court, in the office or at home, the threat is very real to our profession. And it is very close.
In 1983, Judge Henry Gentile and attorney James Piszczor were slain at the Daley Center by Hutchie Moore, a dis-abled former police officer involved in divorce proceedings.
In 2000, a Dolton woman tried to bring a loaded pistol into the Dirksen Building, but was caught by alert court se-curity officers. She was on her way to Judge Ronald Barliant's courtroom, where she had been six times in four years.
In 2005, a man was stopped while trying to enter the Daley Center after police saw a .22- caliber handgun in his bag as it went through an X-ray machine.
And on Dec. 8, 2006, a man forced his way into the law firm of Wood Phillips and murdered patent lawyer Michael McKenna, patent lawyer Allen Hoover, and 78-year-old clerk Paul Goodson.
So, as for security at the courthouse, they can cut the dictaphone-grabber who needs to be told you can now record with a cell phone. We can throw caution to the wind and risk death by pinching by eliminating the Barney Fifes who confiscate nail clippers.
But as for the rest, glad they are there.
