Business and Consumer Court set to launch

AUGUSTA – The two judges who head Maine’s district and superior courts will take on additional duties March 1 as part of the state’s new Business and Consumer Court, Chief Justice Leigh I. Saufley told legislators Tuesday.

During her annual address to the Legislature, Saufley said Thomas E. Humphrey, chief justice of the state’s superior courts, and John C. Nivison, chief judge of the state’s district courts, will oversee the new court, funded last year at an annual cost of $1.28 million.

Humphrey will continue to work from his office in the Cumberland County Courthouse in Portland. Nivison will work from his office in Augusta.

Both men will travel throughout the state to hear cases.

Nivison was appointed to the district court bench in 1999 by Gov. Angus King. Humphrey was appointed to the district court bench in 1993 by Gov. John McKernan and to the superior court bench in 1998 by King.

The new court is expected to launch on March 1, Saufley said at a news conference after her annual State of the Judiciary speech.

The judges will gather pending and recently filed cases through the spring and summer, then begin accepting new cases through an electronic filing system by the end of the summer.

The new court should be fully running with a clerk working from 6th District Court in West Bath in a year, Saufley said.

At a meeting last week of the Maine State Bar Association in Portland, Saufley said she hoped the use of modern technology would allow the Business and Consumer Court to become the state’s first “paperless court.”

“Conferences of counsels, non-trial matters and some pre-trial matters will be conducted through video conferencing,” she said. “Judges will travel to counties where the parties are located to conduct trials and all paperwork will be filed electronically.”

The qualifications for having a case heard in the new court simply will be that one party is a business, Saufley said in Portland, and that one of the parties requests the case be heard in the Business and Consumer Court.

Cases concerning regulatory matters, contract disputes and fights over trade secrets are the kinds of litigation Saufley said she expects the new court to handle during its first few years.

She said last week that it was unlikely the Business and Consumer Court soon would hear cases involving wage and hour disputes or employment discrimination lawsuits.

While specialty criminal courts such as drug and mental health courts, which have been created in Maine on a limited basis, have been on the rise nationally, specialty courts on the business side have been slower to evolve, especially in rural states.

Like those specialty courts, the Business and Consumer Court was created out of necessity, Saufley said.

“Small-business owners often can’t afford lawyers or arbitrators to collect outstanding debts or to settle disputes,” she said. “So they walked away from the courthouse disgusted.”

Over the past several years, the number of filings in small claims cases has fallen as small-business owners turned away from the justice system because it was taking so long for cases to be heard, Saufley has said.

In her address to the Legislature last year, she stressed that “the ability of the judicial branch to address business and consumer-related disputes in a timely fashion is critical to the health of Maine’s economy.”