5th March 2014
Apology after court blunder delays
hearing
THE
company responsible for providing interpreters for criminal courts in England
and Wales has apologised unreservedly to York magistrates for causing a
day-long court delay.
Romanian
speaking Cristian Bodgan Ariel Cristea, 31, was scheduled to have his bail
application and case heard at 10am.
But
although staff at York Magistrates Court had booked an interpreter from Capita
Translation & Interpreting, none attended.
Magistrates
heard it was not until staff rang the agency that they learned, at 10.55am,
that the interpreter scheduled to attend could not attend because her car had
broken down at 6.15pm the previous day.
Only
after the court had contacted a different interpreter directly, could Cristea
start his bail application – at 4.30pm. He was successful and was able to walk
free shortly after 5pm, seven hours after his case had been due to be heard.
Magistrate
Jenny Taylor, speaking on behalf of all three magistrates, said of the
non-arrival of the Capita interpreter: “We have had a lot of problems because
of that.”
She
thanked the court-booked interpreter who had rushed from Harrogate Magistrates
Court where she had been working in a different case to York.
Magistrates,
court staff, prosecutor and probation staff had had to wait for some time after
they had finished the rest of their work and Cristea’s barrister Matthew
Collins had been unable to start work on other cases he was appearing in later
in the week because he had had to stay at the York court.
A
spokesman for the interpretation agency said: “We have a number of procedures
in place to ensure that courts are informed, in a timely manner, when Capita
Translation & Interpreting is unable to source interpreters or when
assigned interpreters are unable to complete a booking.
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