Donna Henry will take over duties of town
magistrate effective immediately, while her husband and former
Magistrate John Henry takes on the position of deputy magistrate.
Since November of 2005, John Henry has been the official town magistrate and is also the former Wickenburg justice of the peace.
Early last year, due to John Henry’s health,
Donna Henry applied for the position of deputy magistrate in order to
fill in for her husband when he was not up to sitting on the bench.
“Court
dates are set and a judge must be present for scheduled court dates,”
Donna Henry said. “Municipalities can hire pro tem (non permanent)
judges from the Justice Court for about $60 an hour, but that is very
expensive. There is a Wickenburg town ordinance that says a deputy
magistrate can be appointed when the magistrate cannot take the bench.”
Henry
felt confident to sit on the bench due to her court background and said
she wanted to do the job because of the town’s need. She has been
working pro bono (free of charge) as deputy magistrate.
“John is
recovering from colon cancer, and he wants to step back now and not
have to make the day-to-day decisions that come with this job,” Henry
said. “The arrangement that was worked out with the town seemed to work
well for everyone.”
Henry took a two-week course for new judges,
which is required of all appointed or elected judges in the state. Her
prior court experience includes clerking for the Wickenburg and Peoria
courts, and she has been a small claims and traffic hearing officer for
various municipalities.
She possesses a paralegal degree, and Henry also administered the Wickenburg Justice Court Teen Court program for eight years.
“Teen
Court was a very serious thing, and the experience was life-changing
for many of the kids who participated as court personnel and for the
defendants as well,” Henry said. “Many of the active members who worked
at the court have gone on to do really great things. We have nurses, a
cardiologist, and an attorney.”
Henry said teens who received
citations through the Justice Court were given one opportunity to
attend Teen Court. If the teen paid his or her fines, or performed
community service, their respective charges were dismissed.
The
teen had to have a job in order to pay his or her fines. Henry said
parents were not allowed to pay the fines through Teen Court, because
the money had to come from the hard work of the teen.
Henry
continues to care and worry about the youth of Wickenburg and has
attempted to put together a program of after-school activities for
local teens. Her attempts have so far been unsuccessful, but she is
planning to look into a program utilized by the Town of Surprise where
teens sit on a city commission.
“It is scary because these kids
think it is funny to get in trouble for underage consumption of
alcohol,” Henry said. “They don’t realize that these charges stay on
their records for 99 years. The charges show up on credit checks, when
applying for car loans and when purchasing auto insurance. It has a
huge effect on their lives, but they think they can pay the fines and
walk away. This is just not the case.
“And the drugs are
terrible,” she added. “They get addicted so quickly and then they don’t
have a chance. We do need to get something going for the kids…
something needs to be done.”
Donna and John married in 1986,
while John was a deputy for the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, and
Donna grew up in a close-knit Flagstaff family.
There, her
grandfather was a state representative, a state senator and a highway
commissioner. Her father and uncle both functioned in various
governmental positions.
The Wickenburg Municipal Court does not
process felonies and handles only lower level charges such as
misdemeanors, town code and municipality violations. However, Henry
(who is known to be a bit sterner than her soft-spoken husband) does
sentence offenders to jail.
“I don’t like putting people behind
bars, but there are times I have no other option,” Henry said. “I like
this job, it’s a good job, but some days it’s an energy sucker. I can’t
get personally involved in these cases, even though some are heart
breaking. I recently sentenced an 80-plus year-old man to eight days in
county jail because he refused to pay his fines or do community
service.”
Wickenburg Town Court takes place every Monday and
every second and fourth Tuesday. Residents are also provided with an
amusing letter from the court nearly each week which is printed in The
Wickenburg Sun.
Henry says she enjoys the work even through all
the heartaches, and finds satisfaction when she witnesses a defendant
getting his or her life together.
“I listen to people who do
some really stupid things,” Henry said. “They hit others, steal from
grocery stores and drive on suspended licenses. But then I see some
people little by little putting their lives back together,” she added.
“They are not making great strides but doing it little by little. It is
wonderful when you can hear in their voices the excitement of getting
their licenses back.”
Henry reminds these individuals at that
time about the responsibility of driving, like needing insurance and
things of that nature. She says, though, that it is all in a day’s work.
She
hopes to stay with the job for a number of years and hopes to make a
difference in the lives of those in Wickenburg.
Source: The Wickenburg Sun
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