Counties need funding to meet courthouse safety standards

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The Journal Gazette on 1/19/2023

In June, a Muncie man was charged with five counts of intimidation for threatening to “pick off” several Delaware Circuit Court judges with a firearm. Days later, another Muncie man received a four-year prison sentence for threatening to blow up the home of a juvenile magistrate judge.

Unchecked courthouse access in the Hoosier State remains a considerable security threat, according to the Indiana Judicial Conference. Yet three years after the Indiana Supreme Court set a deadline for counties to submit new courthouse safety plans, just 22 of Indiana’s 92 counties have done so, according to David Kuhnz, a staff attorney with the state Supreme Court’s Office of Communication, Education and Outreach.

In northeast Indiana, only Allen and DeKalb counties filed courthouse safety plans before the January 2022 deadline.

 

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