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LISBON -- If defense attorneys want to meet with their client/inmates at the Columbiana County Jail in a timely manner, they should call ahead.
That was the message from Jail Warden Mike Curley after he was asked by the Journal about a recent story in which two defense attorneys told a judge at a court hearing they were having trouble getting to see their client/inmate, Terry A. Brown, who wants to withdraw his guilty plea to murder charges.
The story also quoted county Common Pleas Court Judge C. Ashley Pike as saying other attorneys and probation officers have told him they sometimes have to wait hours to see an inmate.
Curley and his executive secretary said almost all of the attorneys show up at the jail unannounced for an unscheduled meeting with their client, and while they try to accommodate them quickly, that is not always possible, especially as lunch time or if the inmates are in lock down.
"Security comes first over everything and I realize sometimes there's a delay" depending on what is going on at the moment, he said. "We're not staffed for visitation during the week but we understand the necessity to accommodate their schedules, too."
Curley said he has an open-door policy, and anyone with concerns can contact him "and we will handle the problem properly."
The warden's executive secretary said she only knows of one attorney who regularly calls ahead of time to tell them, and if others would call before they intend to arrive that would make it easier for the staff to make arrangements to have the inmates ready to meet with them.
Kelly Linger is president of the county Criminal Defense League Inc., the non-profit agency created to provide public defender services, and she has never been told they should call ahead. "I never understood that was something we should do, but if it will be helpful that's what we'll do," she said.
Curley was hired in November, and Linger said the waiting time has decreased significantly over the past several months. While public defenders sometimes still have to wait up to an hour, she said the usual wait time is now 5 to 15 minutes, which is reasonable.
Linger does not encounter long delays anywhere else where she practices. "In Jefferson and Mahoning counties, it's significantly quicker," she said.
Cindy Scarabino, chief probation officer for the adult probation department, said sometimes her people do call ahead, but the results are usually the same. "He gave them ample time," she said of one probation officer, "and he still had to wait another 45 minutes" after arriving at the jail.
Scarabino said her probation officers need to visit with convicted inmates to prepare the court-ordered pre-sentence investigations and that is not getting done in a timely manner.
"It's very frustrating trying to get our work done because of these long delays," she said.
Scarabino said she has spoken to past wardens about the problem and she and Pike even met with a previous warden at one time.
Pike suggested perhaps the problem is all of the turnover at the jail in recent years.
"We've had so many different organizations run the jail and so many different wardens that it's really next to impossible to have established some type of protocol for lawyers to visit their clients or for the adult probation department to interview inmates out there for their presentence investigations," he said.
County commissioners contract with a private company to operate the jail, and company ownership has changed hands twice in the past decade, the last change occurring in 2017. As for wardens, Curley is the sixth warden since fall 2015.
Commissioner Mike Halleck questioned whether any attorneys have been forced to wait several hours to meet with an inmate, and he also recommended they call ahead.
"You just can't show up and say I want to see John Jones and expect to see him immediately," Halleck said, adding that neither Judge Pike nor anyone else contacted them to express any concerns.
tgiambroni@mojonews.com