Armenian Officials Tour N.Y. Courts
John Caher
New York Law Journal
08-15-2005

After spending a year helping the Armenian government set up a modern legal
system, Joseph J. Traficanti Jr. figured he would show his foreign friends a
truly balkanized court structure. So he brought them to Albany on August 2.

The former deputy chief administrative judge led a delegation of Armenian
court officials on a study tour of the New York courts and the state
Legislature. They visited the Albany County Family Court and the state Court
of Appeals, chatted with the lieutenant governor’s counsel, discussed the
transition from decentralized to centralized court administration and
examined the judiciary’s computer operations across the Hudson River in the
city of Rensselaer. And they got a chance to view an antiquated court
structure that is far more fragmented than anything at home.

“I learned [in Armenia] that you can have a very nice, simple structure for
your court system and you don’t have to have a complicated one like ours to
have a good one,” Traficanti said. “They have a streamlined system that
would be the envy of anyone here in New York who is interested in reform.”

Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye and all of her recent predecessors have sought a
constitutional amendment that would modernize a court structure designed in
and for a far different era. But the effort fails (largely for political
reasons) as often as it comes up, which is about every year.

Traficanti retired last year from state court administration and headed to
Armenia, where he led a World Bank project to modernize court operations
there. He experienced court administration on a shoe-string. The annual
budget for the entire Republic of Armenia — the whole government, not just
the courts — is about half of the New York court system’s.

“They are struggling to build a good democracy, a strong democracy, and
included in that is a good court system,” Traficanti said. “There are very
difficult hurdles, especially in terms of resources. The budget of the New
York state court system is about $1.2 billion. The budget for the entire
Republic of Armenia is a little over $500 million.”

This week, nine of the Armenian court officials with whom Traficanti worked
came to New York State, thanks to a grant from the U.S. Agency for
International Development and logistical support from the New York State
Judicial Institute in White Plains, N.Y. On August 1, they spent the day
with court administrators at the institute. On August 2, they took a road
trip to Albany. Before returning to Armenia on August 6, the delegation
planned to tour the commercial and criminal courts in Manhattan.

At the Capitol, the group received a brief civics lesson from John R.
Watson, counsel to Lieutenant Governor Mary O. Donohue, on the workings of a
two-house legislature.

LESSONS FOR NEW YORK

But the visitors were mainly interested in the structure of the courts, both
from a hierarchical standpoint and from the perspective of day-to-day
operations. Structurally, Traficanti said, the system that evolved after
Armenia won its independence 12 years ago offers much for New York to
imitate.

“The structure of their court system is what we should have in New York — a
court of first instance, an appellate court and a high court, and that’s
it,” Traficanti said.

Arsen Lazarian, a representative of the Armenian chief judicial officer,
said through an interpreter, that as a rule, there is not much difference
between the courts of his country and New York — except that in Armenia
there is more centralization.

“Here the structure is more decentralized,” Lazarian said. “But we must
take into consideration how small is our country and how big is New York
State. We have only 21 courts, so centralized management is more easy.”

Arman Khachatryan, director of the Republic of Armenia Council of Court
Chairmen — a judicial training center — said training methods employed in
Armenia were borrowed from the National Judicial College in Reno, Nev. But
he is also picking up tips from the New York Judicial Training Institute.

“I can see that we have to do more work,” Khachatryan said, partially in
English and partially through a translator. “This is one of the benefits, to
see how it is implemented, court management in this state. We hope after our
return we can organize the training of the staff to try to use the
experience, our American experience, for the modernization of the Armenian
courts.”

The delegation included representatives of four groups: three pilot courts,
the Court of Appeals for Military and Criminal Matters, the Community First
Instance Court and the Economic Court, which is similar to New York’s
commercial courts. Also included were representatives of the Armenian
Council of Court Chairmen, a court-system administrative agency.

Traficanti’s participation in the project began with a World Bank rule of
law project administered by DPK Consulting, a California-based business
consultancy. DPK is working with a local Armenian partner, Ameria
Consulting, to re-engineer courts in the capital city of Yerevan. The
structural form that evolves is expected to be replicated nationwide.

Karine Nikoghosyan, management advisory services assistant for Ameria, said
she hopes to harvest from this trip some of New York’s technical
innovations. She said the courts in Armenia have a long road to travel in
terms of achieving technological parity.

“It is rather interesting,” Nikoghosyan said of the court system’s use of
even such basic technology as electronic recording of proceedings. “We do
not have that much automation.”

A similar but more extensive court modernization project is under way in
Macedonia, and Traficanti hopes to take part in that effort as well.