FCB Faith is your rhythm and prey station. I listen, my mom listens, pretty much the whole family. I cannot, I cannot. I canna. Said, don't, don't and no joke, don't. Listen to FCB Faith on iHeartRadio, Odyssey at faith dot com, or tell your smart speaker to play FCB Faith on iHeartRadio. The following is a presentation of FCB Faith. This is the Jeff Lori and Nick Show. Welcome to the Jeff Lori Nick Show. And of course we are an informative show that's presented to solve solutions to problems that we have in our lives, in our communities, in our nation. Today we have a guest attorney, Tim Hess. He is running as a candidate for the Cayahoga County Court of Common Please welcome to our show. Tim, How are you this morning? Very good? Thank you, Thank you for having me. It's privileged to be here. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Tim hats a great candidate, well known in the legal circles. Tim, give us a little bit of your background. What type of law do you practice? So forth? Well, what I started out in two thousand and two actually was working as a foreign attorney from about ninety seven through two thousand and one. Passed the bar in two thousand and two. I started out in a plaintiffs firm, so you know, car accidents, medical malpractice, personal injury, that kind of stuff, small boutique firms started out there, was there for about three years, and I wanted to also do criminal defense work, something I've always wanted to do. I went to college at Kent State for criminal justice and criminology and psychology, and then, of course, you know, in law school kind of really honed in on focusing on criminal defense and criminal law. So Mark, who I worked for, were still good friends, in fact my office with him now we separated and amicably and I started out on my own. So in the beginning, as a young solo practitioner, it was do what you can. Keep the lights on and put food on the table and bills. So I did a little bit of everything. I dabbled at a couple of divorces I learned I never definitely didn't want to do that again. I did some business law, I did some liquor law. I continued with personal injury, and of course then I got into doing criminal defense and I did a little bit of here and there, with a focus on criminal defense up until about two thousand and ten, and then about twenty ten I just strictly focused on criminal defense work and also representing people for civil rights claims. Again, it's the state, so you know, we saw a lot of this. We're not seeing it as much anymore, thankfully, I think, with the advent of body cameras. But in early twenty tens, we were representing people who were, you know, abused or assaulted by police officers, jail staff, things of that nature. So I still do that. I have a friend of mine that I work with by the name of Paul Cristalo. He's really good on those cases. But I do primarily criminal defense and I like it. It keeps me busy. I'm in trial a lot. I'm in the courthouse almost every day, so yeah, that's pretty much my focus now. So why are you running for judge of the portcoming place? When I I wanted, I decided I was going to run, probably around two thousand and seventeen. I approached a judge, told her I was going to probably run for her seat. She said, Okay, you've got experience. I think you can do it because a lot of people they you know, you only have to practice law for six years, I believe before you can run for judge. You definitely have the experience. Yeah, I've got the experience now, and I tacked on some years since twenty seventeen. So twenty seventeen it was, it was in my mind, and I think around COVID when I saw well, I shouldn't say that there were some things. As I've over the years, I've seen some things I didn't like going in the court room. I mean, I've practiced all over Ohio, Federal court, state court, Mayor's court, unicourt, you name it. And I've seen good judges and I've seen bad judges. And I would like to believe that when I get on the bench, I will be a good judge because I have the experience in front of a whole array of judges. But twenty twenty really kind of set it off for me because I saw just an even more trampling of our civil rights, the trampling of our constitutional rights. You know, defendants not being able to have their cases heard because of COVID, because of these crazy restrictions that were placed in the courthouse. You know, jurors didn't want to come down. Cases were just lying out there, you know, and people weren't having their day in court. So while I've wanted to do it for a long time, I think twenty twenty was a tipping point for me to say, you know what, this isn't right. The Constitution doesn't take a pause because we have a virus that's floating around our country. So I decided to run for judge in twenty twenty two. Great. So one of the things that or issues should I say, that really is on the minds of a lot of our listeners and just citizens is crime and safety. You know, we always hear that, you know, crime is on the decrease. However, folks are scared. People are scared to walk there, neighborhoods are scared to jog on their own. People are scared to drive and pump gas, pull up at a gas station. If they're skeptical about whether or not they're safe in just their daily activities. What would you, as a judge do, or could you even just speak to that whole issue of crime safety? What would you do to help. Well, let's first address the idea that this talking point that keeps coming out the crime is decreasing. That that's not true. The reason that a lot of people like to cite statistics and say that crime is decreasing is for twofold one, the FBI reporting change the way in which they report statistics on crime and around I think it was around twenty or twenty twenty one. So major metropolitin areas like New York, California, Chicago, they're not reporting their homicides, they're not reporting major felony cases. So it appears that crime is going down. But you know, don't trust your lying eyes because you know, obviously people who actually live in these areas can tell you something differently. So that's one. Two. When you have prosecutors in some of these major metropolitan areas who have gone down this road of you know, we need to treat the comfort of the criminal better than the comfort of the citizen. So we're not going to prosecute somebody who steals nine hundred and ninety died dollars worth of goods from a mom and pop shop. When you have prosecutors who, you know, let murders, rapists, and robbers walk out, walk in the jail and walk out the back door on a no bail, you know, no cash bail, and then go out and commit more crimes. Yes, And if you don't prosecute crimes, how are you going to know that there's being crimes committed? Right, So I just want to address that briefly. With regard to community safety. The other thing that I think would would come into the play of this is what I had just mentioned, which is the the idea that bail should somehow we shouldn't. We shouldn't impose a bail or a bond on a defendant. You know, there's I think five principal reasons for bond. Protection of the safety of the community, the likelihood of the offender to abscond, whether or not a weapon was used, the seriousness of the crime. And I can't think of that. The other one's top of my head right now. But there was a case that came out a few years back to BOS that said that judges could not consider the threat to the community of the defendant and safety of the community when when imposing a bond. I mean, that's really the main job of a of a judge. Consider that, right. It's amazing that, yeah, right, it's amazing that voters, citizens the community put thejudge there and then for their safety and to do to provide services that are in judgments that are going to improve their lives. But then here comes ruling that says, you can't even think about that. So it doesn't make sense. No, it doesn't, and I think, you know, I think it was in twenty twenty two we passed one of the issues. It was what issue one er Show three, which basically said, look, a judge should consider the safety of the community when imposing a bond or a bail. So we corrected that. Okay, but that is something that a judge absolutely needs to look at. Now, I don't think that you know, low level felonies where a guy is, you know, maybe he's got a drug issue or a mental health issue, and you know he stole something that got him a felony five charge. Does that individual need to be languishing in our jail. Absolutely not, Okay, it's not going to improve his life in any way. It's not going to get him help in the resources that he may need while his case is so I don't believe that that's necessary. A murderer, a rapist, a robber, somebody who takes a gun and puts it in somebody's face to force them to do something against their will. That person is a threat to our community, that person is a danger to society. That person absolutely should have a high bond. And people think, oh, well, if you're affluent and rich, you can afford the bond, And it's only it privileges the wealthy while they may have the means to be able to do it. You also have to think of somebody who commits crimes, maybe a drug dealer who makes more money than sometimes the hard working blue collar guy who's you know, swinging a pickaxe or working on a factory line. But the idea is if they pay that money, because if you have a two hundred thousand dollars bond, in most scenarios, they're not paying a two hundred thousand they're paying a bondsman twenty thousand, ten percent to then be released from jail. And if you come up with that kind of money, you are now invested in your case, and you now have a duty to appear, You have an obligation to be invested in your case. And I think it creates that investment to where a defendant says, well, wow, if I don't show up to court where I go out and commit a new crime and violate my bond. They're going to ask for that other you know, eight hundred thousand dollars or whatever it is, and or you know, eighty six thousand dollars, and the bondsman is going to become an actor after me to look for it, you know, dog the bondy hunter, right, that's his job. He goes out and he finds people who ditches, skips bond and brings them back to court. So I don't think it's just a thing that privileges the affluent. I think it also causes defendants to be invested in their case, to know that they're going to show up and they have to show up, and they've got to keep their nose clean while they're out on bond and not get more cases. That would reduce the recidivism for people who are released on a bond. I agree totally, especially with these cases that have been in the news where folks have been released, no bond, just out, and then they go out, they terrorize the community, they commit another crime right back in jail, and then the judge and the community asked why were they let free? And so that needs to be addressed, and Tim has Tim has your perspective on that is right on, right on point, and you would be a good judge if that's your temperament. As it really relates to crime and safety of the community. You have women seniors that go out and vote for these judges and then they don't protect their interests and their safety, which makes no sense at all. So yeah, so investing our vote with Tim hass with you would without a doubt help bring safety to our communities. Can you speak to the issue of like mental health court. Well, and that kind of ties in, Thank you, It kind of ties into you know, the community safety. And what I was talking about is low level offenses. Not all low level offenses are committed only by mental health people with mental health issues. Of our psychological hospitals that are run by the state in this in this state, of those beds are taken up by people who are there by order of the court. Okay, one in three inmates in our jails and in our prisons have a mental health issue. Prisons in jails should not be houses for those with mentally mental health issues. Now I get sometimes people with mental health issues commit serious grievous crimes and maybe that's where they belong. Okay, to protect society, but we need to figure out what we can do to an alternate path for people with mental health issues. Right now, I believe we have five mental health court judges. I think that number should be increased to at least ten. We have thirty four judges on the bench. I would like to see at some point twelve to fifteen of our judges handle mental health court cases. And by increasing the number of judges who handle mental health court cases, maybe we can have judges who specialize in other words, depression, anxiety. For this judge, this judge handles bipolar disorder and manic depression. This judge handle schizophrenia and a multitude of higher level mental health issues. So I think we could do that if we put more judges in the mental health court on the bench. There's so much anger that goes along with these issues, especially when there's a murder or death involved, you know, by someone with illness. So without a doubt, yeah, there needs to be more judges assigned to these cases, and there's there needs to be more preventive care as well. We're going to take a quick break right now, we're going to ask our audiences to stay with us and we'll be right back with candidate for Common Please Court, tim Hess, tim Hess, Attorney tim Hess, Thank you with attorney tim Hess, candidate for kuy Hogan County Common Police Court. Tim Can you speak to the issue of probation. A lot of folks are on probation and how can you enhance that whole area of the courts? Thank you, h probation. The problem with probation a lot of it is, you know, they just want to make sure that you're not getting in trouble or maybe you're not using drugs. And some judges will say, look, I want you to have a full time job or at least thirty five hours a week. I want a W two submitted you know what I mean. I want you to be a tax pay earning member of our society. And I applaud that not all the judges do they put you on probation and they say, well, whatever the Probation Department deems necessary, you got to abide by the terms and conditions of what they set. Okay, what is your approach I would My approach would be, I think there needs to be some more services provided to probationers. I think the probation Department, and I'm sure that in some extent they already do this, but I think it needs to be expanded. Probation department should be reaching out to local employers, local businessmen, local unions for that matter, and to try to get these people jobs, you know, the whole you know, the idle hands are the devil's playground. Or however, I'm sure I butchered that quote from the Bible, but you know it's true. You know a lot of these guys, they get out, they go back to their same buddies on the street and doing the same stuff. And then the next thing you know, they're back in front of the judge because they have a positive drunk screen, or they were caught with somebody else who was charged with a felony. So I think if we can get people working, you know the old another old Bible quote, if you give a man official eat for a day, if you teach him official'll eat for a lifetime. I think a lot of these guys, if given the opportunity to actually earn a wage, support your family and understand what the benefits of a hard day's work is and the self accomplishment of that. I think we could make some progress there. So rather than just come down pein a cup and don't get in trouble, I think we really should focus on trying to get people in a better situation in life through our probation department. Oh that sounds so good right now. I guess a lot of our audience is really probably not familiar with this area of probation. But if we could get those services there kind of tied in, I think that would make a big difference. What about this area of disparate sentencing, because you know, oftentimes folks field as though and cry out, hey, that sentence was not fair, was not just what is your approach to sentencing so that it shows fairness and you know across the board it's equal. Well, one of the reasons I ran in twenty twenty two and against the opponent that I did, was because there was national news made by a woman that he sentenced versus the sentence that another female in another courtroom. He did not sentence both of the two individuals. So a white woman in another courtroom and buzzled a lot of money, she got a probation. A black female in his courtroom got a harsher sentence. Now there was some things about that. You know, the first woman was able to pay a good amount of the restitution back even though she stole more. Black female was not. Ultimately, the judge did not even send her even though he sensed her a prison. He reversed his sentencing. She was in jail for a while, and then he released her and put her on probation. But I think, and since then, I think this judge that I ran against in twenty twenty two is actually a part of the pilot program that the judges are trying to build a sentencing database. So if I have an individual in front of me who committed, you know, ex felony of the second degree, has this kind of similar attributes, has this kind of similar circumstances and facts to the case, I can look at other sentences around the state and say, well, this guy down in Hamilton County got you know, five years, this guy in Youngstown got six, the guy over here in Toledo got four. Well, you know what, I think that it would probably be fair if I gave this guy five years, right, And I'm probably oversimplifying the sentencing guy. There's no guidelines. But the sentencing database, but I think that would be a good thing to have, and somehow the ability to make it accessible to the private citizen would would have to be very fine tailored is to not expose any private information like that. But I think that's something that we should continue to look into and improve on, is a sentencing data spase so we can avoid disparate not disparate sentencing. So yeah, I would definitely want to be a part of that. Yeah, I think that makes a big difference. And I think you as a candidate and as a judge would definitely stand out and receive a lot of accolades because for creating that database, because there's always cries for equal justice under the law and in sentencing, this would really make a difference and bring a lot of trust, increased trust, and increase the integrity of the court. So Tim has you are again right one point by you know, making that appeal to or effort to create some type of a database that would help judges get to that balance, that that right point in sentencing, so that there's no outcry of the citizens or the public or any groups saying that the sentencing was just wrong. So that's but also there's another issue, and when we listen to the judicial system and judges talk about the backlog of cases and maybe civil cases, can you kind of speak to that? Oftentimes you know, there's an outcry again from the public that say, hey, it's just taking so long to get to this case. What can you do? What can be done to improve that? Sure, so, one of the things that we often hear, and having practiced in the civil realm, is that cases take two, three, four years to make their way to finally having their day in court. That's just unacceptable. And one of the reasons I believe that this is is unfortunately, and particularly in Kyaga County, we have a large number of our judges who are former prosecutors. It's what I call the prosecutor to the bench pipeline. I myself was never a prosecutor, and I don't, you know, disparage anybody who was. I think it's a great way to get experienced. It's a great way to get trial experience. But for some reason, of our thirty four judges, I want to say, of my knowledge, at least half of them, if not more, are former prosecutors. And what that tends to do is cause these judges to want to get into the juicy and fun, you know, interesting and salacious cases of murder, and you know, the murder cases, the rape cases, the felonious assault cases, the ones that are you know, have the gritty details and that they're used to working on because they were prosecutors. And we have a couple of defense attorneys and public defenders that are on our bench too. The problem with that is we don't have too many judges on our bench that came from the civil world, and those cases tend to get back burner. Now, there is certain rules and laws and of court that say criminal cases do take a precedence, especially if they're over time. Right, this case has to be brought to to not infringe on somebody's civil rights. Right, they can't be held in jail indefinitely and say, well, we're just going to keep putting. Your case off. So there are some rules that judges have to follow and say, look this this criminal criminal trial takes precedent. It's getting old. I got a postpon own this civil trial for this criminal trial. But a friend of mine who's on the bench recently take took took the bench, said it's amazing how many civil trials he's trying to get through and update and bring people in and say we got to get moving on this. He's got cases that are two, three, four years old that he's trying to get moving. So they don't spin cases across the street anymore. What that means is they used to send a case over to a visiting judge. Now they have to be handled by the judge. So I think that's something I would like to focus on, is to up, you know, speed along these civil case dockets. There are states, I believe, like Tennessee and some other jurisdictions where actually they have judges who only handle civil cases and judges who only handle criminal I don't know if I'll ever get to that point, but it sounds like a pretty efficient program that maybe we can explore down the road. Wow, thank you, Tim Hass. You certainly unpacked a lot and uh we certainly look forward to your being successful this November. Thank you. Let's remember Tim Hass Jernie Tim has candidate for Kyle the County Common Please Court. Thank you again Tim for sharing with us, Thank you to our audience, and let's all remember to keep fighting a good fight. The strengthen our communities, our cities, our regions, and we can make this country a better place. And let's remember that we can all do our part to do better and make it a better place. This has been a presentation of the FCB podcast Network, where real Talk lives. Visit us online at fcbpodcasts dot com.
