Eric Watness plays a mean Western Swing fiddle, but when he is on the job as ex parte commissioner in King County Superior Court, he does not fiddle around. Commissioner Watness is renowned for treating all before him with courtesy and respect. He believes that if the person wearing the black robe of a judge does not show respect for the people in front of the bench, the result will be a lack of respect for the legal system.
Commissioner Watness recently celebrated his 14th year on the ex parte bench. Despite the perils of a high-volume courtroom practice, none of his subsequent days on the bench have been as exciting as his second day. On that day in the ex parte department, March 2, 1995, a crazed husband fatally shot his wife and her friend. The courthouse was placed on lockdown and the judicial officers refused to return to work until screening for weapons was implemented. Amazingly, the following day, using equipment borrowed from the airport, court security was able to commence screening and the courthouse was reopened.
The King County Ex Parte Department handles guardianship matters, trusts and probates, landlord-tenant issues, adoptions, divorces, vulnerable-adult matters, and civil restraining and protective orders, among other issues. With the high volume of cases, Commissioner Watness is concerned that there just is not enough time to devote to each case to do the job as well as he would like.
He loves the difficult cases, however. He enjoys using analytical skills to understand the facts and interpret the law in each situation and then to articulate his decision well so that lay persons, not just the lawyers, will understand his ruling and the basis for it.
Commissioner Watness served as a pro tem commissioner on the ex parte bench before he was appointed to his current position. As a pro tem, he would often feel “wrung out” after a day on the bench and took his concerns over the job home with him. Now, with 14 years’ experience, he is pleased that he can leave his job concerns in the courthouse for the most part and enjoy his wife, two adult daughters and their families, including three grandsons and a granddaughter who will be born soon. He recently bought a beach house on Willapa Bay and loves spending time there with his extended family.
Even though he is generally able to leave the concerns of his job at the courthouse, he is not afraid to admit a mistake and has at times called the parties back sua sponte to revise a decision. The hardest part of his job, besides the sheer volume of cases, is “trying to figure out the right thing to do when only one party is in front of him.”
This is especially true when the party is pro se. He usually asks the party why he should not sign the order they are presenting when the other party is not there to state his case. Attorneys know they have an ethical duty to answer that question honestly, but pro se parties often do not understand why they have to play devil’s advocate.
Although some would say that the most difficult judicial job in the county is the King County ex parte commissioner, Commissioner Watness says he loves it. He is challenged by all of the varied issues in the contested cases he confronts each day. If all of the cases were the same, he thinks the job would be boring.
He gets frustrated at times, however, when dealing with intra-family fights and especially in cases in which family members have mistreated the elderly and show no sense of remorse when their abuse is exposed. It can be difficult in those situations to maintain objectivity and decorum and stay “cool.” On top of that, there is little guidance from the case law and the statutes themselves concerning the interplay between the guardianship and vulnerable-adult statutes, which often makes the judge’s job in those cases more difficult.
Being at the crossroads in people’s problem-solving is a gratifying aspect of his job. He hopes he can resolve issues to make things better for the parties, or at least avoid making the situation worse.
He is cognizant of the economic cost as well as the emotional toll on the parties and will sua sponte order mediation if he feels that might help speed a fair resolution of the problem. He has conducted settlement conferences in the past, but with the current court budget problems limiting the use of pro tem commissioners, there is no longer time to act as a settlement judge. In retirement, however, he looks forward to doing mediation work.
Commissioner Watness is very concerned about the needs of incapacitated persons who appear in his courtroom. He believes the court should better accommodate people with limitations. For instance, if the person is hard of hearing, there should be a way to accommodate the hearing difficulty without having to use raised voices broadcasting personal information in a courtroom filled with strangers. He feels strongly that we should all try to honor the capacity of those with limitations while trying to help as much as we can to deal with their areas of incapacity.
With a new procedure for obtaining ex parte orders in place since the beginning of the year, the court still is working out the kinks in the new rules. Commissioner Watness has been instrumental in drafting a new, single, local rule for ex parte that will be going out for comment soon. He also has been involved in the development of legislation involving guardians ad litem, family law, juvenile law and guardianship law. He facilitated a training for judges on federal law on violence against women.
When asked to provide advice to those appearing before him, Commissioner Watness expressed his desire for counsel to put themselves in his shoes and to identify what they would want to know and what is extraneous, and then to concisely present the facts and legal authority so as to make his job of finding the facts and applying the law easier.
Even if the person appearing before Commissioner Watness has not followed that advice, however, he still will be treated with courtesy and respect, and with no fiddling around.
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