North Carolina Court Appearance Project

North Carolina

Court

Appearance

Project

Findings and Policy Solutions from April 22, 2022

New Hanover, Orange, and Robeson Counties

Table of Contents

Executive Summary.............................................................................................................................. 1

Project Team Members ....................................................................................................................... 2

Background .......................................................................................................................................... 4

Key Findings ......................................................................................................................................... 6

What’s the scale of missed court appearances? ........................................................................... 6

What are the consequences of a missed appearance? ............................................................ 12

Policy Solutions at a Glance ............................................................................................................. 17

Policy Solutions by County .............................................................................................................. 18

New Hanover County ................................................................................................................... 18

Orange County .............................................................................................................................. 23

Robeson County ............................................................................................................................ 31

State-Level Changes ..................................................................................................................... 36

Appendix A: Methodology and References .................................................................................. 38

Appendix B: Supplemental Data Tables ........................................................................................ 42

Executive Summary

Diverse teams of justice system stakeholders in New Hanover, Robeson, and Orange Counties

participated in the North Carolina Court Appearance Project. Project teams sought to improve

local court appearance rates and develop better responses to nonappearances. Starting in

August 2021, teams examined local court and jail data, reflected on court practices and

procedures, and crafted policy solutions suited to the needs of their communities and

courtrooms. The project was supported by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the University of

North Carolina School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab.

The tables below summarize the key problems that project teams saw in the North Carolina

data and the range of policy innovations they developed to address those issues within their

own counties.

Measuring the Problem

A lot of people miss court…

About 1 in 6 North Carolina criminal cases had a

missed court appearance.

Mostly for traffic offenses…

Traffic misdemeanors accounted for 82% of

nonappearances statewide.

More often for younger people…

People in their 20s were twice as likely to miss court as

people in their 60s or 70s.

Especially when cases weren’t

resolved quickly…

Nonappearance rates for non-traffic misdemeanors

were twice as high in cases resolved in 6 months

compared to those resolved in 3 months.

With notable differences by

race…

Black people made up 22% of the resident population

but 40% of the criminal cases served and 49% of court

nonappearances.

Significantly hampering people’s

ability to drive…

Failures to appear in court prevented 1 in 10 North

Carolinians from driving.

And causing people to go to jail.

About 1 in 6 jail bookings in project counties occurred

solely because of a failure to appear.

Adopting Policy Solutions

Help people understand and

remember the need to appear

Text message reminders; palm cards to accompany

citations; forms that are easier to read and understand

Address barriers to appearance

Transportation assistance; virtual appearance options

Make court more user-friendly

Hearings scheduled in smaller time blocks; walk-in

hours; services for high-need groups; shorter

disposition times

Build community trust

More diverse court personnel; regular community

engagement

Reduce collateral harms

Fewer unnecessary orders for arrest; license

restoration services; updating state laws

Note: Table reflects statewide data unless otherwise noted.

Project Team Members 2

Project Team Members

New Hanover County

Team Members:

Honorable J. H. Corpening II, Chief District Court Judge, Team Leader

Honorable Phyllis Gorham, Senior Resident Superior Court Judge

Jennifer Harjo, Chief Public Defender

Major Jonathan Hart, Sheriff’s Office

Michelle Taylor, Community Justice Services Adult Enhancement Services Division Manager

Barrett Temple, Assistant District Attorney

Wanna Whitted, Chief Magistrate

Additional Support and Participation:

Max Ashworth, Assistant Public Defender

Tonya Gilley, Trial Court Administrator

Ret. Major Lachlan MacNeish, Sheriff’s Office

Kristi Severo, Assistant District Attorney

Alysha Scheer, Public Defender Investigator

William Van Trigt, Assistant District Attorney

Orange County

Team Members:

Honorable Allen Baddour, Senior Resident Superior Court Judge, Team Leader

Woodrena Baker-Harrell, Chief Public Defender

Sheriff Charles Blackwood, Sheriff’s Office

Honorable Samantha Cabe, Chief District Court Judge

Caitlin Fenhagen, Criminal Justice Resource Director

Mark Kleinschmidt, Clerk of Superior Court

James R. Woodall, Jr., District Attorney

Additional Support and Participation:

Natasha Adams, Assistant Public Defender

Captain David Berry, Sheriff’s Office

Ted Dorsi, Criminal Justice Resource Department Pretrial Services Director

Emma Ferriola-Bruckenstein, Criminal Justice Resource Department Restoration Legal Counsel

Jeff Nieman, Assistant District Attorney

Angela Pendergraft, Deputy Clerk of Superior Court

Jennifer Powell, Assistant Clerk of Superior Court

Project Team Members 3

Robeson County

Team Members:

Honorable James Bell, Senior Resident Superior Court Judge, Team Leader

Major Howard Branch, Sheriff’s Office

Ronald Foxworth, Chief Public Defender

Carlton Mansfield, Immediate Past President, District 20 Bar

Honorable Angelica Chavis McIntyre, Chief District Court Judge

Joseph W. Osman, First Assistant District Attorney

Shelena Smith, Clerk of Superior Court

Harry Warriax, Offender Resource Center Assistant Director

Additional Support and Participation:

Shannon Blackwell, Superior Court Legal Assistant

Johnson Britt, President, District 20 Bar

Major Tammy Deese, Sheriff’s Office

Krystle Melvin, Assistant District Attorney

Jack Moody, Assistant Public Defender

Matt Scott, District Attorney

Background 4

Background

North Carolina courts process more than one million criminal cases each year.

While some

cases are handled online, many require people to appear in court one or more times before

their case is resolved. Although most people appear for court, no-shows in even a small

percentage of cases can add up to a large number of rescheduled hearings. This is inefficient

for court personnel, and causes inconvenience for people involved as witnesses, victims, and

anyone else expecting a proceeding. Additionally, common responses to nonappearance –

even a single missed court date in a low-level case – can land people in jail or prevent them

from driving, causing significant consequences for them, their families, and the community.

Despite this significant impact, practitioners have few resources to improve local appearance

rates. Studies have found that adopting behavioral science tactics, such as sending reminders

before a court hearing or simplifying court date notices, can increase appearance rates,

but

little to no research has been done on other court practices. Still, local court leaders across the

country are creating innovative models to rethink court appearance policies and practices.

The Court Appearance Project launched in August of 2021 to support local North Carolina

criminal justice system leaders committed to examining the scale and impact of missed court

appearances in their communities and devising policy solutions to address them. New

Hanover, Orange, and Robeson Counties were selected from a diverse pool of applicants,

based on the collective commitment of local practitioners and their ideas and momentum for

improving policies. Teams were comprised of stakeholders from across the justice system,

including the senior resident superior court judge; chief district court judge; representatives

from the offices of the district attorney, public defender, clerk, and sheriff; and others.

Gibson, S., et al., eds. (2022). CSP STAT Criminal. Court Statistics Project. https://www.courtstatistics.org/csp-stat-

nav-cards-first-row/csp-stat-criminal.

Cook, B., et al. (2018). Using Behavioral Science to Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes: Preventing Failures to

Appear in Court. University of Chicago Crime Lab & Ideas42. https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-

content/uploads/2018/01/crim-just-report.pdf; Hatton, R. (2020). Research on the Effectiveness of Pretrial Court

Date Reminder Systems. UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2020/03/Court-Date-Notifications-Briefing-Paper.pdf.

Orange

Robeson

New Hanover

Background 5

With technical assistance support from The Pew Charitable Trusts and the University of North

Carolina (UNC) School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab,

the teams met over

several months to review findings from court and jail data, evaluate the available research and

examples of innovation, and develop consensus local solutions. Relying on their combined

expertise and the findings from the data, each county team crafted policy solutions that they

believed would deliver a high impact in their courts and communities.

To contact project staff, please reach out to Jessica Smith, Director of the Criminal Justice Innovation Lab, at

smithj@sog.unc.edu and Terry Schuster, Manager of Pew’s Public Safety Performance Project, at

tschuster@pewtrust.org.

Key Findings 6

Key Findings

To understand the scale of missed court appearances and

their impact on individuals and justice system resources, the

North Carolina Court Appearance Project teams examined

local data from courts and jails, reviewed existing research

and data on court appearance nationally, and explored the

growing body of innovative and evidence-based policy

solutions designed to improve appearance rates and better

respond to missed court dates.

What’s the scale of missed

court appearances?

Missed court appearances occurred in about 1 in 6 North

Carolina criminal cases. These included people who missed

their very first court hearing and individuals who missed a

hearing after having successfully appeared multiple times.

Collectively, they amounted to almost 250,000 missed

hearings a year, a significant strain on court systems. Missed

appearances require additional resources from court and

law enforcement personnel and generate orders for arrest

and other collateral harms for court users.

Trends in nonappearance data can guide policymakers to targeted solutions. The project

teams saw differences in failure to appear rates by geography, charge type, demographics,

and case length.

Geography

Court appearance rates varied across North Carolina’s 100 counties. Rates of missed

appearances ranged from 7% in Yancey County to 35% in Robeson County (see Figure 1).

Among project counties, Orange and New Hanover Counties both had rates closer to the state

average of 15%. Variation by geography might reflect differing practices, suggesting that

practitioners can learn and benefit from sharing ideas across jurisdictions. It might also be tied

to differences in public transportation access and other court appearance barriers.

ABOUT THE DATA

Unless otherwise cited, the

findings in this report are

from court and jail data

analyzed for the project. The

court data comes from the

UNC School of Government

Criminal Justice Innovation

Lab’s North Carolina

Criminal Information System,

a comprehensive database

of Automated Criminal /

Infractions System (ACIS)

data from 2015 to present.

Sheriffs’ offices in Orange

and New Hanover Counties

provided local jail data,

covering two years of recent

jail bookings. See Appendix

A for more information

about the data and

methodology.

1 in 6 criminal cases in North Carolina had at least

one missed court appearance.

Key Findings 7

Figure 1

County nonappearance rates range from 7% to 35%.

Nonappearance rates by county for North Carolina criminal cases, 2015 – 2020.

Source: UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab North Carolina Criminal Information System.

Even within counties, location mattered. Analysis of individuals’ zip codes found that certain

areas in each project county had higher nonappearance rates. In some instances, zip codes

farther from the courthouse had higher nonappearance rates, but in others there was not a

clear relationship (see Figure 2). When stakeholders evaluated their own county maps, they

suggested that bus routes, neighborhood density, and income levels could all factor into the

variation.

Orange

15%

Robeson

35%

New Hanover

15%

35%

Key Findings 8

Figure 2

Nonappearance rates vary by zip code.

Nonappearance rates by in-county zip code, criminal cases served in Robeson,

Orange, and New Hanover Counties, 2015-2020.

Source: UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab North Carolina Criminal Information System.

Type of Cases

Court appearance rates varied by type of case. Traffic misdemeanors had the highest

nonappearance rates statewide, with about 1 in 5 individuals missing court at some point

before case resolution. Missed appearances were less likely for other types of misdemeanors,

occurring in about 1 in 10 non-traffic misdemeanor cases. Felonies had the lowest

nonappearance rates at 1 in 20.

Traffic misdemeanors make up about two thirds of criminal cases handled in North Carolina

courts. Their sheer volume coupled with the higher rates of nonappearance meant that 82% of

all missed appearances between 2015 and 2020 were for traffic misdemeanors.

The data did not distinguish people who were released prior to their court date from those held in jail, so all

cases were included when calculating appearance rates. Felonies likely have lower nonappearance rates in part

because individuals facing felony charges are more often held in jail pretrial, ensuring their appearance in court.

Traffic misdemeanors accounted for 82% of all

nonappearances in North Carolina.

17%

10%

18%

30%

43%

Hillsborough

Wilmington

Lumberton

Fairmont

St. Pauls

Red Springs

Pembroke

Maxton

Key Findings 9

The most common offense for which people missed court was Driving While License Revoked

where the underlying revocation was not for impaired driving.

Expired Registration and

Speeding rounded out the top three and together accounted for about half of all

nonappearances statewide (see Figure 3).

Figure 3

Most common nonappearances were for driving-related

offenses.

Nonappearances by offense for North Carolina criminal cases served, 2015-2020.

Rank Top 10 offenses by nonappearance

1 Driving While License Revoked – Not Impaired Revocation

2 Expired Registration Card or Tag

3 Speeding

4 No Operator’s License

5 Operating a Vehicle with No Insurance

6 Fictitious or Altered Title or Registration Car or Tag

7 Misdemeanor Larceny

8 Driving or Allowing Driving with No Registration

9 Cancelled, Revoked, or Suspended Certified Tag

10 Reckless Driving to Endanger

Note: If a case included multiple offenses, the most serious offense was used for analysis.

Source: UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab North Carolina Criminal Information System.

Traffic misdemeanors include a variety of motor vehicle offenses with a broad range of public

safety implications. To better understand this key contributor to nonappearances, project staff

classified traffic misdemeanors into three subgroups:

Because a failure to appear can result in license revocation, a missed appearance for Driving While License

Revoked often reflects a situation where a person has some history of failure to appear in court. See analysis on

pages 13 and 14.

Key Findings 10

• DWI-related: Offenses related to driving while impaired.

• Administrative: Offenses that involve operating a vehicle with improper licensing,

registration, or other paperwork.

• Moving: Offenses related to unsafe driving behavior, such as speeding and reckless

driving.

Broken out in this manner, the data showed court nonappearances were primarily for

administrative offenses such as driving with expired tags or with a revoked license unrelated

to impaired driving. Administrative traffic charges accounted for 76% of all nonappearances in

traffic misdemeanor cases, with moving offenses representing 20%, and DWI-related offenses

making up only 4%.

Missed court dates also occurred in non-traffic misdemeanor cases. About 1 in 7 misdemeanor

larceny cases had a missed court date, making that the top non-traffic offense for

nonappearance. Other common non-traffic misdemeanors, like marijuana possession up to ½

ounce, drug paraphernalia charges, and second-degree trespassing, had missed court dates

in about 1 in 8 cases.

Demographics

Even for similar types of cases, nonappearance rates differed by demographics. Younger

people missed court most often, and nonappearance rates steadily declined as people aged.

For example, of people charged with traffic misdemeanors, those in their twenties missed court

in 24% of cases, those in their forties missed court in 18% of cases, and those in their sixties

missed court in 11% of cases (see Figure 4). The typical person who misses court is a young

person charged with a traffic misdemeanor. This trend may reflect differences by age group in

ability to take time away from work or in housing stability. Or it may signal a need to reach

younger court users more effectively through different means of communication.

Figure 4

Younger people have higher rates of missing court.

Nonappearance rates by age, all criminal cases in North Carolina, 2015-2020.

Source: UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab North Carolina Criminal Information System.

Nonappearance rates began to rise at age 80, but this group made up less than 1% of cases.

Of defendants

in their twenties

2 in 10

missed court.

Of defendants

in their sixties

1 in 10

missed court.

Key Findings 11

Court appearance rates also differed by race and ethnicity, which may suggest that some

groups face more significant barriers to appearance, hold different assumptions about the

consequences of nonappearance, or have different levels of confidence that the court process

will be fair. Black people, for example, made up 22% of the state’s population, 40% of criminal

cases served, and 49% of missed court appearances (see Figure 5). This pattern is more

pronounced in some counties and less in others but persists in most jurisdictions across the

state.

Figure 5

Racial differences exist in both cases served and

nonappearance rates.

North Carolina resident population by race, 2020; North Carolina criminal cases and

nonappearances by race, 2015-2020.

Sources: UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab North Carolina Criminal Information System;

U.S. Census Bureau population data, 2020.

Case Length

It can take months or even years to resolve a case. The case’s complexity may have the biggest

impact on disposition time, but even non-complex cases can experience numerous delays or

continuances before resolution, increasing the opportunities for a person to fail to appear.

The longer a case takes to resolve, the more likely it is that the person charged will miss an

appearance. This trend is particularly pronounced among non-traffic misdemeanors. The

majority of North Carolina’s non-traffic misdemeanor cases moved through the court system in

six months or less, and the nonappearance rate for those cases was 7%. Among the smaller

number of non-traffic misdemeanor cases that took 12 to 18 months to resolve, the

nonappearance rate jumped to just over 20% (see Figure 6).

White Black Hispanic Asian Native American

Key Findings 12

Without greater detail available in the data, it is difficult to distinguish if the nonappearance

was the cause or the effect in this pattern. Did cases take longer to resolve because people

missed court? Or did longer cases require multiple appearances, making it more challenging

for people to attend each required hearing? Based on their experiences, project teams

believed both situations routinely occurred and contributed to the higher nonappearance

rates for cases with longer resolution times.

Figure 6

Cases that take longer to resolve have higher

nonappearance rates.

Nonappearance rate by case length for non-traffic misdemeanors in North Carolina,

2015-2020.

Note: Includes only cases with trial dates within 18 months of service date in district court.

Source: UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab North Carolina Criminal Information System.

What are the consequences of a missed

appearance?

The full impact of a missed court appearance is difficult to quantify. The repercussions depend

on the type of case, the individual's circumstances, local policy, and discretion of local system

actors. A missed appearance could result in a driver’s license suspension, an additional fine,

Number of cases

Months from service until trial

Nonappearance rate

Key Findings 13

an order for arrest, and potential jail time.

Any witnesses, victims, or family members who show

up for court when the person charged fails to appear also experience disruption in their lives

and work schedules, which may erode their confidence in the justice system.

There are repercussions for court actors as well. To reschedule a case, issue and serve an order

for arrest, contact a person who missed court, or take other steps to resolve a nonappearance

requires additional time from clerks, lawyers, magistrates, judges, and law enforcement. Clerks

in particular carry additional work in pulling case files and rescheduling hearings following

missed appearances.

Project teams were able to measure two key consequences of failures to appear using state

and local data: driver’s license suspensions and jail admissions.

Driver’s License Suspensions

State law requires the Division of Motor Vehicles to revoke the license of an individual who fails

to appear for a hearing on a motor vehicle offense.

The statute imposes the same penalty for

failure to pay certain fines and fees.

Most commonly, these nonappearances occur in cases

that are unrelated to dangerous driving, like having an expired registration tag.

Researchers at Duke University School of Law analyzed North Carolina data on license

suspensions and found that more than one million people had active driver’s license

suspensions in the state in 2018. The vast majority of those suspensions, more than 800,000,

were solely for missing court.

Failure to appear alone prevents 1 in 10 driving-age North Carolinians from driving. In Orange

and New Hanover Counties the rate is also 1 in 10, and in Robeson County it is larger, at 1 in 4

(see Figure 7). Robeson County team members shared that because their rural county does

not have a regular bus service, transportation is a major obstacle for getting to court.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-24.1; N.C. Gen. Stat. § 15A-305. Note that North Carolina statute refers to license

“revocation” for a missed court appearance, but literature and existing research often refer to license

“suspension.” The terms are used interchangeably in this report.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-24.1; N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-24.2.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-24.1.

More than 800,000 driver’s licenses are suspended in

North Carolina solely for missing court.

Key Findings 14

Figure 7

Failure to appear alone prevented 1 in 10 North Carolinians

from driving.

Active license suspensions for failure to appear cases only as share of driving age

population by county, 2018.

Note: Driver’s license suspensions for failure to appear and failure to comply cases prevent 1 in 7 driving-age North

Carolinians from driving. Source: “Driver’s License Suspension in North Carolina,” Wilson Center for Science and

Justice, Duke University School of Law (2019).

A license suspension and the underlying motor vehicle offense incur many potential costs that

can add up to several hundred dollars, some that can be waived by the courts and some that

cannot. Potential costs include: a fine for the underlying traffic offense between $5 and $500,

court costs of $176,

an insurance premium increase of 30% to 340%,

a failure to appear fee

of $200,

and license restoration and service fees of $120.

Individuals charged with certain

misdemeanors that are ineligible for jail time, including many common traffic offenses, are

typically not provided with court appointed counsel even if indigent, and may therefore find it

difficult to understand these and other consequences of failing to appear.

“Traffic Offenses for Which Court Appearance May Be Waived,” North Carolina Administrative Office of the

Courts (2020). https://www.nccourts.gov/assets/documents/publications/waiver-list-traffic-waiver-2020.pdf.

“Court Costs and Fees Chart,” North Carolina Judicial Branch (2020).

https://www.nccourts.gov/assets/documents/publications/2020-criminal-costs-chart.pdf.

“A Consumer’s Guide to Automobile Insurance,” North Carolina Department of Insurance (2019).

https://files.nc.gov/doi/documents/consumer/publications/consumer-guide-to-automobile-insurance_cau1.pdf

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-304(a)(6).

“Driver License Restoration,” North Carolina Department of Transportation (2021).

https://www.ncdot.gov/dmv/license-id/license-suspension/Pages/driver-license-restoration.aspx.

36%

Robeson

25%

Orange

10%

New Hanover

Key Findings 15

Orders for Arrest

State law allows orders for arrest (OFAs) for anyone who fails to appear at a court hearing in a

criminal case, even if the original charge is ineligible for a jail sentence.

To gauge the extent

to which missed court appearances were leading to jail bookings, project staff analyzed jail

data provided by Orange and New Hanover Counties covering bookings from January 1, 2019

through June 30, 2021. While multiple reasons could be associated with a single jail booking

(e.g., a person could be arrested for shoplifting and also have an outstanding OFA for failing

to appear in another case), about 1 in 6 bookings into the New Hanover jail and 1 in 7 bookings

into the Orange County jail were solely attributable to failure to appear (see Figure 8).

Figure 8

Some people were jailed solely for missing court.

Share of jail bookings by reason for booking, New Hanover and Orange Counties,

2019-2021.

Source: New Hanover County and Orange County jail data.

Additionally, bookings solely for failing to appear on a misdemeanor outnumbered all other

reasons or charges associated with jail booking (see Figure 9). Driving while impaired and

probation violations were other common reasons for booking.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 15A-305.

Key Findings 16

Figure 9

Missing misdemeanor court dates was the most common

reason people went to jail.

Jail bookings by reason for admission, New Hanover and Orange Counties, 2019-

2021.

Orange County

Rank Most Common Reasons for Jail Booking

1 OFA for Failing to Appear on a Misdemeanor

2 Assault on a Female

3 Driving While Impaired

New Hanover County

Rank Most Common Reasons for Jail Booking

1 OFA for Failing to Appear on a Misdemeanor

2 Driving While Impaired

3 Probation Violation on a Felony

Note: Multiple reasons may be associated with a single booking. OFA for failure to appear was only counted if it

was the sole reason identified at booking. Source: New Hanover County and Orange County jail data.

Individuals booked solely for failing to appear tended to have shorter lengths of stay compared

to those booked for other reasons. Most people booked only for an OFA for failure to appear

were released within 24 hours and only 1 in 10 stayed in jail longer than a week.

Because of these relatively short lengths of stay, people arrested for failing to appear did not

comprise a large share of the jail population on any given day, but they remained a substantial

contributor to jail bookings, consuming law enforcement time and resources. Research has

found that it can take North Carolina police officers about two to four hours to make an arrest,

a significant drain on resources that pulls police officers away from other patrol and public

safety priorities.

Reported time is for warrantless arrests in misdemeanor incidents. See Smith, J., Desmarais, S.L., McKinsey, E., &

Rex, E. (2021). The Citation Project: First Report. UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab.

https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/19452/2021/07/Citation-Project-Report-1-Final.pdf.

Policy Solutions at a Glance 17

Policy Solutions at a Glance

Steps to Increase Court Appearance

New

Hanover

Orange Robeson

Improve text message reminders for court

Design law enforcement “palm cards” with helpful

links and information

Offer support with transportation to court

Reduce wait times for hearings with block scheduling

Formalize and expand options for remote or virtual

participation in court

Launch diversity and inclusion initiatives to foster

community trust

Set benchmarks for reducing disposition times and

continuances

Better Response

s to Nonappearance

New

Hanover

Orange Robeson

Implement walk-in hours for people to resolve missed

court appearances

Reduce unnecessary orders for arrest through a

nonappearance bench card

Implement a grace period before issuing some orders

for arrest

Provide driver’s license restoration support

Partner with service providers to help high-needs

populations get to court

State

-Level Recommendations

Joint Recommendation

Stop revoking driving privileges for missed court

dates

Eliminate mandatory bond doubling statute

Expand access to state’s criminal justice database with

nonappearance history and jail custody status

Simplify forms given to people charged with crimes by

law enforcement and courts

Indicates new or improved policies prioritized in the project.

Indicates pre-existing initiatives.

New Hanover Policy Solutions 18

Policy Solutions by County

New Hanover County

New Hanover County is an urban center located on North Carolina’s coast. The county seat,

Wilmington, is the state’s eighth largest city.

The county is home to 226,000 people, with 10%

living below the poverty line.

Each year, New

Hanover courts process between 25,000 and

30,000 criminal cases, with a nonappearance rate

of 15%, near the statewide average of 16%.

Since 2016, the county’s Criminal Justice

Advisory Group, which consists of stakeholders

from across the local justice system and county

government, has met regularly to take on significant issues affecting the community, such as

gang violence and the opioid epidemic. In 2021, many of these same stakeholders came

together as part of the Court Appearance Project. The project team sought to create more

efficient court calendars and case processing, ensure courts are more accessible and easier to

navigate, and reduce the burden on law enforcement resources to enforce court appearance.

The New Hanover County Clerk’s Office was unable to participate in the Court Appearance

Project because of staffing and workload challenges. The project team will seek to implement

the following solutions, making adjustments as needed in coordination with the clerk’s office

to ensure feasibility for their staff and to address any additional issues identified by that office.

Solution 1: Court Reminders

Increase enrollment in automated text messages reminding people of their

court dates.

Doctors’ offices, hair salons, and other businesses commonly use text or phone call messages

to remind clients of upcoming appointments. In recent years, courts have followed suit, and

reminders have successfully increased appearance rates across many jurisdictions.

The New

Hanover County Public Defender’s Office was one of the first public defender’s offices in the

state to pilot software from Uptrust that provides a platform for attorneys to communicate more

efficiently with their clients and sends tailored text message reminders about upcoming court

dates.

The North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) launched a text and email

reminder service for all courts in North Carolina in 2018. Since then, enrollment has been

relatively low across the state. Despite the tens of thousands of cases that are handled by New

“North Carolina Cities by Population,” North Carolina Demographics by Cubit (2022).

https://www.northcarolina-demographics.com/cities_by_population.

“QuickFacts: New Hanover County, North Carolina,” United States Census Bureau (2021).

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/newhanovercountynorthcarolina.

Hatton, R. (2020). Research on the Effectiveness of Pretrial Court Date Reminder Systems. UNC School of

Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2020/03/Court-Date-Notifications-Briefing-Paper.pdf.

See https://uptrust.co/how-it-works/.

New Hanover Policy Solutions 19

Hanover County courts each year, only 1,100 people were enrolled in AOC reminders for New

Hanover County cases by 2021.

To increase appearance rates among people not

represented by the Public Defenders’ Office, stakeholders will better publicize the AOC text

reminder service using information cards and posters.

How It Works

Justice system practitioners will distribute wallet-sized cards with clear and simple information

about the free AOC text reminder service to individuals charged with crimes and members of

the public and will post signs throughout the courthouse advertising the available service. The

card and poster both feature a QR code to easily allow people to enroll in reminders using

their mobile device (see reminder card below and poster on page 24).

Stakeholders across the local justice system, including defense counsel, jail staff, magistrates,

assistant district attorneys, pretrial services, and law enforcement will be provided with cards

to hand out at court proceedings and elsewhere. The back of the card will remain blank to

allow stakeholders to share additional, individualized information (such as defense counsel’s

name and contact information) with the person if necessary.

Mock-up of Reminder Card

Solution 2: Virtual Court

Use remote appearance for people who have difficulty traveling to the

courthouse.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual court (in which the person charged appears at a

proceeding remotely by video), has become more common in North Carolina.

Allowing

individuals to take part in court hearings remotely removes potential barriers to appearance,

such as travel, missed work, or family obligations. Like many practitioners throughout the

country, New Hanover County stakeholders made use of remote appearance as a public health

measure. Now, stakeholders will formalize the use of remote appearance as a tool to expand

access to court for people facing charges who might otherwise have challenges attending

court in-person.

Enrollment figures are as of 8/6/2021, provided by the Administrative Office of the Courts.

Clarke, S.E.D. & Smith, J. (2021). Virtual Court Proceedings In North Carolina: Adapting to a Global Pandemic.

UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2021/03/Virtual-Courts-Findings-Report-FINAL-3.15.2021docx.pdf.

New Hanover Policy Solutions 20

How It Works

District and Superior Court will adopt different virtual court policies, tailored to each court’s

cases and procedures. Both policies will ensure that defendant’s Sixth Amendment rights are

protected. In District Court, where the bulk of nonappearance occur, virtual appearance is

allowed via Webex for any matter except pleas, trials, evidentiary hearings, and probation

matters. In Superior Court, where charges are often more serious, individuals charged with

crimes will be allowed to appear virtually via Webex for first appearances, status hearings, and

proceedings relating to problems with attorney-client representation, excluding waivers of

counsel. In all cases, individuals and their attorneys should coordinate with the court to request

a virtual appearance and ensure access to the necessary technology. The courts will accept a

verbal waiver of an individual’s right to appear in person, as long as the court is satisfied that

the waiver is knowing, intelligent, and voluntary.

Solution 3: Reduced Time to Disposition

Shorten case resolution time to reduce opportunities for nonappearance.

Resolving cases efficiently creates more manageable caseloads for defense attorneys and

prosecutors and also may reduce the likelihood of nonappearances. The longer a case remains

open in North Carolina, the more likely a person will fail to appear. For non-traffic

misdemeanors, for example, nonappearance rates for cases that took six months to resolve

were twice as high as for cases resolved in three months.

Disposing of cases more quickly

could have the added benefit of improving appearance rates.

New Hanover County stakeholders recognize that reducing case disposition times requires a

careful review of state and local procedures, statutory time periods, constitutional protections,

county resources, and other factors, and thus cannot be resolved quickly. County leaders will

continue this work, exploring opportunities in policy and practice to minimize unnecessary

hearings and reach timely case resolutions while protecting constitutional rights.

Solution 4: Walk-In Hours

Provide a time for people who missed court to resolve their nonappearances.

People may fail to appear at court because of conflicts with work, illness, or simply forgetting,

reasons that are unrelated to evading justice.

Stakeholders believe that individuals should

have a straightforward opportunity to resolve scheduling conflicts or accidentally missed court

appointments. As an area for future work, the team aims to establish regular and accessible

walk-in hours to provide a set time each week for people to appear voluntarily and address

their case. Staffing shortages in the Clerk’s Office and technological limitations that require the

movement of a physical case file for each individual appearing in court are obstacles to

A charged individual must be able to communicate fully and confidentially with counsel (if represented), per

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-49.6(b), and, except as otherwise permitted by law, when the right to confront witnesses or to

be present is implicated, the court may not proceed with the virtual proceeding unless it has obtained a knowing,

voluntary, and intelligent waiver of those rights, per N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-49.6(e).

See analysis on pages 11 and 12.

See Mahoney, B., et al. (2001). Pretrial Services Programs: Responsibilities and Potential. National Institute of

Justice, U.S. Department of Justice. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/181939.pdf; Bornstein, BH., Tomkins, A.J., &

Neeley, E.M. (2011). Reducing Courts’ Failure to Appear Rate: A Procedural Justice Approach, Report submitted to

the U.S. Department of Justice. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/234370.pdf.

New Hanover Policy Solutions 21

immediately implementing this policy. However, North Carolina is moving toward electronic

case management through the Odyssey platform,

which could make walk-in hours more

feasible to implement in the future.

Solution 5: Fewer Unnecessary Orders for Arrest

Adopt a bench card to standardize when nonappearance should result in

arrest.

Currently, individuals who fail to appear in court often receive an order for arrest (OFA), and

failure to appear is the most common reason for booking into the New Hanover County jail.

Almost 1 in 5 bookings are the result of a court nonappearance.

County stakeholders

recognized that not every missed appearance requires such a response.

Stakeholders will implement a structured decision-making tool, called a bench card, to guide

judicial officials in responding to nonappearances. This includes providing recommendations

for distinguishing which instances of nonappearance should justify custodial arrests and

standardizing the use of arrest alternatives, authorized by an administrative order. The changes

will reduce the burden on court clerks issuing OFAs and law enforcement serving them.

How It Works

A nonappearance bench card recommends factors that judges should consider when deciding

whether to issue an OFA for a nonappearance and what conditions of release to impose. If the

person has good cause for missing court, is charged with a misdemeanor and has not

previously failed to appear, or is charged with the lowest level misdemeanor,

the bench card

will recommend that the person’s court date be reset without issuance of an OFA. If the court

determines that an OFA is necessary, the judge will set conditions of release in the OFA, in

consultation with defense counsel and the assistant district attorney, to avoid mandatory

operation of the bond doubling statute. Judicial officials retain discretion to override the bench

card’s recommendations.

In recognition that the highest rates of nonappearance are for traffic misdemeanors,

New

Hanover County’s bench card will recommend against using an OFA for any case set during

administrative traffic court, which includes the least serious cases. To further reduce collateral

consequences for missed appearances in traffic cases, the bench card will also recommend

resetting the case without entry of a failure to appear (FTA) for a first missed appearance in

administrative traffic court. An FTA on a traffic offense results in a driver’s license suspension,

which can have serious and compounding consequences.

See “eCourts,” North Carolina Judicial Branch (2022). https://www.nccourts.gov/ecourts.

See analysis on pages 15 and 16.

Class 3 misdemeanors in North Carolina are minor offenses not likely to result in incarceration, so New Hanover

County’s bench card will recommend against issuance of an OFA for a nonappearance on a Class 3 misdemeanor.

See analysis on pages 8 to 10.

See analysis on pages 13 and 14.

New Hanover Policy Solutions 22

Solution 6: Driver’s License Restoration

Cancel old unpaid fines and fees to provide relief for thousands of people

with revoked licenses, and proactively assess ability to pay moving forward.

North Carolina law requires the Division of Motor Vehicles to revoke a person’s license when

they have failed to appear for a court hearing on a motor vehicle offense.

In New Hanover, 1

in 10 driving-age residents is unable to drive because of a license revocation for failing to

appear in court.

Without a valid driver’s license, people may find it even more challenging to

get to court, keep their job, or maintain other family and community responsibilities.

The team identified costly fines and fees as a reason why people fail to appear in court initially

and an obstacle to restoring their driver’s licenses even after their cases are resolved. To

address this barrier, stakeholders will periodically review cases and waive fines and fees for

cases that do not pose a public safety risk but where those monetary obligations are preventing

license restoration. On the front end, stakeholders will implement a process for assessing

ability to pay before fines and fees are imposed, to avoid licensing issues down the line.

How It Works

The district attorney and court will periodically conduct a review of cases with outstanding fines

and fees, including those resulting from failure to appear, that are preventing people from

getting their driver’s licenses restored. The court will waive fines and fees that are past a certain

age, where it is clear that the person does not have an ability to pay and there are no other

public safety concerns. Court leaders also will examine the process for assessing ability to pay

before the imposition of fines and fees in traffic court, partnering with the state’s Equal Access

to Justice Commission for support.

Solution 7: Support for High-Needs Individuals

Partner with service providers to help people who face extra barriers in

getting to court.

While resolving a case can be challenging for anyone, those with additional hardships face an

uphill battle in getting to court. Individuals experiencing homelessness or others without a

permanent physical address may not be aware of the time and location of their court date.

Those with developmental disabilities or mental illness may not understand the importance of

being present in court or how to navigate getting to court.

Local service organizations in New Hanover have built deep roots and relationships with the

county’s vulnerable residents. These organizations are often the best point of contact for high-

needs populations and have a familiarity and level of trust with court-involved individuals not

found elsewhere. Court leaders will hold a series of meetings with established service

organizations to discuss ways to partner in support of high-needs individuals who face criminal

charges, including assisting them with court reminders and transportation to court.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-24.1.

See analysis on pages 13 and 14.

Orange County Policy Solutions 23

Orange County

Orange County is a medium-sized metropolitan county and home to the University of North

Carolina at Chapel Hill, a large campus of the state’s public university system.

The county is

home to 149,000 residents, with 10% living below the poverty line.

Each year, Orange County

courts process between 13,000 and 18,000 cases, with a nonappearance rate of 15%, near the

state average (16%).

Orange County’s Justice Advisory

Council meets regularly to address

system needs and had already taken

on several large-scale reform efforts

prior to the Court Appearance Project,

including making changes to bail and

pretrial practices, implementing

coordinated diversion programs, and

establishing access to legal and

financial assistance for charged individuals. Among other motivations, the project team was

driven to improve court appearance policies to make court calendars and case processing

more efficient, improve the experiences of individual court users, and increase perceptions of

the court system as fair, effective, and innovative. Orange County will implement the following

policy solutions.

Solution 1: Court Reminders

Maximize use of automated text messages to prompt defendants about their

court dates.

Research consistently finds that court reminders lead to increases in appearance rates.

The

North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) created a statewide automated

reminder system in 2018, giving individuals the opportunity to sign up for text message

reminders about their upcoming court dates. However, the system is underutilized – Orange

County criminal courts process thousands of cases each year, but fewer than 600 people had

signed up for reminders in Orange County cases as of 2021.

Stakeholders determined that a

lack of public awareness about the service and unwieldy enrollment functionality both

contribute to this low uptake.

To leverage the benefits of text message reminders, the Orange County team will better

publicize the AOC court-date reminder service through palm cards (see page 25) and posters

(see page 24) in the courthouse and on public transportation systems. They will also adopt

“Census Reporter Profile page for Orange County, NC: American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates,” United

States Census Bureau (2020). http://censusreporter.org/profiles/05000US37135-orange-county-nc/.

“QuickFacts: Orange County, North Carolina,” United States Census Bureau (2021).

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/orangecountynorthcarolina.

Hatton, R. (2020). Research on the Effectiveness of Pretrial Court Date Reminder Systems. UNC School of

Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2020/03/Court-Date-Notifications-Briefing-Paper.pdf.

Enrollment figures are as of 8/6/2021, provided by the Administrative Office of the Courts.

Orange County Policy Solutions 24

Uptrust, a more versatile text reminder and communication service in the public defender’s

office, to support attorney-client communication.

Mock-up of Reminder Poster

North Carolina Indigent Defense Services is finalizing a contract with Uptrust to provide text-based

communication software to public defender’s offices across the state. The Orange-Chatham judicial district has

been prioritized for the next phase of rolling out the software.

Orange County Policy Solutions 25

Solution 2: User-Friendly Court Communication

Establish a hotline and distribute wallet-sized “palm cards” with easy-to-

understand information about getting to court.

Navigating the court system can be challenging. For example, although the criminal citation

form contains necessary case and appearance information, the form is two pages long and is

densely packed with other information. The North Carolina judicial branch website offers

guidance on how to handle cases, but answers to many common questions depend on the

specifics of each local court and are written at a grade level higher than experts recommend

for a general audience.

Research has found that

making information about

appearing in court easier to

understand can help

improve court appearance,

and courts are advised to

adopt plain language when

communicating with the

public.

To help make the

courts more user-friendly

and ensure that individuals

charged with crimes and

other court users have the

information they need,

Orange County will

implement two strategies:

wallet-sized “palm cards”

with clear, simple, and

concise information about

appearing in court; and a

Help Hotline to give the

public a one-stop resource

to get their questions

answered.

See “Traffic Violations,” North Carolina Judicial Branch (2022). www.nccourts.gov/help-topics/traffic-and-

vehicles/traffic-violations. Reading levels determined by OpenAdvocate’s WriteClearly software, see

www.openadvocate.org/writeclearly.

Cook, B., et al. (2018). Using Behavioral Science to Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes: Preventing Failures to

Appear in Court. University of Chicago Crime Lab & Ideas42. https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-

content/uploads/2018/01/crim-just-report.pdf.

Roberts, A. & Zamora, A. (2019). Plain Language Guide: How to Incorporate Plain Language into Court Forms,

Websites, and Other Materials. National Association for Court Management. https://nacmnet.org/wp-

content/uploads/NACM-Plain-Language-Guide-20190107.pdf.

Mock-up of Palm Card

Orange County Policy Solutions 26

How It Works

Palm cards with the Help Hotline number and other resources will be distributed by law

enforcement when issuing citations and given out as needed by other system practitioners,

such as clerks, magistrates, and jail staff (see palm card on page 25).

The Help Hotline will be staffed during business hours by the Criminal Justice Resource

Department (CJRD).

In addition to answering questions, staff will further publicize existing

resources mentioned on the palm card, including text reminders, license restoration services,

transportation support through a CJRD-maintained ride-share account, and information about

how to handle a case online. Accompanying the Help Hotline, CJRD will create a page on their

website to answer frequently asked question about appearing in court and available resources.

Solution 3: Narrower Court Hearing Windows

Use block scheduling to reduce the amount of time people wait for their cases

to be called.

Even though individual hearings are often quite short, people facing charges and those

involved in hearings as witnesses and victims often spend hours waiting for a case to be called,

causing significant disruption to work and family obligations. In order to reduce the burden of

court appearance on both the public and practitioners, Orange County will schedule hearings

in shorter blocks rather than having full morning or afternoon sessions with a long list of cases

to be called one at a time. The implementation of block scheduling will provide more clarity

for people on how much time they should plan to be in court for a hearing and reduce wait

times.

How It Works

Orange County will schedule District Court hearings in 1.5-hour blocks and will group cases

by type of representation. Blocks with private attorneys, public defenders, and unrepresented

people will be staggered for hearings happening concurrently in different courtrooms to

prevent attorneys from being double booked. Court users will receive information about what

time to appear when they receive their hearing notice and will know the process should not

take more than 1.5 hours. This policy will apply to all non-traffic court sessions in District Court,

except for trials and domestic violence court.

Solution 4: Remote Participation in Court

Provide video appearance options for people who have difficulty traveling to

the courthouse.

Following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, remote appearance in court has become

more common in North Carolina.

Allowing individuals to appear remotely via video removes

potential barriers to attending court, such as travel, missed work, or family obligations. Like

CJRD is a branch of the Orange County government that administers a number of programs with the aim of

safely reducing pretrial incarceration, providing jail alternatives and diversion, and improving equity in the

county’s criminal justice system.

Clarke, S.E.D. & Smith, J. (2021). Virtual Court Proceedings In North Carolina: Adapting to a Global Pandemic.

UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2021/03/Virtual-Courts-Findings-Report-FINAL-3.15.2021docx.pdf.

Orange County Policy Solutions 27

many practitioners throughout the country, Orange County courts have made use of remote

appearance as a public health measure during the pandemic. Now, stakeholders intend to

formalize the use of remote appearance as a tool to expand access to court for people facing

criminal charges who might otherwise have challenges attending in-person appearances.

How It Works

District and Superior Court will adopt different remote court policies, tailored to each court’s

cases and procedures. Both policies will ensure that Sixth Amendment rights are protected. In

District Court, an individual charged with a crime may choose to appear remotely for first

appearances and pleas scheduled on the designated Webex session, currently held once a

month. Once District Court courtrooms are equipped to conduct hybrid hearings, this policy

will be revised to provide more opportunities for remote appearance. In Superior Court, which

is better equipped with videoconferencing technology, charged individuals may choose to

appear remotely in any proceeding allowed by statute.

In all cases, the courts will accept a verbal waiver of an individual’s right to appear in person,

as long as the court is satisfied that the waiver is knowing, intelligent, and voluntary. Orange

County also will explore providing “satellite locations” for people facing charges who do not

have reliable internet access or technology to appear remotely without travelling to court

through the use of remote kiosks in government buildings.

Solution 5: Community Trust Building

Conduct outreach and hold listening sessions with community members to

gather feedback on their experiences with the court system.

Black residents make up a small percentage of the population in Orange County but account

for more than half of nonappearances.

Contributing to this racial difference may be differing

levels of community trust and confidence in the justice system. In one Nebraska study, for

example, among individuals who received no court reminders, those surveyed as having low

trust in public institutions had nonappearance rates three times higher than those with high

trust.

A survey in North Carolina revealed that Black residents had less confidence in the

fairness of the court system than White residents.

To better understand and address racial differences in court system outcomes, the Orange

County team focused on solutions that would invite feedback and build greater trust with

community members. They will coordinate with Black community leaders to host “Justice

Listening Sessions” across the county to listen to community members’ experiences with the

A charged individual must be able to communicate fully and confidentially with counsel (if represented), per

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-49.6(b), and, except as otherwise permitted by law, when the right to confront witnesses or to

be present is implicated, the court may not proceed with the virtual proceeding unless it has obtained a knowing,

voluntary, and intelligent waiver of those rights, per N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-49.6(e).

Black people make up 12% of the resident population in Orange County, but account for 40% of criminal case

filings and 54% of nonappearances.

Bornstein, BH., Tomkins, A.J., & Neeley, E.M. (2011). Reducing Courts’ Failure to Appear Rate: A Procedural

Justice Approach, Report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice.

https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/234370.pdf.

1 in 3 Black respondents were “not very confident” or “not at all confident” in the North Carolina state courts,

compared to 1 in 5 White respondents. See North Carolina Commission on the Administration of Law & Justice.

(2015). Public Trust & Confidence in the North Carolina State Courts: October – November 2015 Survey Results.

https://www.nccourts.gov/assets/inline-files/public-trust-12-15-15-PTC-Survey-Results.pdf.

Orange County Policy Solutions 28

court system, gather input on measures that would improve court practices, and create a space

for dialogue and understanding.

How It Works

The Justice Listening Sessions will be hosted by a cross-section of court practitioners (judges,

prosecutors, public defenders, and representatives from the Criminal Justice Resource

Department) and will primarily focus on listening to people’s experiences with the court

system, answering their questions, and gathering input on how practices could improve. Some

part of each session also may be informational, with the goal of creating more transparency

about how the courts work and demonstrating the court’s commitment to serving the

community. The project team also may pair this outreach with more formal research on

community experiences with the court system.

The sessions will be developed in partnership with community groups, churches, nonprofits,

and other organizations. They will include focused efforts to engage Black communities.

Additionally, the Orange County team is committed to building trust with all county residents

and may explore holding sessions tailored for students, immigrant populations, and others

who may have unique interactions with and feedback for the courts.

Solution 6: Diversifying Courtroom Staff

Recruit and retain justice system professionals who reflect the racial diversity

of court users.

Stakeholders recognized that coming to court can be intimidating for people who have been

charged with crimes as well as those who have been victimized. Additionally, they reported

that often all or nearly all staff in Orange County courtrooms – judges, attorneys, bailiffs, and

clerks – are White, while more than half of the community members navigating their cases in

court are people of color.

The Orange County project team members acknowledge that the lack of racial diversity among

courtroom staff can affect the public’s confidence and overall perceptions of fairness in the

court system and could make people of color less confident coming to court. To best serve the

community’s needs and meet the judiciary’s goal of administering impartial and timely justice,

Orange County team members committed to enhancing efforts to reflect the racial and ethnic

diversity of the county’s population in courtroom personnel.

How It Works

Each local agency will identify internal strategies for recruitment and retention of a diverse

workforce and will monitor staff demographic data to measure changes over time. Strategies

for recruiting a diverse workforce include:

• Posting open job positions on a wide variety of recruitment websites or job boards,

• Building relationships with local community and affiliation groups, especially those

associated with groups underrepresented in court personnel, and

• Making workforce demographic data available internally and publicly to foster greater

transparency.

Orange County Policy Solutions 29

Solution 7: Faster Case Resolution

Reduce opportunities for nonappearance with reasonable limits on

continuances.

Resolving cases efficiently creates more manageable caseloads for defense attorneys and

prosecutors and may also reduce the number of required appearances. The longer a case

remains open in North Carolina, the more likely that someone facing charges will fail to appear.

For non-traffic misdemeanors, for example, nonappearance rates for cases that took six months

to resolve were twice as high as for cases resolved in three months.

The Orange County team recognized the importance of maintaining reasonable disposition

times and reducing continuances, while allowing people facing charges the time they need to

comply with court programs and conditions. Orange County court leaders will examine their

disposition times and revise local standards for case resolution and continuances by the

summer of 2022.

Solution 8: New Steps Before Ordering an Arrest

Allow a short window of time for a person to correct a missed appearance, and

do not order arrests in cases unlikely to be prosecuted.

Failure to appear in court is the most common reason people go to jail in Orange County.

About 1 in 7 jail bookings are the result of a nonappearance.

Stakeholders agreed that not

every missed appearance requires an order for arrest (OFA), and currently use a

nonappearance bench card to determine when an OFA is appropriate. Orange County courts

also currently maintain a weekly “strike court” session, when individuals with outstanding OFAs

may appear without prior scheduling to request that an OFA be removed, either

administratively (if certain conditions are met) or by appearing before a judge. To provide

further opportunities for individuals to quickly resolve a missed appearance even when an OFA

is recommended, Orange County courts will institute a grace period before the OFA is issued.

Additionally, to avoid the issuance of OFAs in cases unlikely to be prosecuted, the district

attorney’s office will institute a rapid review of cases eligible for an OFA and flag those where

it is clear the case will not likely proceed.

How It Works

When a person fails to appear in court and the judicial official determines that an OFA is

necessary using the existing nonappearance bench card, the assistant district attorney will

review the case, determine whether it is likely that their office intends to pursue the matter, and

if not, recommend against issuing an OFA.

If the prosecutor’s office plans to proceed with the case, the judge will indicate to the clerk

whether to issue the OFA immediately or hold processing of the OFA for two business days, to

allow the person a short window of opportunity to appear and rectify the nonappearance.

Judicial officials retain discretion to issue the OFA immediately if warranted by public safety or

other considerations.

See analysis on pages 11 and 12.

See analysis on pages 15 and 16.

Orange County Policy Solutions 30

Solution 9: Resources for High-Needs Court Users

Offer extra supports for people who face additional barriers to court

appearance.

The Orange County team plans to pursue internal policies and partnerships with local service

providers to increase appearance rates for court users with unique needs, such as people

experiencing homelessness, people with substance use or mental health challenges, people

with intellectual disabilities, and young people. The county will develop and enhance

programs tailored to these higher-needs populations, including diversion, reminders,

transportation, and other supports. They may also consider creating a courthouse navigator

position, someone who can spend time in high-volume courtrooms to answer questions and

connect court users, particularly those with high needs, to resources and services.

Robeson County Policy Solutions 31

Robeson County

Robeson County borders South Carolina and is the state’s largest county by land area.

It is

home to 117,000 people, with 27% living below the poverty line. Robeson County is one of the

nearly 10% of U.S. counties with a population that is a majority people of color – Black, Hispanic,

and Native American residents make up approximately 70% of the population,

including

many from the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina.

Robeson County courts process

between 21,000 and 26,000

criminal court cases annually, with

a nonappearance rate of 35%,

well above the state average

(16%). The most significant

difference in appearance rates in

Robeson County compared with

trends across the state is in traffic

misdemeanor cases. Statewide,

about 1 in 5 traffic misdemeanors involves a failure to appear, but in Robeson County, the

figure is closer to 1 in 2. Robeson County also has one of the highest rates in the state of

residents with a revoked driver’s license because of failure to appear in court or failure to pay

court fines and fees.

Court stakeholders have formed an executive committee that meets regularly to discuss issues

related to criminal justice. The Court Appearance Project team, which has overlapping

membership with the executive committee, identified their county’s large rural area, lack of

public transportation, and high poverty rate as factors that can make it difficult for residents to

get to court. Among other motivations, the project team was driven to improve court

appearance policies to make case processing and court calendars more efficient and courts

more accessible and easier to navigate. They committed to implementing the following policy

solutions.

Solution 1: Court Reminders

Maximize use of automated text messages to prompt people about their court

dates.

Many businesses use text or phone call messages to remind clients of upcoming appointments,

and in the past decade, some courts have followed suit. The North Carolina Administrative

Office of the Courts (AOC) launched a statewide text and email reminder service in 2018. But

despite significant evidence that reminders increase court appearance rates,

there is low

“About Us,” Robeson County, North Carolina – Official Site. https://www.co.robeson.nc.us/.

“QuickFacts: Robeson County, North Carolina,” United States Census Bureau (2020).

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/robesoncountynorthcarolina.

Tippett, R. (2014). “North Carolina’s American Indian and Alaska Native Population.” Carolina Demography –

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. https://www.ncdemography.org/2014/11/17/north-carolinas-american-

indian-and-alaska-native-population/.

Hatton, R. (2020). Research on the Effectiveness of Pretrial Court Date Reminder Systems. UNC School of

Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2020/03/Court-Date-Notifications-Briefing-Paper.pdf.

Robeson County Policy Solutions 32

enrollment in Robeson County and across the state. By 2021, approximately 200 people had

enrolled in the service for Robeson County cases, despite the courts processing thousands of

criminal cases a year.

To increase enrollment and take advantage of the benefits of text message reminders, the

Robeson County team will work to enroll more individuals in the AOC’s notification system,

while also adopting Uptrust, a more versatile text reminder and communication service in the

public defender’s office, that has been recently piloted in other offices in the state.

How It Works

Justice system practitioners will post signs throughout the courthouse advertising the available

service. Information about the text reminder service will also be included on the palm card

handed out by law enforcement and court personnel. The card and poster both feature a QR

code to easily allow people to enroll in reminders using their mobile device (see poster on

page 24 and palm card on page 33).

Solution 2: Share Resources for Getting to Court

Provide simple and clear information about court reminders and

transportation support.

Confusion, forgetting, and lack of transportation are all common reasons for nonappearance.

In Robeson County, stakeholders noted that the county’s large and rural area, lack of regular

public transit, and high rates of driver’s license revocation make transportation to court a

particular challenge. In addition, the county’s higher proportion of people living in poverty

makes communication from the court more difficult – some people do not have a consistent

permanent address to receive court notices, and many parts of the county do not have reliable

internet. To help make the courts more user-friendly and ensure that people have the

information they need, Robeson County will distribute wallet-sized “palm cards” with clear,

concise information about getting to court and brochures describing how to use the county’s

pick-up and drop-off van service.

How It Works

The palm cards will include information about court appearance and consequences for

nonappearances, a link to sign up for text message reminders, and information on

transportation assistance through the South East Area Transit System (SEATS) program, which

offers rides across the county, including to courthouses or Robeson Community College where

traffic court is held, for $2 each way. Because nonappearances are a particularly acute problem

for traffic misdemeanors, the palm cards will be distributed by law enforcement whenever a

citation is issued. Palm cards and more detailed brochures about the SEATS program will be

Enrollment figures are as of 8/6/2021, provided by the Administrative Office of the Courts.

North Carolina Indigent Defense Services is finalizing a contract with Uptrust to provide text-based

communication software to public defender’s offices across the state. Robeson County has been prioritized for the

next phase of rolling out the software.

See Mahoney, B. et al. (2001). Pretrial Services Programs: Responsibilities and Potential. National Institute of

Justice, U.S. Department of Justice. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/181939.pdf; Bornstein, BH., Tomkins, A.J., &

Neeley, E.M. (2011). Reducing Courts’ Failure to Appear Rate: A Procedural Justice Approach, Report submitted to

the U.S. Department of Justice. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/234370.pdf.

Robeson County Policy Solutions 33

provided at a person’s first point of contact with the jail or court. Robeson County also will use

social media to publicize the SEATS program as a means to get to court.

Mock-up of Palm Card

Solution 3: Virtual Court

Allow remote participation for some people with transportation issues or

other barriers to in-person appearance.

Following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual court (where the person charged with

a crime appears remotely by video), has become more common in North Carolina.

Allowing

individuals charged with crimes to appear remotely removes potential barriers to appearance

Clarke, S.E.D. & Smith, J. (2021). Virtual Court Proceedings In North Carolina: Adapting to a Global Pandemic.

UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab. https://cjil.sog.unc.edu/wp-

content/uploads/sites/19452/2021/03/Virtual-Courts-Findings-Report-FINAL-3.15.2021docx.pdf.

Robeson County Policy Solutions 34

such as travel, missed work, or family obligations. Robeson County courts have made use of

remote appearance as a public health measure during the pandemic but have not been able

to use it as widely as some other counties because of technological limitations. Robeson

County intends to formalize the option for people facing charges to use remote appearance in

Superior Court, where there are fewer cases, while working to increase access to virtual court

technology in District Court and improving internet access across the county.

How It Works

Robeson County will allow individuals charged with crimes to appear virtually in Superior Court

proceedings related to first appearances, bond motions, and probation matters and pleas that

will not result in a custodial sentence, unless the court determines that an in-person

appearance is necessary. Robeson County courts also will continue to work with the AOC to

secure more reliable technology and technical support for remote proceedings in District

Court, which deals with many more cases than Superior Court.

Solution 4: Grace Period Before an Arrest is

Ordered

Allow a brief window of time for a person to correct a missed appearance.

Robeson County stakeholders acknowledged that many different reasons can lead someone

to miss court and agreed that not every missed court appearance requires an order for arrest

(OFA). People might be unable to take time off work, be taking care of relatives, or – as the

project team indicated was a major issue in Robeson – they do not have a ride to court. These

individuals still may want to resolve their case, and research has found that a portion of people

will show up at court within a few days of missing court to do so.

When the person returns to

court of their own accord, the clerk and law enforcement have spent unnecessary time issuing,

monitoring, and recalling the OFA. To reduce that additional labor and allow people an

opportunity to remedy a missed court appearance, Robeson County will implement a grace

period after someone misses court before an OFA is issued.

How It Works

If the court determines that an OFA is necessary after a nonappearance, the judge will indicate

to the clerk whether to issue the OFA immediately or hold processing of the OFA for two

business days, to allow the person a short window of opportunity to appear and rectify the

nonappearance. Judicial officials retain discretion to issue the OFA immediately if warranted

by public safety or other considerations.

A charged individual must be able to communicate fully and confidentially with counsel (if represented), per

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-49.6(b), and, except as otherwise permitted by law, when the right to confront witnesses or to

be present is implicated, the court may not proceed with the virtual proceeding unless it has obtained a knowing,

voluntary, and intelligent waiver of those rights, per N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-49.6(e).

Jones, M.R., Schnacke, T.R., & Wilderman, D.M. (2012). “Increasing Court-Appearance Rates and Other Benefits

of Live-Caller Telephone Court-Date Reminders: The Jefferson County, Colorado, FTA Pilot Project and Resulting

Court Date Notification Program.” Court Review: The Journal of the American Judges Association. 393.

https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1396&context=ajacourtreview.

Robeson County Policy Solutions 35

Solution 5: Driver’s License Restoration

Cancel old unpaid fines and fees to provide relief for thousands of people

with revoked licenses, and proactively assess ability to pay moving forward.

1 in 4 driving-age residents of Robeson County is unable to drive because of a license

suspension related to failure to appear in court.

Project team members acknowledge that

rather than serving as an incentive to appear for scheduled hearings, the policy of suspending

licenses has instead become a large-scale barrier not just to future court appearances, but also

to employment, family responsibilities, and long-term stability. To address this problem,

Robeson County project team members have committed to periodic large-scale fee waivers,

to help remove the primary barrier to license restoration for people with old, unresolved

nonappearances and outstanding fines and costs. They also will implement new practices to

assess ability to pay before fines and fees are ordered in traffic cases.

How It Works

The district attorney and court will periodically conduct a review of cases with outstanding fines

and fees, including those resulting from failure to appear in court, that are preventing people

from getting their driver’s licenses restored. The court will waive fines and fees that are past a

certain age, where it is clear that the person does not have an ability to pay and there are no

other public safety concerns. Court leaders also will examine the process for assessing ability

to pay before the imposition of fines and fees in traffic court, partnering with the state’s Equal

Access to Justice Commission for support. The Commission also will assist the county in

retaining funding for temporary court clerk staff resources needed to implement the license

restoration initiative.

See analysis on pages 13 and 14.

State-Level Changes 36

State-Level Changes

While project teams primarily focused on changes to local policy and practices, they also

identified state-level changes that would increase appearance rates and reduce unnecessary

collateral consequences for court users.

Recommendation 1: Stop Revoking Driving

Privileges for Missed Court Dates

End automatic license revocation in state law for court nonappearance and

unpaid debts.

Under existing law, the North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicles must revoke a person’s

driver’s license upon receiving notice that the person was charged with a motor vehicle offense

and failed to appear when the case was called for trial or hearing.

As of 2018, there were 1.2

million driver’s license revocations in North Carolina, mostly for court nonappearance.

While the project teams believe that license revocation is appropriate for reasons related to

road safety, they recommend ending the practice of revoking driver’s licenses because of

failure to appear and failure to pay fines and fees. They further recommend that this statutory

change be retroactive, with notice to drivers and without requiring the payment of restoration

fees. At the same time, the project teams acknowledge the need for appropriate remedies for

willful non-appearance and non-compliance. The Orange County team further recommends

that the Chief Justice form a workgroup and charge it with developing proposed legislation

and model court practices to accomplish these ends.

Recommendation 2: Restore Discretion to Set

Individualized Bail Following a Failure to Appear

Amend the state law mandating that a financial bond be doubled following a

missed appearance.

Currently, when a judicial official is imposing conditions of pretrial release for someone who

has been arrested for failure to appear, and conditions have not been preset by a judge, the

judicial official must set a secured bond at least double that of the most recent previous

secured or unsecured bond for the charges. If no bond has yet been set in the case, the judicial

official must impose a secured bond of at least $1,000.

The project teams support giving judicial officials the discretion to set conditions based on an

individualized determination of the case and circumstances of the nonappearance. Project

teams also believe that magistrates should be required to adhere to conditions set by judges

in orders for arrest (OFAs). They thus recommend that state law be amended to (1) make bond

doubling permissive rather than mandatory, and (2) require that magistrates impose

conditions set by judges in OFAs rather than allowing magistrates to impose more stringent

conditions.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-24.1(a).

See analysis on pages 13 and 14.

N.C. Gen. Stat. § 15A-534(d1).

State-Level Changes 37

Recommendation 3: Expand Access to the

State’s Criminal Justice Database

Give more court practitioners the authority to see a person’s failure to appear

history and their location in other county jails.

The Criminal Justice Law Enforcement Automated Data Services (CJLEADS) is a centralized

database that integrates criminal justice data, such as warrants, jail status, court records, prison

records, probation and parole status, sex offender registration, and Division of Motor Vehicle

records. The information contained in CJLEADS is sensitive and understandably restricted.

However, project teams believe that responsibly expanding access to CJLEADS to other

specific stakeholders will allow for more informed and effective decision-making and reduce

instances of unwarranted orders for arrest.

Formulating the most appropriate responses to missed court dates requires that all relevant

actors have access to all relevant information. The project teams thus recommend that

CJLEADS access be expanded to public defenders and county pretrial services agencies and

that all court users have access to all failure to appear information. This change may require

legislation.

Recommendation 4: Simplify Forms

Make court paperwork more accessible, practical, and easy to read.

Citations, summonses, and conditions of release and release order forms currently provided

to individuals charged with crimes are densely written, with small font and confusing legal

jargon. Research shows that simplifying forms to use clear, concise language, prominently

displaying the relevant date, time, and location for the court proceeding, and identifying

consequences can reduce instances of nonappearance.

The project teams recommend that the Administrative Office of the Courts further consider the

simplicity and design of state-level documents, including citations, summonses, and conditions

of release and release order forms, to make them easier to read and understand. In addition

to simplifying forms, project teams recommend, if deemed allowable under current law,

including a space for the cell phone number of the person charged on each form. Being

mindful of appropriate privacy protections, this would significantly improve the court’s ability

to communicate efficiently with charged individuals.

Cook, B., et al. (2018). Using Behavioral Science to Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes: Preventing Failures to

Appear in Court. University of Chicago Crime Lab & Ideas42. https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-

content/uploads/2018/01/crim-just-report.pdf.

Appendices 38

Appendix A

Methodology and References

This report primarily references data from North Carolina courts, but also includes analysis of

data pertaining to jail admissions, county resident populations, and driver’s license

suspensions.

Court data

The court data is from the UNC School of Government Criminal Justice Innovation Lab’s North

Carolina Criminal Information System. That database includes data from the Automated

Criminal/Infraction System (ACIS), a computer system maintained by the North Carolina

Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC).

The analyzed dataset includes all criminal cases from courts statewide with process service

dates from January 1, 2015 through December 31, 2020, for individuals 18 and older. Case

information was current through June 30, 2021. Analyses were conducted at the case level,

meaning that there may be more than one charge or offense associated with each case.

Nonappearance

If any offense associated with a case involved a missed court date (as indicated by the ACIS

fields “motor vehicle FTA date,” “called and failed date,” and “event description”) the case was

identified as having a nonappearance. Nonappearance rates were calculated as the number

of cases involving a missed court date divided by total number of cases (those with and without

a missed court date).

Demographics

The age of a defendant was calculated based on the case’s process service date. Cases in which

the defendant was younger than 18 were dropped from the dataset. The available race

categories in the data included: Asian, Black, Hispanic, American Indian, White, Other,

Unknown, and Non-person. Cases that were identified as Other, Unknown, or Non-person

were excluded from analyses using race (approximately 2% of all cases).

Case length

The data did not include information on each required court appearance for each case.

Instead, the data captures a single date when the case was disposed and a single date of trial

or adjudication. For many cases, these dates were within one week of each other. For case

length analysis in the report, the difference between the trial date and the case process date

was utilized to measure the length of time between when a case was served and resolved.

Most serious offense per case

A single case could include one or more offenses, but the most serious offense was used for

analysis. The most serious offense was identified using the designations in the AOC’s “Court

Appendices 39

Offense Codes and Classes” and the data available for each offense. Each offense was ranked

accordingly from most to least serious:

• Felonies Class A, Felonies Class B1, Felonies Class B2, Felonies Class C, Felonies

Class D, Felonies Class E, Felonies Class F, Felonies Class G, Felonies Class H,

Felonies Class I, Felonies with missing class information, Misdemeanors Class A1,

Traffic Misdemeanors Class A1, Misdemeanors Class 1, Traffic Misdemeanors Class 1,

Misdemeanors Class 2, Traffic Misdemeanors Class 2, Misdemeanors Class 3, Traffic

Misdemeanors Class 3, Misdemeanors with missing class information.

Based on this ranking, the most serious offense for each case was identified. If offenses were

tied, the most serious offense was randomly assigned (approximately 13% of cases). The

following offenses were excluded from analysis utilizing offenses since they do not represent

substantive crimes under state law: civil revocation of driver’s license; contempt by

probationer; criminal contempt; extradition/fugitive; felony or misdemeanor probation

violation; probation revocation appeal; governor’s warrant; habitual felon; motions; show

cause; and any infraction.

Offense category

Offenses resulting in nonappearance were categorized as a subgroup of traffic misdemeanor

or as “Other offense.” Overall, 95% of nonappearances were categorized. Traffic

misdemeanors were categorized as follows:

• DWI-related: Offenses related to driving while impaired, including: Driving while

impaired; driving after consuming when person is younger than 21; driving while

license is revoked, revocation for impaired driving.

• Moving: Offenses related to unsafe driving behavior like speeding and reckless

driving, including: Speeding, reckless driving; window tinting violation; allowing

unlicensed person to drive; hit and run, leaving scene; hit and run, failure to stop;

open container after consuming alcohol; fail to report accident; fail to heed light or

siren.

• Administrative: Offenses that involve operating a vehicle with improper licensing,

registration, or other paperwork, including: Driving while license is revoked,

revocation not for impaired driving; expired registration card or tag; no operator’s

license; operating vehicle with no insurance; fictious or altered title, registration, or

tag; driving with no registration; cancelled, revoked, or suspended tag; no liability

insurance; possessing altered driver’s license; lending license plate to another;

registration plate not displayed; giving fictious information to officer; fail or refuse to

surrender title, card, or tag; permitting operation of vehicle with no insurance; failure

to apply for new title; failure to comply with license restrictions; using foreign license

while driving while license is revoked; no motorcycle endorsement; failure to

surrender license.

Appendices 40

Zip code

Analysis of zip codes only included cases in which the individual’s zip code was in the same

county where the case was filed. Zip codes were mapped using Tableau software. Courts often

have jurisdiction over cases in which the person charged lives in another county or state, so

this analysis does not reflect every criminal case moving through the courts. In New Hanover,

approximately one-third of cases were for individuals with zip codes outside of the county. In

Orange, about half were from out-of-county zip codes, and in Robeson about one-fifth.

Jail data

Sheriff’s offices in New Hanover and Orange Counties each provided data on people booked

into their jail over the past two years. Robeson County was unable to timely provide jail data

for administrative reasons.

The jail data includes bookings from January 1, 2019 through June 30, 2021. It does not

include noncustodial charges (e.g., people given a citation but never taken to jail) or people

released directly from the magistrate’s office (e.g., because they were given a written promise

to appear, unsecured bond, or custody release or where no probable cause was found). It also

does not include people who satisfied their secured bond before being booked into the jail.

Finally, federal detainees were excluded since they are not under the jurisdiction of North

Carolina state courts.

Jail admissions resulting from orders for arrest for a missed court appearance were identified

using the charge description field in the data. That field labeled bookings resulting from

failures to appear on misdemeanors or felonies. Because there may be multiple offenses

associated with each booking, those in which failure to appear was the only reason attributed

were labeled as being solely for failing to appear.

When ranking the most common reasons for booking into jail, failing to appear on a

misdemeanor was only counted if it was the sole reason associated with booking. Other

offenses were counted once for each booking in which they were associated. For example, if a

booking included failing to appear and shoplifting, shoplifting would be counted once and

failing to appear would not be counted. If a booking included shoplifting and impaired driving,

each offense (i.e., reason for booking) would be counted once when identifying the most

common reasons for jail booking.

In the Orange County data, 11% of bookings did not have reliable length of stay information

and were excluded from the length of stay analysis.

Driver’s license suspension data

License suspension data was collected and analyzed by the Duke University School of Law. The

license suspensions reflect active suspensions as of 2018. County-level data is reported in

Appendix B of “Driver’s License Suspensions in North Carolina,” Wilson Center for Science and

Justice, Duke University School of Law (2019).

Appendices 41

Resident population data

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention, in collaboration with the National Center for

Health Statistics, maintains an online database of U.S. Census Bureau population estimates.

This database was utilized for county-level population estimates and is accessible at

https://wonder.cdc.gov/. The county population estimates are for July 1, 2020 and include all

residents within the county.

Appendices 42

Appendix B

Supplemental Data Tables

Table 1: Nonappearance rates by county and offense type, criminal cases served 2015-

2020.

County Felonies

Non-traffic

Misdemeanors

Traffic

Misdemeanors

Total

ALAMANCE 3% 6% 15% 12%

ALEXANDER

11%

ALLEGHANY

13%

10%

ANSON

27%

22%

ASHE 1% 2% 16% 9%

AVERY

13%

11%

BEAUFORT

13%

11%

BERTIE 2% 6% 22% 17%

BLADEN

21%

17%

BRUNSWICK

16%

11%

BUNCOMBE 4% 10% 16% 12%

BURKE

10%

16%

12%

CABARRUS

11%

17%

15%

CALDWELL

22%

16%

CAMDEN 4% 9% 18% 16%

CARTERET

16%

11%

CASWELL

19%

14%

CATAWBA 3% 8% 19% 14%

CHATHAM

13%

11%

CHEROKEE

13%

20%

17%

CHOWAN 3% 4% 16% 10%

CLAY

12%

15%

13%

CLEVELAND

18%

13%

COLUMBUS

22%

17%

CRAVEN 2% 6% 14% 11%

CUMBERLAND

19%

40%

31%

CURRITUCK

14%

11%

DARE 2% 5% 11% 9%

DAVIDSON

17%

13%

DAVIE

12%

10%

DUPLIN 1% 12% 18% 15%

DURHAM

14%

24%

17%

EDGECOMBE

12%

24%

19%

FORSYTH

12%

32%

25%

FRANKLIN 2% 8% 24% 18%

GASTON

12%

20%

15%

GATES

17%

13%

GRAHAM 2% 2% 20% 10%

GRANVILLE

26%

19%

GREENE

16%

13%

Appendices 43

GUILFORD 7% 15% 20% 17%

HALIFAX

25%

17%

HARNETT

28%

21%

HAYWOOD

10%

23%

17%

HENDERSON

14%

19%

16%

HERTFORD

21%

15%

HOKE

12%

33%

24%

HYDE 2% 4% 9% 7%

IREDELL

13%

10%

JACKSON

12%

23%

19%

JOHNSTON 2% 8% 22% 17%

JONES

14%

12%

LEE

20%

15%

LENOIR

11%

15%

12%

LINCOLN

15%

11%

MACON

18%

15%

MADISON

15%

13%

MARTIN 3% 9% 16% 13%

MCDOWELL

25%

19%

MECKLENBURG

22%

16%

MITCHELL 4% 5% 14% 11%

MONTGOMERY

16%

14%

MOORE

17%

14%

NASH

14%

22%

18%

NEW HANOVER

14%

18%

15%

NORTHHAMPTON

22%

14%

ONSLOW

12%

21%

17%

ORANGE 5% 11% 17% 15%

PAMILCO

14%

10%

PASQUOTANK

18%

13%

PENDER 3% 8% 16% 13%

PERQUIMANS

16%

13%

PERSON

20%

13%

PITT

20%

15%

POLK

16%

15%

RANDOLPH

13%

16%

14%

RICHMOND

10%

24%

18%

ROBESON 4% 17% 45% 35%

ROCKINGHAM

10%

18%

15%

ROWAN

17%

13%

RUTHERFORD 4% 16% 5% 9%

SAMPSON

20%

16%

SCOTLAND

14%

30%

22%

STANLY

19%

15%

STOKES

18%

13%

SURRY

13%

23%

18%

SWAIN

11%

14%

31%

25%

TRANSYLVANIA 4% 7% 16% 11%

TYRELL

10%

UNION

19%

16%

VANCE 2% 14% 32% 25%

WAKE

15%

20%

17%

Appendices 44

WARREN 3% 10% 25% 20%

WASHINGTON

14%

10%

WATAUGA

11%

WAYNE

10%

14%

12%

WILKES

19%

15%

WILSON

11%

20%

15%

YADKIN

17%

13%

YANCEY 2% 3% 8% 7%

Grand Total

11%

21%

16%

Table 2: Project counties, resident population by race, 2020; criminal cases and

nonappearances by race, 2015-2020.

County Race

Share of resident

population

Share of criminal

cases

Share of

nonappearances

New Hanover

White 79% 64% 58%

Black 13% 29% 35%

Hispanic 6% 6% 6%

Asian 2% 0% 0%

Native American 0% 1% 1%

Orange

White 71% 46% 34%

Black 12% 40% 54%

Hispanic 9% 10% 10%

Asian 8% 3% 1%

Native American 0% 0% 0%

Robeson

White 25% 17% 15%

Black 24% 29% 27%

Hispanic 9% 9% 9%

Asian 1% 0% 0%

Native American 41% 44% 48%

Note: Percentages are rounded and may not add to 100.

Table 3: Project counties, top 3 most common offenses of nonappearances, 2015-2020.

Offense Share of all nonappearances in county

Robeson

Driving While License Revoked – Not Impaired Revocation 23%

No Operator’s License 18%

Expired Registration Card or Tag 10%

Orange

Speeding 21%

Expired Registration Card or Tag 17%

Driving While License Revoked – Not Impaired Revocation 16%

New Hanover

Driving While License Revoked – Not Impaired Revocation 16%

Expired Registration Card or Tag 14%

Speeding 10%