Order to judges: Work weekends if necessary
New Mexico Court of Appeals judges are under orders from the state Supreme Court to be at their desks working – including evenings, weekends and holidays if necessary – to clear a backlog of several hundred cases that has built up over several years.
As part of a series of unprecedented case management orders, the Supreme Court in December found that the lower court had a “persistent and historically large backlog of undecided cases,” despite previous efforts to clear the logjam and noted that each of the 10 Court of Appeals judges needed to write at least four opinions a month. Not all the Court of Appeals judges were meeting that mark.
The Supreme Court found that 108 cases were awaiting opinions in the Court of Appeals, with 41 of them past due. Another 286 cases were ready to be submitted for written opinions.
The Court of Appeals has had huge turnover in judges since 2015, with 21 judges serving on the court during that time. Only three of the original judges from 2015 are still serving.
Read more: https://www.abqjournal.com/1311169/order-to-judges-work-weekends-if-necessary.html
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