Longtime Hinds County Circuit Clerk Barbara Dunn must pay $9,535 in sanctions for her office's failure to timely file appeal papers to the state Supreme Court.Hint to whoever takes on the appeals-clerk duties: read MRAP 10 and 11.
Also, Hinds County Circuit Judge Tomie Green ordered that the deputy clerk who handled appeals in Dunn's office be suspended for 30 days, effective today. Deputy Clerk Loretta Wells also will have different duties once she returns from suspension.
Lee Howell, attorney for T. Jackson Lyons & Associates, said he just wanted to have the appeal filed.Lee Howell, YOU DA MAN!
"We were just trying to get records," Howell said.
The amount of the sanctions is what the fees were in trying to get the appeal filed, Howell said.
And what about that mandated training for deputy clerks?
This time, the Supreme Court is mandating that Dunn provide adequate training for her staff. Green ordered Dunn to provide at her own expense mandatory in-service training for her employees, including cross training.TBA is tempted to volunteer, at least as regards the appellate duties.
But Dunn said she is having a difficult time finding someone to provide training for her staff.
Dunn said most of her staffers have been on the job for a long time and know what their duties are even if they don't always do them.
... H/t JL, who notes that compared to the prior photographic evidence of Dunn's vampiric nature, this one looks positively Photoshopped:
Could be ... or it could be that she's fed recently on the blood of the living. But who was her victim?
Wells could not be reached for comment.Uh-oh. "You have failed me for the last time!..."
And it's not over yet. See today's Supreme Court order in In re Dunn, 2011-CS-0255-SCT .
ReplyDeleteThis new order goes beyond incompetence to outright fraud in the conduct of the Clerk's duties.
ReplyDeleteLast year I sent Dunn's office a notice of appeal with a copy to be stamped and returned in an already-stamped envelope. I got my copy back 5 months later. I wasn't worried because I had sent a copy of it to the Supreme Court and could track it on their docket. (Otherwise there is no way I would mail anything to Barbara Dunn). What boggles the mind is that there has to be a stack my copy was placed in where someone got to it five months later. Why when the obvious thing to do is stamp the original and the copy, place the copy in the envelope provided and place in the outgoing mail? I still think Hoarders needs to feature that office. Meanwhile we're just stuck with the mess.
ReplyDeleteThanks, SOMS - meant to post about that, but today they are actually making me work in my, er, workplace. It happens. From time to time.
ReplyDeleteCan a circuit clerk be impeached or otherwise removed for incompetence? How?
I was helping a friend with the docs needed to file an appeal but I drew the line at contacting Dunn's office to find out the estimated cost. She went down there to get the info and reports that they are taking classes with the Supreme Court on record preparation. Maybe one day lawyers will be able to call the Hinds County Circuit Clerk's office and not only get the info. they need but trust that it will be true.
ReplyDeleteYay! As the old Yiddish joke says, maybe the horse will learn to sing!
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