Court Monitoring
What is court monitoring?
Court monitoring groups share a common belief: Public scrutiny of the courts is essential to ensure the courts are fair and just.
WATCH’s court monitoring program has these components:
- Trained volunteers observe court hearings every day and report what they see
- Research projects look closely at specific courts, like domestic violence court; or certain types of hearings, like probation revocation hearings, to document how they are handled
- Staff work with advocates and court committees to push for change
- We make our findings public through our newsletter, website and the media
Court monitoring groups focus on issues such as:
- violence against women and children
- racial disparities
- drunk driving
- police brutality
- teenage domestic violence
- how judges conduct themselves in court
Why monitor the courts?
It is the only way the public can know what is going on and be a voice for change. The legal system plays a significant role dealing with violence in our society, and must be accountable for its actions. The presence of observers in the courtroom sends the message that the public cares what happens there. A judge had this to say about WATCH, “They hold up a mirror [to us]…and sometimes we don’t like what we see.”
Observing hearings day after day provides a picture of a local justice system and its procedures and practices. Independent court monitoring groups are in a unique position to document problems and make recommendations. We work closely with the courts but are not part of them.
WATCH promotes court monitoring across the country because it works. Some things we have accomplished:
- Released The Impact of Minnesota’s Felony Strangulation Law, a review of domestic strangulation cases following passage of new legislation in 2005
- Published Victim Impact Statements at Sentencing: Do They Matter? a collaborative research study on how judges respond to input from crime victims
- Formed the Hennepin County Fatality Review Task Force which review domestic homicides and tries to close loopholes and prevent further deaths (please link to the fatality review team website or latest report)
- Supported the county in establishing a specific Domestic Violence court and making child protection court open to the public

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Developing a Court Monitoring Program
Managing Court Monitor Volunteers
NATIONAL WALK-IN FOR JUSTICE
View photos or a short video of the Walk-in for Justice hosted by WATCH in November 2008.
Watch Briefs
When Cindy Dyer, the chief prosecutor for the Dallas Family Violence Division, was told by a judge that he would hold her in contempt if she attempted to bring a domestic violence case forward without the victim, she knew quick thinking was in order. After discussing the dilemma with a friend, the friend's mother brought her entire bridge club to the court the next morning. The judge not only allowed the trial to go forward without the victim, but the jury found the defendant guilty and he served a jail term.
An Alaskan grandmother from a small fishing village was upset when a judge was not taking the domestic violence against her grandaughter seriously. The grandmother asked four of her elderly friends to accompany her to court. They brought their knitting and sat in the front row, only pausing to peer over their glasses when the judge did something they didn't like. When the judge asked the women what they wanted, they presented him with a prepared list of domestic violence statutes he was not upholding (clearly they had done their homework!). The grandmothers reported that within six months they had transformed the practices of the court and only visit now and again to be sure the changes are permanent.
The above examples are from Family Violence Court Watches: Improving Services to Victims by Documenting Practices by Sarah M. Buehl. Originally published in The Texas Prosecutor.
