Courts for Rich, Poor Feared in Greater Use of ‘Rent-a-Judges’

Leaders of state and national lawyers’ groups warned in Los Angeles on Tuesday that increased use of private “rent-a-judges” to settle disputes may be leading to a two-tiered system of justice--one for the rich and one for the poor.

Robert Raven, president of the American Bar Assn. last year, told a committee investigating rent-a-judges that he fears the evolution of “a private justice system for those who can afford it, and an even more crippled system for the poor and those charged with crimes.”

Rent-a-judges are retired judges who are usually hired by businesses or wealthy individuals to preside over the settlement of their disputes. Those who cannot afford their fees must wait as long as five years for their civil disputes to come to trial in some busy urban areas.

Raven said courts in the nation’s urban areas are already overburdened and have had to cut back drastically on the number of civil jury trials to accommodate soaring numbers of criminal cases involving drugs. Criminal cases have constitutional priority over civil cases.

Raven told the committee, appointed by California Chief Justice Malcolm Lucas, that he expects the situation to worsen.

“As we begin to put more and more resources into the criminal justice system, which we must do, the civil system will be overwhelmed in two or three years,” Raven told the committee at a public hearing.

Alan Rothenberg, president of the State Bar of California, echoed Raven’s remarks, saying the civil justice system in California is al ready overwhelmed.

Rothenberg said he feared that increased use of private judges by the well-to-do will lessen political pressures to provide more resources for public courts.

Private judges hire themselves out at fees that often reach $250 an hour or more for mediation or binding arbitration. In addition, with the approval of sitting judges, private judges can conduct trials or referee certain pretrial disputes.

More and more litigants are hiring private judges to resolve commercial and family disputes, legal experts say. But because much of the work takes place in private, no public agency knows exactly how much of it goes on.

Some experts who fear the phenomenon of private judging warn that it poses a threat of “brain drain” to the public court system. These experts say they are concerned that talented judges will be tempted to retire early by the prospect of making more money under cushier working conditions.

But John C. Woolley, president of the California Judges Assn. and a Superior Court judge in Orange County, disputed that theory.

He pointed to a statistical study by the National Center for State Courts that showed the pace of judges’ retirements holding steady throughout the 1980s. Woolley said he does not see private judging as “a fearsome force that will do in the public system.”

John K. Trotter Jr., who retired as presiding judge of the 4th District Court of Appeal in Santa Ana and now heads the largest rent-a-judge operation in California, agreed.

Trotter’s firm, Judicial Arbitration & Mediation Services, which has 91 judges handling about 7,000 cases this year and operates an Orange County office, has attracted more than a dozen judges from the local bench in recent years. Superior Court Judge Jerrold S. Oliver, a specialist in complex litigation who retired from the bench in July after 18 years, was among the recent additions, along with other prominent jurists.

Trotter said he could not understand why retired judges were being singled out for scrutiny.

He said there is nothing new about resolving disputes outside court, noting that the 63-year-old American Arbitration Assn. handles 50,000 cases a year, that the securities industry routinely uses arbitration in its disputes, and that mediation and arbitration are widely used by school districts, labor unions and medical providers.

“If all of these other forms of private, consensual, paid-for dispute resolution processes do not demean the courts, it is difficult to assume the existence of private judging will,” Trotter said.

Times staff writer Eric Lichtblau in Orange County contributed to this story.