EXPERIMENT BRINGS COURTS CLOSER TO COMMUNITIES

Judge Rolando T. Acosta may be sitting in Manhattan, but when he speaks -
calling the defendants by their first names and imploring them to listen to
their parents' advice - he sounds more like the small-town judge in "To
Kill a Mockingbird."

"I'm going to release you to your mom, but only on certain conditions," the
judge told one defendant last week, a penitent-looking 14-year-old boy in a
T-shirt and baggy jeans who had confessed to writing graffiti on a
city-owned building. "You've got to be home every night by 9 p.m. You must
continue to attend counseling sessions here at the court. And you've got to
attend our Hard Hats program on Saturdays."

Judge Acosta is the lone presiding judge at the Harlem Community Justice
Center, the latest addition to the city's ongoing experiment with community
courts. The court's juvenile intervention wing, which began hearing cases
in January, will officially open today in a ceremony to be attended by
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and other city and state officials.

The new court, in a spectacular Victorian Gothic building on East 121st
Street, is intended to make justice more accessible to a community plagued
by crime, and to address crime's root causes with a battery of social
services like drug treatment, psychological counseling and mentoring for
adolescents. It is part of a nationwide movement toward community-based
problem-solving courts that began with the Midtown Community Court in
Manhattan in 1993.

Planners hope to redefine the way courts work by bringing them closer to
communities.

"If you were to distill this down to its essence, it's about improving
public confidence in the criminal justice system," said Greg Berman, the
director of the Center for Court Innovation, a public-private partnership
in New York that is the prime mover in the courts' development.

The new courts, which handle low-level crimes and some civil matters, like
housing disputes, have generally been well received. But some lawyers and
academics say that in their efforts to address the social problems that
lead to crime, community courts can become overly paternalistic, generating
harsher punishments and funneling more people into the criminal justice system.

"I appreciate the effort to do things differently, but I share some
concerns about courts of this type being more expansive than necessary,"
said Leonard E. Noisette, executive director of the Neighborhood Defender
Service of Harlem, which has represented several people in the new courthouse.

In a sense, the new courts represent a return to tradition. The city's
courts were once spread throughout its neighborhoods, and it was not until
the 1960's, burdened by excessive caseloads, that they were centralized.
(The Harlem and Midtown community courts are in buildings that once housed
local courts.)

But by the late 1980's, some judges were frustrated by the courts'
inability to change the chronic problems that plague low-income areas.

"For some problems - drugs are a good example - dealing with the individual
case alone doesn't help," said Judith S. Kaye, the chief justice of the New
York State Court of Appeals, who helped create the city's community courts.
"It's better to deal with the underlying problem."

With that goal in mind, the Midtown Community Court was created in 1993.
Paid for in part by local business groups (including The New York Times
Company Foundation), the court handles misdemeanors like low-level drug
use, prostitution and vandalism.

Two years ago the city introduced a second effort, the Red Hook Community
Justice Center, in a refurbished Catholic school in Brooklyn.

In a sense, the Red Hook and Harlem courts are the more radical
experiments. Situated in low-income residential areas, their goal is to
restore a trust in the criminal justice system that has been badly frayed,
said Jeffrey Fagan, a professor of law and public health at Columbia
University who is directing evaluations of both courts.

The courts bring together elements that are usually separated - housing,
family and drug cases - in one small building, so people can deal with
several related problems at the same time.

On a recent morning at the Harlem court, for instance, landlords and
tenants who showed up to sue each other were greeted cheerfully by a case
manager with a clipboard who asked them to fill out a form describing their
problems and complaints. At the court's Resource Center, three employees of
the Human Resources Administration help them apply for public assistance or
loans in an effort to forestall litigation.

"With housing court, 99 percent of the cases are nonpayment, so it makes
sense to deal with those economic issues in the building," Judge Acosta said.

Although many people who have used the court note that it is less crowded
than the courthouses downtown, this may change. The Harlem courthouse will
eventually hear about 18 percent of all housing matters in Manhattan,
roughly 15,000 cases annually.

The Harlem court's juvenile intervention wing also provides a stark
contrast with the more crowded courts downtown. Teenagers arrested for
nonviolent felony and misdemeanor offenses in its jurisdiction, which
includes all of East and much of Central Harlem - the 23rd, 25th and 28th
Precincts - are generally referred to the court. When a teenager arrives, a
probation officer conducts an interview, to get as much information as
possible about the problems that may have led to the arrest.

Court officers try to contact the defendant's parents and teachers.

They schedule drug tests, and soon appear at a hearing with Judge Acosta.
He can order counseling, drug treatment or a mentor for the teenager, or
even recommend job training for the parents. Often he orders appearances at
the court's weekend community service program, which may involve painting
rails or raking leaves at the Harlem Art Park, behind the courthouse.

The court also has a Youth Court program, in which children or teenagers
who have been caught in minor crimes by the police or at school face a
court composed entirely of peers, complete with school-age prosecutors,
defense advocates, judges and juries. Sentences consist mostly of community
service or essay-writing. Although the penalties are voluntary, few fail to
obey them, court officers say.

Teenage offenders are likely to face a tougher - or at least more
time-consuming - penalty in community court than they would have
encountered downtown. To some local residents, this is just fine.

"Kids need to do something constructive," said Edna Smith, who sat in
Harlem Art Park on a recent Saturday, watching her son rake leaves as part
of a community service project. "Especially in a neighborhood like this.
This morning I walked out of my hallway and saw eight guys walking in to
buy drugs from a dealer who lives in the building."