Hon. Randy R. Koschnick

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Judge Randy R. Koschnick worked as a public defender for 14 years in Jefferson County before being elected to the newly created branch 4 in 1999.

Then in 2006, when he became presiding judge, he began investigating some major changes — relying heavily upon his own experiences, and in consultation with district attorneys, public defenders, corporation counsel, the clerk of court, human services and the sheriff’s department.

The linchpin of Koschnick’s plan was to divide the caseload according to a two-year rotation system, so that there are two criminal/traffic branches, a civil/family branch and a juvenile/probate/general branch. Beforehand, the cases were equally divided among the four judges.

With the new system, it is easier for the judges to schedule cases, and there’s less waiting time, because the government lawyer who’s needed for a court appearance is not busy in the neighboring courtroom. In addition, the government lawyers, as well as human services staff, have fewer courts to cover.

“One of my goals was to expedite repeat drunken driving cases, because they pose a significant public safety issue. Under the old system, they were languishing too long — too many defendants were getting additional OWIs while waiting for their cases to come to trial,” Koschnick says.

Within the rotation system, he initiated a significant scheduling change designed to speed up the processing of these cases: He eliminated pretrials. This has had a ripple effect; now there’s more room on the criminal pretrial calendars for other cases, and they, in turn, are coming to trial sooner.

The results speak for themselves. In 2006, under the previous system, the average time from the initial appearance of a defendant charged as a misdemeanor repeat OWI was 112 days. For the first half of 2007, under the new system, that number dropped to 77 days.

Moreover, Koschnick’s plan saved the county $12,000, because a full-time judicial assistant who recently retired, was replaced by a half-time court intake criminal court commissioner.

He additionally pushed for the increased use of videoconferencing for mental commitment cases. Previously, the county was spending roughly $30,000 per year to transport patients from the Mendota Mental Health Institution in Madison to Jefferson. The county invested $60,000 in the videoconferencing equipment, which will pay for itself in two years.