School hosting court hearings

By The Raton Range staff

The Raton Range/STPNS

May 07, 2008

RATON, New Mexico (STPNS) -- The Raton High School gymnasium this Wednesday will become a courtroom in which sentences will be issued for actual DWI offenders, an exercise that local court and DWI-prevention coordinators hope will have an impact on students who will be watching.

From 9 to 11 a.m., Raton Magistrate Judge Warren Walton will preside over the sentencing hearings for four DWI defendants. In addition to the junior and senior classes of RHS that will watch the hearings, the public is also welcome to attend.

The students will see the prosecuting and defense attorneys present their arguments and the judge hand down final sentencing for the defendants, who have already pleaded guilty to DWI offenses, some as repeat offenders. Strict courtroom decorum will be observed and enforced by uniformed police officers.

In a unique aspect to the court-at-school hearing, Judge Walton will direct the sentenced defendants to address the assembled students by discussing the effects of drinking and driving on their lives. The defendants have agreed to have their sentencing hearings held as part of the in-school program.

The local "Court to Schools" program is modeled on a similar program started in New Mexico by Judge Danny Hawkes at the Valencia County Magistrate Court in Belen. Such programs are held at community high schools, according to officials with the New Mexico Administrative Office of the Courts, "in an attempt to reach out to local youth so they can witness how defendants are held accountable for the crime of DWI." Officials hope the "exposure to the actual working of the criminal justice system is preventative in nature."

"DWI in this state has been a continual problem," Walton said. "I see this program, as Judge Danny Hawkes has presented it, as a fantastic way to reach out to kids before they commit such a crime."

In support of the program's potential effect, Walton points to a discussion he had with the local school superintendent, John Wilbanks, wherein Wilbanks explained he did not care for "Scared Straight" programs. "With Scared Straight programs," as Judge Walton recounted the conversation, "when the students go into jails, they see these people as criminals, as different from themselves.

"With the Court to Schools program, the students see the defendants in their own school. They see people they know from their own community. They know these people, they're the ones who run the gas station, or work in the local store. It drives the seriousness of drinking and driving home and makes them realize that this can happen to any one of them."

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