Banks campaign responds to Waller's attempts to take credit for drug courts and e-filing

Here's the text of a press release issued by the Earle Banks for Supreme Court campaign today:

WALLER OVERSTATES DRUG COURT AND E-FILING CREDIT

In response to a new campaign TV ad by Chief Justice Bill Waller, Jr.’s campaign, touting Waller’s leading role in promoting drug courts and statewide “e-filing,” the Earle Banks campaign responds as follows:

“Justice Waller only witnessed success with drug courts after the heroic legislative efforts of Representative Alyce Clark (D-Jackson) to create and fund them.  And it was the state legislature, including Rep. Earle Banks, who voted to fund drugs courts, just as he helped to create the Court of Appeals in Mississippi,” said Banks campaign spokesperson Tanya Patterson. 

“Waller’s claim to success with electronic filing, or “e-filing,” a system modeled after the feds that would allow lawyers to file court documents by computer, is absurd.  Only four or five out of eighty-two counties have e-filing.  Even the three largest courthouses in this district, Hinds, Rankin and Lauderdale, cannot afford e-filing.  The smaller counties in poor and rural areas will likely never see electronic filing in their courthouses.  In fact, you cannot even file appeal briefs in Waller’s Supreme Court electronically,” says Patterson.