COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE
FOR
COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE
FOR
Senate Bill No. 400
(By Senators Kessler, Guills, Jenkins, Caruth,
Barnes and Plymale)
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[Originating in the Committee on Finance;
reported February 26, 2007.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact §51-2-1 of the Code of West Virginia,
1931, as amended, relating to providing for five additional
circuit court judges.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That §51-2-1 of the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended,
be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 2. CIRCUIT COURTS; CIRCUIT JUDGES.
§51-2-1. Judicial circuits; terms of office; legislative findings
and declarations; elections; terms of court.
(a) The state shall be divided into the following judicial
circuits with the following number of judges:
The counties of Brooke, Hancock and Ohio shall constitute the first circuit and shall have four judges; the counties of Marshall,
Tyler and Wetzel shall constitute the second circuit and shall have
two judges; the counties of Doddridge, Pleasants and Ritchie shall
constitute the third circuit and shall have one judge; the counties
of Wood and Wirt shall constitute the fourth circuit and shall have
three judges; the counties of Calhoun, Jackson, Mason and Roane
shall constitute the fifth circuit and shall have two judges; the
county of Cabell shall constitute the sixth circuit and shall have
four judges; the county of Logan shall constitute the seventh
circuit and shall have two judges; the county of McDowell shall
constitute the eighth circuit and shall have two judges; the county
of Mercer shall constitute the ninth circuit and shall have two
judges:
Provided, That effective the first day of January, two
thousand eight, said circuit shall have three judges; the county of
Raleigh shall constitute the tenth circuit and shall have three
judges; the counties of Greenbrier and Pocahontas shall constitute
the eleventh circuit and shall have two judges; the county of
Fayette shall constitute the twelfth circuit and shall have two
judges; the county of Kanawha shall constitute the thirteenth
circuit and shall have seven judges; the counties of Braxton, Clay,
Gilmer and Webster shall constitute the fourteenth circuit and
shall have two judges; the county of Harrison shall constitute the
fifteenth circuit and shall have three judges; the county of Marion
shall constitute the sixteenth circuit and shall have two judges; the county of Monongalia shall constitute the seventeenth circuit
and shall have two judge:
Provided, however, That effective the
first day of January, two thousand eight, said circuit shall have
three judges; the county of Preston shall constitute the eighteenth
circuit and shall have one judge; the counties of Barbour and
Taylor shall constitute the nineteenth circuit and shall have one
judge; the county of Randolph shall constitute the twentieth
circuit and shall have one judge; the counties of Grant, Mineral
and Tucker shall constitute the twenty-first circuit and shall have
two judges; the counties of Hampshire, Hardy and Pendleton shall
constitute the twenty-second circuit and shall have one judge:
Provided further, That effective the first day of January, two
thousand eight, said circuit shall have two judges; the counties of
Berkeley, Jefferson and Morgan shall constitute the twenty-third
circuit and shall have five judges; the county of Wayne shall
constitute the twenty-fourth circuit and shall have one judge:
Provided further, That effective the first day of January, two
thousand eight, said circuit shall have two judges; the counties of
Lincoln and Boone shall constitute the twenty-fifth circuit and
shall have two judges; the counties of Lewis and Upshur shall
constitute the twenty-sixth circuit and shall have one judge; the
county of Wyoming shall constitute the twenty-seventh circuit and
shall have one judge; the county of Nicholas shall constitute the
twenty-eighth circuit and shall have one judge; the county of Putnam shall constitute the twenty-ninth circuit and shall have two
judges; the county of Mingo shall constitute the thirtieth circuit
and shall have one judge:
Provided further, That effective the
first day of January, two thousand eight, said circuit shall have
two judges; and the counties of Monroe and Summers shall constitute
the thirty-first circuit and shall have one judge:
Provided,
however,
And provided further, That the Kanawha County circuit
court shall be a court of concurrent jurisdiction with each single
judge circuit where the sitting judge in such single judge circuit
is unavailable by reason of sickness, vacation or other reason.
(b) Any judge in office on the effective date of the
reenactment of this section shall continue as a judge of the
circuit as constituted under prior enactments of this section,
unless sooner removed or retired as provided by law, until the
thirty-first day of December, two thousand.
(c) The term of office of all circuit court judges shall be
for eight years. The term of office for all circuit court judges
elected during the general election conducted in the year two
thousand shall commence on the first day of January, two thousand
one, and end on the thirty-first day of December, two thousand
eight.
(d) Beginning with the primary and general elections to be
conducted in the year one thousand nine hundred ninety-two, in all
judicial circuits having two or more judges there shall be, for election purposes, numbered divisions corresponding to the number
of circuit judges in each circuit. Each judge shall be elected at
large from the entire circuit. In each numbered division of a
judicial circuit, the candidates for nomination or election shall
be voted upon and the votes cast for the candidates in each
division shall be tallied separately from the votes cast for
candidates in other numbered divisions within the circuit. The
candidate receiving the highest number of the votes cast within a
numbered division shall be nominated or elected, as the case may
be:
Provided, That beginning with the primary and general
elections to be conducted in the year two thousand, judges serving
a judicial circuit comprised of four or more counties with two or
more judges shall not be residents of the same county.
(e) The Supreme Court of Appeals shall, by rule, establish the
terms of court of circuit judges.