Yesterday we posted an entry quoting from an Evansville Courier&Press story titled "Interpreters' new legal requirements present another challenge in driver's license quest." Today the C&P has several related stories.
"Cultural differences complicate police work," is the title to this story by Bryan Corbin and Maureen Hayden. Some quotes:
While language is the biggest and most obvious hindrance to Hispanic immigrants navigating local courts, cultural barriers also confound. Vanderburgh County courts interpreter Simon Leon encounters that constantly.A second important story from the same pair talks about translation of court proceedings. Some quotes:"Here, our system is based on the idea that you are innocent until proven guilty,'' Leon said. "In Mexico, if you're arrested, you are guilty until you can prove yourself innocent."
Misunderstandings with serious consequences can arise from simple traffic violations. When a police officer stops a car in Mexico, the custom is for the driver to walk to the policeman's car, the opposite of the U.S. practice.
Leon is not an attorney, but once or twice a week he works in a Vanderburgh County courtroom making sure scores of criminal defendants understand their legal rights. It's no easy task. Leon's job is to translate court proceedings for the growing number of Spanish-speaking immigrants streaming through the local legal system. * * *"Indiana 'ill-prepared' for influx of Hispanics, report finds" is the headline to a third related story by the same Hayden/Corbin pair today. A quote from the beginning of the story:For the last 18 months, the 72-year-old retired Protestant missionary has played a key role in the county's criminal justice system.
The Gary, Ind., native spends every Monday and every other Wednesday in the county's Misdemeanor Court. He is on-call for criminal trials and hearings in Superior and Circuit courts. He accompanies police, prosecutors, defense attorneys and probation officers to defendant interviews as needed. And he routinely attends the court-ordered "traffic school" for drunken drivers when Spanish-speaking offenders are sentenced there. * * *
Both the U.S. Constitution and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 obligate states to provide comprehensive language services to people who can't speak English, said U.S. District Judge Richard Young, who sits on the federal bench in Evansville.
"When you have persons in your courtroom who can't fully comprehend or participate ... it jeopardizes basic legal rights that we Americans value." Though the federal courts long have required use of qualified court interpreters, it is not an easy requirement to meet, Young said. * * *
Creating a cadre of qualified interpreters is central to correcting the problem, according to a Commission on Race and Gender Fairness formed by the Indiana Supreme Court. As a result, the court started a certification process for interpreters and began offering training late last year.
Three years ago, Vanderburgh County Superior Court Magistrate Jill Marcum took part in an Indiana Supreme Court Commission on Race and Gender Fairness, which traveled the state asking how to make Indiana’s legal system more fair and just. The most frequent complaint they heard: the lack of qualified court interpreters.See also this ILB entry from Dec. 17th on the Indiana Court interpreter program. Posted by Marcia Oddi at December 29, 2004 05:43 PMThe commission heard stories of defendants who couldn’t speak English and were denied full and equal access to justice. In courtrooms across the state, defendants unable to understand court proceedings were forced to rely on family members or friends, untrained in legal language, to interpret for them. Some told commission members of shady interpreters who extorted money from defendants or defrauded them with phony credentials.