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In a move to protect the magisterial district judges who often are the entry point in the judicial system, the Lycoming County commissioners approved adding five deputy sheriff positions to the sheriff's department. The five would cover the magisterial district judges' offices spread throughout the county.
"The largest percentage of court appearances in our system begin at the MDJ (Magisterial District Judge) level," said Sheriff Mark Lusk.
"Disputes between neighbors, the disputes within the family structure -- all of the bad and even worse people come to the MDJ office first and they have no protection," Lusk told the commissioners.
Even though those offices are equipped with an alarm, which when activated goes to a monitoring center, the response may be a phone call from law enforcement asking if everyone is OK, and it may take 20 to 30 minutes for law enforcement to respond to the scene.
"My team can't get there fast enough," he said, citing the fact that Lycoming County is the largest in the state.
"We have to travel a long distance to help them. They have no help. Their only help is that they run, hide and fight, which isn't much help when you're facing really bad people," he said.
Three of the county's magisterial district judges were at the commissioners meeting this week -- Denise L. Dieter, whose office is in Jersey Shore; Kirsten A. Gardner, at Muncy; and Gary A. Whiteman, whose office is at the Lysock View Complex. The other three judges are William C. Solomon on Lycoming Creek Road, Aaron S. Biichle, whose office is in the Court House and Christen Frey, whose office is on West Fourth Street.
"When I took office in January of 2022, it became very apparent to me how incredibly vulnerable I was in my office," Dieter shared.
"I could go on and on and tell you all of the incidents that have occurred, but the bottom line is one, I want to thank you for making the building that I'm in safer. But I want you to understand that while I sit in that building, you'll know at some point soon in a courtroom with nobody there with me, with a staff that cannot hear me and no cameras in the courtroom...if something happens to me, nobody will know and I likely won't even be able to get to a button or some other method of self-defense," Dieter said.
"I've had people come straight up to me and try to rip files out of my hands and try to get behind the bench, so at this point, I think it is not a matter of if, but when, something will happen to one of us," Dieter said.
One of the issues with the people coming through her office, Dieter explained, is that they are unrepresented, which means that they do not have some type of legal counsel. They might be there because of a truancy citation, she said, and they're upset with the school district but take it out on her office staff.
"The ones that you would think would be the one to be concerned with oftentimes aren't those," she said.
"The 30-something female who didn't look very strong or very dangerous, who came in to talk to me about a traffic citation, was the one who charged the bench and tried to take my file from me. I only found out later that she was also the same individual that ripped the traffic citation out of the hands of the state trooper that gave it to her. But because he wasn't present because it wasn't a hearing, it was just a meeting because she wanted to talk about the citation, I didn't have the information ahead of time to properly protect myself," Dieter said.
"Those are the times when things become incredibly dangerous. And again, in my office, my staff cannot see or hear me. There are three doors between us, before I could get to them. There's a door I can turn and retreat to but, in a room that is as small as the courtroom that I'm in I might be lucky enough to do that," she said.
Whiteman also addressed the lack of law enforcement presence in the district courtrooms.
"On your criminal day you have law enforcement there...so there may be that day where they are visually overwhelmed by the presence of law enforcement in the court -- they're kind of on their best behavior. But the other four days or four and a half days that are in our court, there is virtually no presence," Whiteman said.
"We have conversations monthly about what do you want to do with your judges. Do you want to give them tasers? Do you want to give them pepper spray? Those of us who are concealed carry holders… I mean is that kind of what we want to do from the bench? I don't think so," Whiteman said.
He praised the commissioners for considering the additional sheriff's deputies as safety measures.
"This is a tremendous step. We are way ahead of the curve if you act positively upon this," he said.
Even though she has not been on the bench as long as her fellow judges, Gardner, admitted, "In my short time on the bench I have realized the vulnerabilities that I have personally and I think that my colleagues have as well."
Gardner's jurisdiction covers the Muncy, Hughesville and Montgomery area. If there is a problem, the state police are called in to deal with it.
"The safety risks that we are posed with every day is that I will have to wait generally for that 15 minute ride or 10 minute ride from state police. I don't have that luxury of having security there within a matter of minutes. We are definitely vulnerable in our positions," Gardner said.
"We're dealing with individuals that don't understand the law, that don't understand the consequences to what has happened to them in their life, and they're upset. Some of them have mental health (issues), that we're not equipped to deal with on a daily basis. When they come into our courtroom, we are trying to mitigate when they come in angry. We are doing our best but we don't have any safety precautions in our courtrooms," Gardner said.
Commissioner Scott Metzger emphasized that safety in the district justice's courtrooms is an "extremely serious matter."
"We do not like to add positions to increase costs, but when it comes to public safety and the safety of the people that work in the system and the public, we're going to make the necessary precautions to make sure that people can come to work knowing that they're safe and can go home safe," Metzger said.
"We'll do everything in our power the best we can to prevent incidents from happening in our county," he added.