(The Center Square) – Judicial races are rarely a source of hot campaign rhetoric, but a Superior Court race in Spokane County is boiling over the old legal proverb that “Justice delayed is justice denied.”
Incumbent Judges Tim Fennessy and Marla Polin face strong challenges this election cycle from attorneys Andrew Van Winkle and Brandon Casey, respectively. Fennessy was first elected to the bench in 2016 and is running for his third term. Polin was appointed in 2022 and elected to her current position in 2023.
The controversy centers around Washington’s constitutional requirement that cases in superior court be decided by judges within 90 days of closing arguments. According to a National Center for State Courts efficiency study completed in 2024, 38% of dependency hearings, 23% of criminal cases and 14% of family law cases in Spokane’s court system were delayed beyond that time limit.
At a judicial candidate forum held in Spokane Valley in September, Fennessy acknowledged delays have happened in the system.
“We don’t get the simple cases” or it would have been resolved by the parties or their attorneys, according to Fennessy. He noted an additional court position was only put in place last year, the prosecuting attorney and public defender offices have been understaffed, and said delays are not the fault of the bench, but they do happen.
Van Winkle sees the delays in the court dockets as a systemic issue in part due to a failure to modernize procedures. An experienced prosecutor, Van Winkle has served as staff attorney to the Washington State Court of Appeals since 2019.
His assignments have included advising judges reviewing cases from all counties in eastern Washington, including Spokane’s Superior Court. Van Winkle has also served over the last four years as a pro-tem court commissioner in Spokane County Superior Court and is familiar with the system from the inside.
According to public documents posted on Van Winkle’s campaign website, Fennessy was censured in 2019 by the Washington Commission on Judicial Conduct for “failure to timely decide cases.” In an interview, Van Winkle also pointed to the high rate at which attorneys for both plaintiffs and defendants request Fennessy be removed from their cases.
Polin is currently assigned to hear family law cases. At the September judicial candidate forum, Polin said, “As an attorney, I could tell when a judge was prepared and had read the materials.”
She emphasized that she has tried to do the same in her preparation, recognizing the impact her decisions have on people’s lives.
Her opponent in the race, Brandon Casey, said at the same forum that he appreciates Polin’s recognition of the need for empathy and to recognize what each person is going through. Casey noted judges must also be decisive in decision-making.
Casey described examples of how delays in the system identified by the NSCS study had impacted families in child custody decisions or litigants losing time at work due to poor scheduling practices.
He said a group of attorneys came to him in November 2023 to ask if he’d run for judge because “it is not just about the decisions that are made; Superior Court judges have to manage staff and work through the processes.”
Ballots in all general election races must be postmarked or delivered to a drop box by 8 p.m. on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5.
