Ep23 Catherine Wiersch—When Advocating From the Outside Isn't Enough

Catherine Wiersch  0:00  
As much as we want to be frustrated, there are organizations all over our city trying to do amazing things with the people that they have access to. We should be supporting them. We should be incorporating them. We should be hearing them, listening to them, believing them, bringing them to the table. I'm tired of begging to be at the table. I'm going to make them easy myself.

Scott Groves  0:19  
Welcome to Henderson HQ. This is the podcast where you get all the stories behind the businesses that make our community tick. Don't forget to subscribe to our weekly newsletter. Hey, ladies and gentlemen, it's Scott groves with the Henderson HQ podcast. Thanks for watching, and don't forget to subscribe to our newsletter. Follow our Instagram, because we put out weekly content on what's going on around Henderson. Today, we are interviewing Catherine wersch. I said it right this time. She's also running for judge here in Henderson, which seems to be our new sweet spot, is like interviewing politicians, which I did not expect, but that's cool. So Catherine with a C for judge.com. If you want to go learn everything about her, she's one of like four people that are born and raised in Henderson. So like, this is one of my one of my one of my first Vegas forever locals, other than my mortgage partner, Leah, who was also born and raised here in Henderson. And she's like the mayor. She seems to know everybody, every time we go out and drink. So tell us what you're running for, why it matters, and then we'll hear all about your history. I am

Catherine Wiersch  1:16  
running for Henderson Municipal Court. So if your address is Henderson, you can vote for me, I will be on that ballot. There's a lot of people that wish they could support me, but they don't live in Henderson, so we are an elite space. Municipal court matters because it is your I like to call it the communities Corp. If you're getting traffic citations, if you're getting misdemeanors, DUIs, domestic violence, all of those smaller charges are going to stay in municipal court, so it's a lot of self represented individuals versus our Justice Courts and our felony courts, where they get a court appointed attorney. We do have court appointed attorneys in municipal court, but there is a large portion of individuals that represent themselves. So who's on the bench matters, not just for the fair and impartial, but what's really great about podcasts like you and others is many people don't know their judge. They don't know why we should know our judges or how important our judges are. Yeah, so it's a good opportunity to know who's on the ballot and or that sign that you drive by, because there's like 1000 of them. Yes, many, many signs in Vegas. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah. I am thankful to be here and have this opportunity.

Scott Groves  2:27  
So I always, I'm always wondering, like, when it comes to, like, whatever, I think, what was that show that was on TV? Night Court, Night Court. I know I love is the best, the bailiff, the tall ball guy, like, all of them were great. But I'm all, I'm always wondering, like, I don't understand very, very little about the law, although I have some entanglements before, um, why are judges in this position? Why are you elected and not, like, appointed, right? Because it's like, a non partisan position doesn't, doesn't seem like the person behind the bench would matter. Because the law is the law, like, Why? Why is it important that this is an elected position within the community.

Catherine Wiersch  3:03  
The way I always describe it is, it's an opportunity to check and balance your judicial selections. So you vote someone in similar to our president. You know, we get that opportunity say, Do we like that choice? Do we not like that choice? And we can reset with an election the difference between our, you know, Federal President election, they're limited in term. Our judges are not limited in terms. So they can run as many times as they want.

Scott Groves  3:30  
Interesting. So, like, this is a weird question, because I'm going to lead the witness here. What matters when we're thinking about who we vote for for a judge? Right? Because I kind of ask Lance the same question, like, well, isn't the law just the law? Like, if I get a speeding ticket, yeah, I got a speeding ticket, right? Yeah, that's a great question. So why does the personality or the history or the perspective of the judge matter, right? Great question.

Catherine Wiersch  3:55  
So I think if you had all of the candidates up here, we'd all say we're gonna follow the law. We know the law. We're lawyers. We we've been doing this. We can follow the law. The question really becomes in the discretion of the judge. So a judge has discretion in certain pockets where they get to implement consequences, for example. So if you're coming in front of me and you're pleading guilty to a trespass, you were somewhere you didn't want to be, they didn't want you there. They want you moved on. You could easily just plead out to your trespass, get a couple days in jail or a fine or requirements. The question is, is in that trespass and that those consequences, is it going to prevent a future trespass? So I think this is where we learn that our judges are more than just the law. They're looking at what experiences they bring to the bench. And it's not a soft spot or like, Oh, you're just a mushy bleeding heart, but it's really looking at Community Safety and saying, okay, because trespass is an easy example, but the reality is, we get domestic violence, we get DUIs, and if we're just easy. Pleading them in and out, and not having a kind of like a stopping point to say, Hey, wait. What's the consequence? The way a case works is say you, you appear in front of me, and you plead guilty to the domestic violence the parties may recommend. Okay, pursuant to statute, there's some required consequences in that domestic violence class. There's a course. But I could also say, now that you've already pled, it's my discretion on what you're you're doing. So I could say, Is this a relationship that needs counseling? Is this? Is there a child involved? Do we need to look into counseling that includes the whole family. DUI is another great example. We could easily go in and out. You're paying your fine. You're on to the next one. But I could say, Hey, listen, is this your first? Like, do we have a problem? Do you want an opportunity to do something extra? Like, I don't know, maybe get treatment or instead of just paying a fine, I could say, go to AA. I want to see some additional support, because it's really an opportunity to stop them and say, how do we make on the other side of this? How do we make our community safer? That's kind of where I find a lot of experience in that right now. I am an appointed judicial officer. I'm a hearing Commissioner for the district courts. I oversee mental health crisis holds. I oversee mental health court, co occurring disorder court and our prison reentry program. So I deal with a lot of mental health substance abuse treatment services. That is how I know Rob from shine a light. Shine a light. Shameless plug. They're more than just going into the tunnels and providing resources and in services for unhoused individuals who are living in the tunnels, but they actually have a case management program, and some of my participants use the shine a light case management, making sure that they're taking medication. They have their one on one, support meetings, etc. That case management component from shine a light is valuable to me. There's a lot of community members that do that in our courts. We have a whole team. So for me, going to the community like Rob, knowing who he is, if I have an issue or have a question, my participants telling me, you know, I'm ready to hold them accountable for a decision they made, and they try to blame shine a light. I can say, No, I've been to shine. I know that's not how they run. Or let me call them, let me get their case manager on, because I have a working relationship with that organization. So for me, it's about knowing the community that we're utilizing so that we can truly produce outcomes that lead to community safety.

Scott Groves  7:43  
Yeah. So you mentioned Robert shine a light. He was in here recording an episode right before you came in, which means it came out last week. Highly recommend you go watch that. Rob really helped me change my frame of like, how I think of the homeless problem in Las Vegas, and we did talk about some of the compounding factors, right, whether it's trauma or drug abuse or crime or whatnot, but conceptually, as like a judge who's going to be making these decisions, how do you weigh, you know, the the person who's in front of you, and that's a human being who probably needs help, right? If you're unless you had one too many at the bar and you were more on and thought you could drive home and you couldn't, I totally get that. Spoiler alert, I've been there before. Versus, like, this person probably has some real problems that need to be addressed. Versus, like, safety for the community. How do you, like, conceptualize that and balance that? Because that seems like a tightrope of, like, all right, there's a human being over here, somebody's brother, dad, mom, sister, son, whatever, that probably needs some help if they're entangled with the law, and, oh yeah, I gotta watch out and serve the community safety. Like, how do you do that? Because I wouldn't be able to do that. I'm not I'm not objective enough. I would either be the hard on crime, throw them all in jail, or maybe the soft heart, let them all out on a on a program. But, like, I wouldn't be able to walk that balance. Hence, the reason, the only reason, I'm not a judge.

Catherine Wiersch  8:59  
Clearly, you seem very eligible, very qualified. The balance for me, I wouldn't say it's necessarily a balance, as much as it's a fine line. For me, there are court programs, there is the law, there are things that are required. My goal is to communicate, effectively, respectfully, set very clear expectations, so that when the choice is to release and the choice is to go to programming, you know exactly what you're doing. So that if you deviate from that, from that law or that rule, I can bring you back in and say, I was so clear with you. Like you said XYZ, you agreed to XYZ, and you went over here and did 123, there is a consequence for that. Now, in the treatment world, there is, we would call them more like, compliance issues or adherence issues, and then a sanction. So if we're looking at a sanction, I'm looking at, okay, what's the clinical response versus like, what's the consequential? Sanction if somebody relapses, or even if they're coming to me for the first time, and it's like, Okay, now we're looking at your substance abuse issues. I'm looking at it two sided of like, okay, are you being just a jerk when you decide to not follow rules? Or do we need to assess your level of care because something wasn't in place to wrap around service enough for you, right? So for me, it's that clear communication. Then it studies there's a best practice standard, of course, the world like studied, it produced a report and said the best practices that work in these specialty court programs, one of the number one predictors of success in those programs is a relationship with the judge. That sounds

Scott Groves  10:43  
very weird to me, having a relationship with your judge?

Catherine Wiersch  10:45  
Well, it's, it's, imagine walking into a courtroom where you're already nervous. It's the legal system. There is a crime you've committed, there's a consequence to that crime, and your judge is disrespectful. Won't give you time to be heard. Won't listen to what you're saying. It's just laying down the law. That's a different approach than somebody who's smiles at you, looks you in the eye and says, you know, good afternoon, good morning. What's your side of the story? What's going on with you? How can we help building that relationship with participants allows them to kind of open up and feel a little bit more confident, not that I keep being score or anything, but there have been times in my courtroom where the participants telling the coordinators a different version, and everyone's going, we know it's not the truth, but they won't admit it, and then I can crack them with just a little bit of compassion, empathy, a safe space of like, listen, we need to assess this. On the clinical side, there will be a sanction, I can assure you, this is the world we're in with the sanction. Sometimes it is to put them back in custody. But again, for me, it's that clear communication. It's the expectations laid out, clearly communicated. You know, if you got there, you know they know it. And when they come in, they're like, oh, yeah, I already told my boss I'm gonna be gone for two days because I know that you'll be locking me back up. And I'm like, Okay, well, at least you knew.

Scott Groves  12:15  
At least you knew. And so what is, what is your background? How does somebody decide to get into the law and then decide to, like, give up whatever you're doing now to go be a judge, sure.

Catherine Wiersch  12:24  
So I, I'm born and raised in Las Vegas. Henderson's been my home for about 18 plus years. That's local after several years, and because you're local, well, and even when I go out of state, I'm like, I'm from Vegas, and then they're like, but you live in Henderson? I'm like, yeah, it's kind of, I mean, it's all the same in my brain, but I always wanted to be a lawyer. My dad was a strived to be a businessman, but had his failings. So I always saw law like legal issues happening. We were my dad was a gambling addict. We were unhoused for a long time. God, please live if you're a gambling addict. Yes, 100% he spent his last days, retired in the Philippines, like in the mud. And I was like, it's a great place. Go be in the mud. But So yeah, unhoused, living in cars, some days, living in casinos, like samtown, boat station, palisation, not the best quality of places, but those were the places my dad gambled. They would give him comps, etc. At 15, I ran away because it just wasn't a stable scenario for me. At that time, it was key adults in my life that said, Okay, Catherine, we're not going left. We are going right. We're gonna get, you know, and it the the guidance was in a wide range of things. It was okay, you've got your job at McDonald's. Do you have a bank account? Where are you putting all this money? Like, let's get a safe space set for that. So I can tell you, you know, my friend's dad who got that bank account set up for me. And it just goes on like that, people that let me sleep on their couch instead of, you know, on the park benches or my old apartment complexes, little nooks and crannies. So there's been moments in my life where I've experienced life, right? Like the hard things that are happening, struggling paycheck to paycheck, understanding what it's like when you get pulled over and you're like, I know I know I don't have insurance, I'm about to get a really high ticket. What's that gonna look like for my bills? Now I'm gonna have to choose. There's a lot of life experience that come along with just kind of the poverty type issues. Growing up fast, right? Very fast. So when I got out of college, I applied to law school, we got wait listed, and I was like, that's fine. I'll go be the next best thing. I became a paralegal. So I was a paralegal for 10 years in labor union law firms that represented the union. So from that perspective, seeing the importance of, you know, every word in a contract, I was married at the time. Time I ended up divorcing that person, and then I thought, Well, nothing's really keeping me here. I'm gonna go to law school out of state. I've never lived anywhere else, and I moved to Ohio, wherever he goes along, they gave me the most scholarship money. So I was like, whatever. How bad can it be? And I got through one winter, and I was like, What is this white stuff. This was a bad decision. So as I grabbed my degree, they had a two year program there, so I got it done in about two and a half. Came right back looking for a job. I'm thinking, Okay, you go back to my labor union. But I had a friend that worked at the public defender's office, and he had always promised me that he would take me in if I ever needed an opportunity. So I interned with them, and that's where my life kind of clicked the law with my story, in just being able to say, Okay, look this yes, this person committed a crime. There's no doubt to that, right? They've done something egregious, but I always looked at it like a legal mindset. Yes, I can fight this legally, but at the end of the day, majority of people did what they did, there's going to be a consequence. How do we mitigate that? So on the end, on the other end, whether they're going to prison or they're going to be released, how do we produce some kind of outcome that secures that community safety, maybe stops the revolving door and prevents them from going to do it again. So I got really good at just talking to people about their story and then learning, okay, we've got some background trauma. We've got, you know, school records that show mental illness or behavioral incidents, and then being able to pull in a social worker team. The Public Defender's Office has a mitigation Social Work team, so using them as a resource to say, Okay, I think my person maybe in his 40s, but never been diagnosed. And I'm picking up some things here.

Catherine Wiersch  16:48  
My brother, one of my brothers, is mentally ill. He went 30 years without being diagnosed. Had a head injury triggered his psychosis. He chooses to not be medicated. So, like, I have a lot of experience and baggage that comes with it. So it just felt so natural to go into this space for somebody who is having the worst day, right? They've done something wrong to the community. They're now locked up. Nobody thinks jail is nice prison as well. They're vulnerable. And that's the opportunity to say, Okay, who are you? Where did you come from? How did you get here, after about four years, kind of became the Whisperer, where they would be like, Hey, can you come in and talk to my client, see if we can ask a couple right questions to get them to to kind of open up. I was placed on a specialty team for behavioral health. So I worked in mental health crisis holds. Mental Health Crisis is when you're a danger to yourself or others, or you're unable to care for yourself, and you're put in a hospital and you're not allowed to leave right that world three years, navigating the community, engaging with community stakeholders. It's not as adversarial. It's, you know, do we let this person out? Will they harm themselves? Will they harm others? How do we work together to get this person back to stabilization? Eventually, my judge bounced. She went out of state, and they had an opening, and they were like, You applied you, you know, the law you've been working in this field. Would you like to take it on? So I said, Yes. How does that relate to City of Henderson? Every morning we would get a printout of cases that are in a mental health crisis and they also have a criminal case. So we would say, I would see this every day, like, Okay, here's our crossover, right? Individuals that are mentally ill who are picking up these, you know, improper using of the shopping cart or block ups, you know, blocking the sidewalk or staying at the park. They're getting trespassed when reaching out to a lot of the city's courts finding that there weren't a lot of services or that it was hard to get to the right person to say, hey, can we communicate this in Henderson, we have a veterans court. You gotta be a veteran. We have a drug court. You gotta have a drug addiction. There's this middle gap that people are just slipping through, that are just mentally ill, that might just need a couple of resources to get back on track. Because not everyone is, you know, a raging mentally ill person. Some people are just need their meds, consistency in those meds, and some case management that will remind them to take their meds, a bed, referral, accessing their Medicaid so they can get back on track. So I said, Well, how can I help? I can only help in the city I live. So I picked Henderson Municipal Court. So I don't know day one that I'm gonna go in and flip any tables and say, Where's my mental health court? But I know the the judges that are there have worked hard to establish the courts they do have. I know that they would be great partners to say, how do we get this done? And even. If it could never be done, it's still the experience I bring to the bench to say, I see this. I have some experience where I can say, hey, attorneys, have you tried this organization? Have you tried this? Have you reached out? I think having the right questions can open a lot of doors. So I'm hoping to bring that experience to Henderson. That's awesome. I know that was a long explanation of who I am and how I got here and why I chose Henderson.

Scott Groves  20:27  
That was That was great. Hey guys, just a quick ad from our sponsors here that make this podcast and our newsletter possible. Want to give a shout out to ethereal Med Spa, a gym for your skin. So doesn't matter whether you're doing anything proactive all the way up to spot removal, all the way up to beautification, right, or vanity. Ethereal Med Spa, they got you covered. Scott right over at right auto body. Love them. So anything from a scratch indent to a big insurance job, all the way up to a custom rebuild of a classic car. They got you covered. And shout out to my buddy, Casey Halstead, owner of 10th Planet Jiu Jitsu, which now has three locations. They just opened new location on the west side. So they got our Henderson location. They got a mid city location, and they've got a West Side location. So anywhere in the valley where you're looking to train jiu jitsu, check out 10th Planet Las Vegas. Now back to the show. Yeah. I think about like again, being a complete novice with the law, somebody comes in for XYZ court, and you mentioned you do have some discretion, but either at the state legislator level or what have you, like, there's certain minimum, right? So if you do X, you will serve y or whatnot. Where does that come from? Like, I guess, like, what are your guidelines for what you have to do versus what you can do. Like, where is the law versus where I can show discretion, right? Well, there you can pick an individual case or an

Catherine Wiersch  21:46  
individual out in the statute. So domestic violence are great. One there is dv courses, like, I think it's a 26 week program, or classes that you have to take you can't get around that. I have participants right now in the district court level that are doing 18 plus months of programming with one on one therapy group settings, requirements to go to weekly group, medication, compliance, sober or testing randomly. And I can still say you need to take your DV classes, because those are statutorily required, and they've been ordered by the judge, the discretion that we have is more in the okay, if it's a trespass, they're getting kicked out of the park. And we know that this person has a history of getting arrested for similarly situated stuff, we can look at that and say, Okay, you may have parties stipulated or agreed to 15 days in jail, but he pled guilty. That was his decision. My decision is the sentencing. So I can say pause, I want him referred to X for services. To some extent we can't force them to do like I can't force them to sign up for Medicaid, right? But in communication with them, I can say, Hey, listen, if you're willing to do some of these things, I'm willing to give you the benefit. On my side, I can. That's where the discretion is. As a currently, as the hearing Commissioner, I don't have the sentencing discretion. I'm statutorily over allowed to oversee, like, status checks, any decisions to terminate. Go to my actual district court judge who's elected, Judge Jager, so in my current world, I can say, okay, sanctions, but I'm not changing their sentence. They already have, like, a prison sentence that's in place, that's been stayed while they have an opportunity to be on probation.

Scott Groves  23:47  
Interesting, what am I? What am I forgetting? To ask about the law. As far as, like, municipal court, do you also have to do the boring stuff, like, like, jaywalking tickets and stuff like that? Okay, I have a funny story. I'm it's only

Catherine Wiersch  24:00  
boring to you. If you talk to officers, they're like, we take these things serious. They get frustrated as well. And in speaking some of our Henderson police officers, it's like, there's a pressure on them to keep our community safe. Businesses are saying these individuals are bothering, or, you know, they're lingering too long, or they're misusing, or they're sealing, or they're damaging, and so they may remove them. So when we get to our courts and we see a lot of that, kind of just get the case out of here, get the case out of here. You know, it weighs on our officers too, because we're asking them to do it right, but then it's not taken seriously on the other side, yeah,

Scott Groves  24:33  
I could not be a police officer either. I thought about that when I got to the army. That was a no go for me. I need a job where I can just talk to people all day. Funny story about Jay walking. I'm, uh, this is so crazy. I'm driving down the 710 is like a 20 year old in my 20s somewhere. I get pulled over for speeding. Cop comes up out of the car, like, okay, out of the car on the side of the road in handcuffs on like, the 710 freeway. I. And the cop comes back laughing. He's like, Hey, man, when I ran your license plate, you had a warrant for your arrest on this code that I'd never seen before, so I had to, like, call it in and look it up. He's like, you have an arrest warrant for an unpaid jaywalking ticket with the city of Long Beach from, like, four years ago. And I'm like, what? And sure enough, I got this jaywalking ticket running from like a bar to go get a lighter or something for my street, or I go across the street and I don't know I had the wrong address, or I never paid the $25 ticket. So then he's like, Look, man, a lesser cop than me would be taking you to jail, impounding your car. It would be a nightmare. Tomorrow. You have I'm gonna let you go. You have to promise me that you're gonna call Long Beach, that's funny, court and get this taken care of tomorrow. I'm like, okay, cool, freaking out. So I had no idea what I was doing. I was sitting on the curb thinking, like, Oh my God. Like, this is a false identification for a murder or something. I'm going away for the rest of my life. So I go to the movies. Yes, that's a movie. I go to Long Beach, and I'm sitting in the court. And of course, I'm like, the last docket number or something as municipal court, right? So they have everything from they have everything from parking tickets to jaywalking to some guy that got, like, jumped behind a bar and they tried to, like, gouge out his eyes because they didn't want him to be able to testify against them. And, like, you, like, do a do an eyewitness. So I'm like, sitting there with, like, all these criminals. I'm like, I'm getting freaked out. And then same thing judge, like, what is this code number? Like, I can see him trying to figure out. He's like, groves. He's like, are you really in here for a warrant on a jay walking ticket? I'm like, apparently, sir, I'm so sorry. He's like, All right, well, I'm gonna make you pay $165 instead of $25 for wasting my time. Get the hell out of here. And it was just like, that was one of my few interactions with the court. And yeah. So Jay walking tickets are important because if you don't pay them, you're going to end up at least the state of California with a warrant out for your arrest. So I had no question there. That's just a funny story about me.

Catherine Wiersch  26:46  
Our traffic tickets are not criminal anymore.

Scott Groves  26:48  
Oh, that's Oh, that's positive. Okay, sweet. So I'm not gonna get my arrest if I forget to, hey, my whatever. What are like some of the things that you're looking forward to, like overseeing. I know this sounds weird, because, like, nobody looks forward to to people committing crime. Like, what are some of the places that you think you're gonna, like, add value on the edge.

Catherine Wiersch  27:07  
This particular department oversees veteran court in immunosupport, and I'm looking forward to running that court. My husband is a veteran Air Force. My dad was a wall against him, but army, I know he, and he's got a double whammy. He's also a firefighter, so in the Air Force, oh, boy. So he gets it from the police, and they're like, oh, a real heroes are here that he's an airman. So he gets it. He actually got out of the air force so that I wasn't subject to kind of the jurisdictional move as a lawyer, Nellis has 5050, active duty civilian firefighters, so he was able to go back as a civilian. So he's actually a Department of Defense firefighter at Nellis Air Force Base, awesome. So both a veteran and a firefighter. But my point there, my dad's an Army veteran, so thank you for your army service in veterans court. Oftentimes we see with veterans themselves, right? Like just any veteran, pick one, there's humility in their service. There's sometimes that humility prevents them from getting the benefits, the resources, the things that they need. They may not want to talk about the things they've experienced, or not as open to it, or they don't want to acknowledge that it impacted them. I'm very sensitive to that. Both my my husband and my father have disability ratings, so I understand the journey to get them to that point, even just getting the disability rating, and then the everyday navigation of what they're experiencing, and then you add into that, you know, kind of the trauma of being arrested and charged and now you're in a court every day. I know it sounds kind of, you know, morbid to be like, I can't wait to work with the offender veterans, but giving them, or at least being a voice that's understanding in that position, that's compassionate and really is rooting for them, because, you know, the world is tough enough, yeah, and you put in these court programs, and sometimes it feels like there's no celebration, because we're all on probation. What are we celebrating? But the reality is, is we want them to be successful. When they are successful, our community can be thankful for that, and so cheering them on along the way is part of that, building the relationship right with your judge. I'm looking forward to having that with our veterans. I volunteer in different capacities with our veterans, and it's something that I value, that I take seriously, and that I can't wait to do. I mean, as a reward,

Scott Groves  29:39  
I love that obviously soft spot in my heart as a veteran, and knowing some of my veteran friends have had serious challenges mentally and everything in between, I have a weird question. You can choose to talk about it or not. How does a judge maintain a relationship with a police force? Right? Because you already said some complimentary things about the hard job that is. For Henderson, and it's like, I'm thinking, if I'm a police officer and I arrest somebody and you choose to do something I agree or disagree with, like, there's got to be an interesting give and take there, right, between the judicial and the enforcement arm, right? Like, like, is there a tension? There? Is there a partnership there? Is it like nobody's counting the wins and the losses, like, what does the relationship look like between judges and Henderson and the Henderson?

Catherine Wiersch  30:24  
PD, well, I think there has to be, it has to be a respectful relationship, yeah. And I think, you know, in our community, what's often highlighted is the failings of an officer versus how many officers are actually successful following the politics procedures. So I think there is an understanding of, you know, looking at an officer, I'm looking at the best version of it, right until something's proven differently. It's easy for me to go in that space look, just expecting the best from everyone until improving different right? I think oftentimes in a hearing or in a bench trial, that's the opportunity to kind of expose some of those cracks, because that officer is being cross examined, or we're looking at their report. You know, I was a defense attorney. I've read a lot of police reports. I've watched a lot of body cam. You can see the bad choices when they're made, but a majority of them aren't making bad choices. And really, that is the promotion. It's like. That's what I want in my officers. I want them to get training. I want them to have the safest equipment, the training experience, the best, top notch technology, as long as they're trained with it, because that really is what's producing their best performance, for the safety of our community, for the safety of them, for the safety of the person being arrested. So remember, in this in the big picture, the officer is there to collect evidence right? They're, to some extent, gathering facts, pinning them to criteria, elements of the law, and then arresting, right? But the attorney the city or the the prosecutor, is going to look at those facts and the law and make sure that or the charges, and make sure they meet, so they're really the gatekeeper to what charges get filed. So if we get to the point where we're ruling against or we're like, disregarding their testimony as accurate, or something like that, or trying to think of a good scenario, like, if they take the stand, they give a testimony, it conflicts with something, defense makes an argument to dismiss it, or just, you know, would I be able to do that? Yes, because I'm going to be looking at the facts that are in front of me, right? This happens to me every day. As a hearing Commissioner, I have a treatment team that's around me. They are the clinical experts. They've got the clinical initials behind their back, but everything they're presenting to me is a recommendation. I have the discretion to say, I see you, I hear you. How am I going to rule? And as long as I can make that ruling educated, informed, aware of what could happen if I went one way, what could happen if I go the other way? I can make that finding on the Municipal Court Judge side. You know, there's some laws that you could argue either way, right, like right. Argue. It's the argument that's, I can't describe it any better, but if the argument leans against the officer, that's it leans against the officer. To me, it's the respect and the learning moment in that I've had some officers who I speak with who say, you know, some of the best experiences they've had is after a bench trial or a major trial, the defense attorney will meet with them and say, Hey, on on cross when I was questioning you. These were some of the things I was looking at, because in your report, you did XYZ. So it kind of shows them like, Hey, these are areas you can grow, you can change, you can tighten up so that these things don't happen. Because the loser in that situation, if an officer deviates from policy or procedure, really is the victim the community, because the things could still have happened. But now we're dismissing on an evidentiary issue, right? And that can really be the loss for the community, yeah, in certain situations now, does that mean that we should say, Oh, poor officer, you're under a lot of pressure, like, No, we, they took an oath. They've got a standard set. We should hold them to that, but I still think we it can be done in a respectful way.

Scott Groves  34:51  
Yeah, one of the things that you said there about, like, most officers doing all the right things most of the time. One of the things that codified in. My Mind that, like a vast majority of police, police officers are doing exactly the right thing at most of the time, overwhelming majority of time is I have some friends in LAPD, and when they mandated LAPD that every have body cams, the people that were the most excited were the police officers, because they're like, Hey, I know I'm doing everything right. I love the idea of having video footage of this interaction, so that the accused can't come back and be like, they slammed my head into the police car. They did this. They did that. They planted the drugs, they planted the whatever. And so like, the funny thing is, universally, every police officer I talked to, they're like, Oh, we love body cams. It eliminates 99% of the He Said, She Said, in our life, because it's like, no, there's, there's video evidence. We can just go to the game tape. So I think that's just a piece of evidence for the departments that have adopted body cams, that they're like, we now have millions of hours of video footage that most police interactions are handling exactly the way they should be. I don't even really have a question there. I just want to make a point, because I'm no, it's a great

Catherine Wiersch  35:58  
you are really smart. Your experiences matter. We're here building your relationship.

Scott Groves  36:03  
Well, read. I just read a lot of random stuff, and that was one of the things that I read,

Catherine Wiersch  36:06  
well, and to kind of piggyback on that, I so in the mental health crisis world, there's a whole training world behind that, because officers get called on crisis, and then they call medic, if you know fire comes it's a whole process for de escalation versus arrest things of that nature. But there's some training that goes on there in the police departments that I assist with. When I switched over to hearing Commissioner, my thought was, why am I limiting myself just to the mental health kind of understanding of how these scenarios are going down and what these officers are experiencing? Because for me, in that in that capacity, it was we have participants in some of our mental health programs that we if they're the best of the best, and they're behaving well, and they're Medicaid and all the things we will allow them to go to the training so the officers can actually speak to somebody whose baseline is hearing voices, delusions, things like that, right? So having that engagement for the officers is really important. It's like a real life person, rather than like in the book, you're gonna walk up upon somebody who's hearing voices, right? Hard to

Scott Groves  37:16  
understand how a schizophrenic is gonna react from a textbook, right?

Catherine Wiersch  37:20  
So then I volunteered to be on the police Citizens Academy. All of the departments have it, and if you haven't done it, you should go do it. It's very eye opening to understand what your police officer is going through, because it's one thing to read a police report or even just to watch about. I mean, if you watch body cam. I'm not sure that there's anyone I know that watches it and doesn't feel a certain way, the anxiety of what they're about to watch, or like, the nerves of, oh my gosh, this officer has to, you know, draw his weapon he's about to shoot. And it's like, I can't imagine being in that environment, right? So for me, going to the citizen Academy, they do it's, I think it's 12 weeks. Henderson is it's either eight or 12 weeks. You're in a voluntary capacity, but they rotate you through everything. They bring in, you know what it's like to be booked, what it's like, what the officers go through in their weapon training. They bring in all the bells and whistles like SWAT comes in. They brought in the little robots and the drones, and they wait.

Scott Groves  38:23  
This is just open to citizens of Henderson. You have to apply, and you have to clear the background. Should you like a mini Academy type thing? You don't know,

Catherine Wiersch  38:30  
I'm not, I didn't actually get to participate like a police officer, okay? But you get to see what they're getting. See you get that, that perspective of the Riverside. They bring in the officers from all of their units to come in. You get to talk to them, ask them questions. They brought in the fingerprint like the CS, the CSI people, so they could go through what it looks like. They took us to the shooting range to see how the officers are trained with their weapons. A lot of just eye opening experiences that really help you understand the words on the page have so much training attached to them, right? So it's a better understanding, a better respect for what the officer is going through. And I think that all plays into, you know, a scene when, when that crime is occurring, like, what is that officer going through at the same time, of what this individual is going through, and what does the law say? And it's all very complex.

Scott Groves  39:26  
You know, your your resume, your life experience, your volunteer experience. I don't know a lot, but seems like it's like tailor made for what you want to do next, which is be a judge. Like, I'm not just saying that to flatter you. We just met. I don't really, I don't really care about flattery, but, like, Was this part of the plan? Like, did you always know you wanted to be a judge? Or is it just like, This experience has kind of cascaded you to this moment?

Catherine Wiersch  39:51  
Yeah, I think five years ago, I wasn't pregnant with my son. I was sitting in my kitchen, and I remember my husband telling. Me You should be a judge. And I was like, no way do I want that burden or that responsibility? I would rather, you know, be on one side to just fight for rights. What I what got me and kind of switched my trajectory was that once I got into the mental health world and I was really trying to navigate the rights of these patients that they're in the hospital, but also just understanding how much they lacked resources. And on an intercept point, when we're looking at an individual, we can see them pre arrest, the behaviors that are leading up, and then we have that intercept point one, where they get arrested. And so now we go, okay, where's the trajectory for that? Now, I had to beg to get into rooms, because I would be like, I have a whole group of people that are civil. They've never even had, you know, some of them have never had an arrest yet. And I'm telling you, they need services. They need better access to stuff, and with the public defender's office, they're very often invited to the table. So I would piggyback. I would be like, you're going to that meeting, boss. I'm going with you. You can't make it. I'll go for you. I want to be in that room. What I quickly learned was that the judges were invited to that room. So I said, Well, if we're going to I could fight for the rights and and track down every room to be in, and really just push my way, bring my chair. What do they say? Like, bring your own, your own chair to the table, or I could be the one invited, or I could be the one planning the meetings. So for me, it was another opportunity to navigate this world with a commitment to follow the law, a commitment to respect the law, the Constitution, all that goes with it, but also bring the experience to say, where are we headed? We're headed in a place where mental health is a hot topic right now, right? And you know my frustration is, is is the judge that's on this seat has been there for about three years. No progress has been made in that space. The other opponent I have, he's been pro teming, like substituting for almost 10 years. No, no advancements there. So sometimes they like say, Yeah, we need help with mental health. And I'm like, but what are we doing about it? It's been in front of us for so long. Words are great. Where are we going? Actions are better, right? And, and, because it's such a hot topic right now, when I go into spaces and I tell people what I do, I mean, their eyes get wide. They're like, you deal with suicidal and homicidal ideation every day for hours, and you still go home eat cake, and you're a pleasant human and I'm like, yes, because there's hope there, right? Like, I'm meeting in the community, and as much as we want to be frustrated, there are organizations all over our city trying to do amazing things with the people that they have access to. We should be supporting them. We should be incorporating them. We should be hearing them, listening to them, believing them, bringing them to the table. So I'm tired of begging to be at the table, I'm just going to bring I'm going to make the meeting myself.

Scott Groves  43:02  
Meeting myself logistically. When is the election? Is there a runoff? Is there a primary? Like to walk us through for people that only vote once every four years in the presidential election, what I try to tell people all the time is like your local election affects you so much more than whether it's Biden or Trump. Like these things are important. I voted a federal level, but it blows my mind. I think I was reading some stat the other day, or somebody, somebody in the legislator, was telling me they were like, we're we're killing it if we get a 30 to 40% turnout for federal elections when there's a president of all eligible voters in your city, it's like 7% of people show up for a local election. So if you are the type of person like me who bitches about politics or bitches about, you know, highway ABC being under construction, or bitching about how the cops are paid too much or too little, or whatever your complaint is, if you're not part of the 7% that like votes locally, you should probably shut your mouth. So that's my little rant. So can you talk about how we how our how our system works in Henderson, sure. So the

Catherine Wiersch  44:04  
local elections matter, and we think, I think we have two things going for us this cycle. One, we're really seeing in this particular administration, how important our judges are. That is everywhere. So when I go to places, they go, Oh, you're a judge. Like, can you how do you feel about immigration? How do you feel? And I'm like, Whoa, that's federal. Let's talk local and how it affects your community, right? That's where, kind of, like my everyday stuff, when I talk about mental health services or substance abuse services, probably one out of every two people you know, like 5050, they have someone in their life that's dealt with something, or that is currently dealing with something. So it's easy for me to connect them with the way that our local our municipal courts are affected, and that there's that awareness that judges matter. So I think it is definitely if you have the opportunity to meet your judges, you should. The other thing that we have going for us right now is this particular election cycle. We have some key figures in here. Anderson that are up for re election, Mayor. It mayor's up, and then there's a council person up. I think there's four people in each race. It might be four for the mayor and three in council. But point is, is they're in the news. They're in the media. Different things going on. It is stirring the buzz. People are going to turn out this vote, even though it's not a presidential election. So that's why it's so important to me. I'm not going to reveal all of my secrets, but like, why I get to the community and I go places, because knowing your voter and and trying to tell them like, this can be this can happen. How does it work? Primaries are in June 9. June 9, June primary. Your early voting ballots will drop in. You should be receiving them kind of the middle of May. You can vote by mail or you can go in person on June 9. The city charter for Henderson allows for a primary regardless of how many people are in the race. Most cities, like city of Las Vegas or our county court, it's if it's more than three or more than two, I'm sorry, you would get a primary. We are getting a primary. We have three people in this municipal court race. So on June 10, when I wake up in the morning and I've earned 51% of that vote, I could win outright. Got it on June 10, if the votes, whoever votes that day is split, say it's like 3534 31 I know mathematically that may not equal 100 but like the top two will go to general in November.

Unknown Speaker  46:34  
And then when's the general? November?

Catherine Wiersch  46:38  
6? Was it the sixth or the third? All the things I prepared for, I didn't look at the calendar. No, it's fine. I'm taking one day at a time. You don't have to

Scott Groves  46:48  
worry about November, because you're just gonna get 51% of the vote on June. I will tell you November 3. November 3, the last judge that we interviewed, she won 51% so I think, I think I'm the trendsetter in the community. You're the lucky charm. Yeah, exactly two years ago, I interviewed her for a previous podcast I was doing, and poor girl drove all the way out here, and then I could tell as soon as she got here, she's like, you're not even in my district. I'm like, whatever. We'll get to some good social media clips. And then when she won, she sent me a little coin. She's like, I think I won just because you're a podcast. So that was pretty cool. So, yeah, I'm sure you'll just set the same trend and we'll have only winners on this podcast. I love that. This is why I can't have people that like our whoever calls first they get on the podcast, because I'm like, Well, I gotta set the trend that we only highlight winners. And if I have two people for the same seat, then I then I'll have a loser. So what other questions about your resume Did I forget to ask? Maybe you as a person or or, you know, life experience, I forgot to ask you. Obviously, we heard you have a husband, if you have a family, dogs, cats,

Catherine Wiersch  47:46  
I think one of the ques. I mean, if I looked at, if I thought about, okay, what could be some of the questions people have, you know, I don't have, I mean, I look at, but I am in my 40s, but I've only been an attorney for going on eight years, most people go, Oh, is that enough to have the experience? And my comment is yes, because it's not that I've only been an attorney for eight years. I've been in the legal space for almost 20 right? I worked my way up from Secretary. I answered phones at a law firm. I know what it means to respect every person along the way. That's what it takes to run a court, because the court is not just the bench in the robe and the gavel. It's your clerk, your judicial assistant, it's your marshals that are in that room. It's the attorneys that appear it's building that respect with everyone, so that your courtroom runs efficiently. I understand that from a everyday position, because I worked my way up, I knew what it meant to provide a professional, respectful relationship to the people above me to the people below me. So for me, that's just part of my experience. I learned what it was to hustle and grind and get it done. Yeah, so again, people might, you know, I get that criticism, like, Oh, you're too or you're really young to run. And I'm like, I don't know why we have an age decision, but sometimes people would say, You're too old to still be there. So like, which is it right? Right? So that might be a question I get sometimes, with viewers, sometimes, you know, particular type of people say, Well, you're a mother, your kids are young. Is this going to impact you? Can you really make these decisions when children are involved, yes, community safety and safety. I'm committed to the safety, because this is my home, right? It's not just a space where I'm like, Yeah, I go to the grocery store. I'm going to grocery store with my children. I'm going to the parks with my children. Yeah, I have a very great understanding of the impact of my decisions, because I'm out living in the community with my children, with my husband, who's a first responder, I want him to come home just as much as I want my law enforcement officers to go to their families. I want my husband's job, you know, when he's responding to emergencies and having to fill out paperwork, I want him to get all the training, do all the. Training, please don't mess up, don't forget to so many emergencies can happen. You know, from the improper clipping of like a gas mask, you just want every thing to be covered, right? I want that same training for my law enforcement, for my marshals, for the social workers, for all of them, because that truly is the safety that I want to see in my community. I want my businesses to grow and boom and succeed. I live off of Lake maldor. I'm born and raised here. I know the reputation that lake made in Boulder has, and I've seen it go through ebbs and flows of business success. I've seen that corner store change business over and over and over the name change. I've seen Water Street come and go and thrive. And when I go and I talk to those businesses about their safety and their community and the crimes they are experiencing, they have a good relationship with their law enforcement. I can respect all of that because it's my community. It's where I'm going. What's your favorite

Scott Groves  51:03  
thing about the law? I feel the passion about why you want to serve in the called a judgeship. Judicial, judiciary. Okay, I feel that. What do you like about the law? Like, what drew you to it?

Catherine Wiersch  51:15  
Originally, originally. I think I mentioned this. My dad was, wanted to be a business person when he was, when I was younger, he was a baker, and so he had opened up bakeries, and really wanted to connect in that way with the community. He just had random things that would happen, like, I remember we run, he rented, he leased a space on trop and Pecos. There used to be a bank. There's a bank America on one side, but there used to be a bank on the other side, and there's a vault in there. My dad had that corner space where the wall was right in the middle of the vault, and his square footage rent, you know, was x, and then one day he went to get the floor retired, and he was like, that's not my square footage. It's supposed to be this. And they were like, There's no way. There's a vault cut line. Like, it would have to be all the way over there. And then, you know, he became, he got in this lease battle about, like, you've been overcharging me for how long? Like, because it's vault. And then so there were just things where I always thought, well, that doesn't seem right. Like the rules say x, like, wire. Why do we have to fight so hard to get what's right right? And so that was kind of my first kind of view. I just watched my dad strive to do right things, and then, you know, he got into gambling and gaming and stuff like that, so that thwarted him, but he always wanted more and wanted better. So I mean, my dad was he would always tell me, go be a prosecutor. They make all the money. But that's not entirely true. My husband sometimes will be like, Oh, are you gonna be a private attorney one day? And I'm like, no, that sounds exhausting. Yeah, there's a billable requirement there, you know, and there's and I like the idea that you can have access to a great attorney at the public defender's office. You can have a great attorney at no cost to you. The quality of your advocacy shouldn't depend on your income, so it kind of just matched with who I am.

Scott Groves  53:16  
That's awesome. Yeah, completely switching gears. Since we're a local podcast, what do you love most about Henderson? What are some of your favorite hot spots?

Catherine Wiersch  53:24  
I am often on Water Street, okay, um, all up and down it. I love public works as I sit and do work there. Yeah, their coffee's great.

Scott Groves  53:35  
My partner's daughter works there. Oh, great. Peyton, tall girl, short hair.

Catherine Wiersch  53:38  
She's awesome. There's coo goose cafe. That's where I usually do my meetings. If I'm going to eat, it's, you know, I'm at chanitas. I'm at flaming wands. We have a lot of great little spots on there, like Archer and Jean is a great resale space for children's stuff, so I'm constantly going in there. Rachel's really great. I mean, we have so many the scoops ice cream place that is my favorite. They have a rewards program

Scott Groves  54:06  
so I don't like, I don't really like caramel, I don't really like apple pie. I They told me when I walked in there, because I was doing some content for the for the newsletter. I was like, hey, just surprise me with your favorite thing. And they're like, apple caramel, blah blah, blah, blah, blah shake. I was like, Oh, God, I asked for them to give me their favorite and now I can't, like, go back on and just be like, give me a scoop of vanilla. So I'm like, whatever. I'll try it. I'm like, This is gonna be horrible. I'll walk out. I'll, like, throw it in the trash, because none of these, none of these ingredients, sound like

Unknown Speaker  54:33  
anything I would like. So you're, like, a plain Jane

Scott Groves  54:35  
kind of Yeah, I'm pretty plain guy. And I took a drink of that shake, and it is the most tasty thing I've ever put in my mouth. So I told our girl, Val, who does content like, hey, go back to scoops, just because you want to try your ice cream. Do some more content with them. That plays one of my fairs. What's a business missing on Water Street that we need?

Catherine Wiersch  54:51  
We even used to go to the jiu jitsu my daughter was in the Jiu Jitsu, unlimited jujitsu there, because my other favorite spot is down st rose. I mean, I remember when St rose. You would drive, and it would stop right after the hospital. Now you can go miles and miles and miles, and they have all these kind of cute little coffee shop. Does it ring place over there? There's a bunch of great burgers, songs way down at the end has, like, amazing margaritas. What's missing on Water Street?

Scott Groves  55:14  
I'll give you mine. You need a really good bagel shop. Oh, I don't want to go to Einstein's middle fence Einstein's. No offense, science, I just

Catherine Wiersch  55:23  
don't want to go to the bakery. That's like,

Scott Groves  55:25  
bakery is amazing, yeah, and I eat all their stuff when I'm at public works. Like, they have the best like lemons, lemon muffin, something poppy seed. It's amazing. But I really want a good bagel spot, just like eggs, Bagel, like something for breakfast. So can somebody, I've mentioned this on like five podcasts, can some entrepreneur please open an amazing bagel shop. I don't know how

Catherine Wiersch  55:43  
to cook an old people New York bagel like I want. Yes, it's fresh made, see. And this is the problem I have in in life in general, is because my dad was a baker, I'm really particular about my baked goods, but I love that bakery you can, you walk in, and it's nostalgia for me. I'm like, I can smell the baker in that space. And I love when public works, when I first got one of their desserts, and I was like, this is from that yes,

Scott Groves  56:07  
yes, for sure. Loving poppy seed. Go try it.

Catherine Wiersch  56:10  
Yeah, bagels would be good. Bagels would be good. I live out in cadence. Now, we just got, you know, Pts opened, which I'm usually a fan of the dive bars. One of my favorite bars is hammers, which is on collagen horizon. They used to do karaoke. I like when a bar has something else going on, because I'm not a big drinker. So I like when there's a live band or a local band karaoke. Hammers used to have, like Ninja karaoke, where you would be leveled up, you know, PT is opened. It's walking distance. So I imagine, you know, some of that will be kind of incorporated in we did get a nine sign bagels, but I agree. I want, like, that home bagel. I want to see the hand roll. My dad used to hand roll bagels. Now you can, like, use this machine.

Scott Groves  57:01  
Yeah, where do people find you donate to you, learn more about you,

Catherine Wiersch  57:04  
all that fun stuff. So I always tell people, not everybody can vote for me, but everyone can donate to me. But my story kind of just more about who I am and and my commitment to the community and why I want to run or why I want to serve, is on Catherine for judge.com that's the number four. My name is with a C, not a K, yes, Catherine for Judge dot that's right. I'm Catherine for judge on Instagram. Catherine for judge on Facebook. I'm there's a donation link there. There's opportunities to volunteer events that we're hosting. We're hosting a fundraiser at who songs on April 29 open to the community, free tacos. Who doesn't love free tacos, right? I love

Scott Groves  57:47  
free tacos. You should come. Gonna go get something. I'm gonna go get some tacos as soon as this is over at fastos.

Catherine Wiersch  57:51  
So, but that's where, that's where you can find me.

Scott Groves  57:55  
Awesome. Well, thanks for being on and when you're like a big celebrity judge in, I guess about 790, days or so after the primaries, will you and Lance come back in to do like, a

Catherine Wiersch  58:04  
victory lap? Yeah, we'll do a victory lap. Okay, perfect. We'll see, and we'll, we'll have to, like, add a little trademark that, like, you produce winners, or don't think, yeah, tall winners,

Scott Groves  58:13  
winners by Scott at headers in HQ. I love that. All right. Hey, thanks for coming in. I know your time is very valuable with work and all the stuff that you're doing for the campaign. So I really do appreciate you coming in. Yeah, thanks for having me. We'll talk to you in 90 days when you win. That's right. Hey, it's Scott groves with the Henderson HQ podcast. I hope you got something out of that episode. If you enjoyed it, please don't forget to like, comment and subscribe to the podcast. It really helps the show grow. And by the way, if you are a business owner, or you know a business owner who has an interesting product service or just an interesting backstory, please, please get in touch with us. Email us at the Henderson hq@gmail.com, we would love to interview you, because that's what this show is all about. It's about building community, supporting local, individually owned businesses, and just making Henderson a great place to live. And don't forget, go to Henderson hq.com and make sure you sign up for our newsletter. We send out a once a week newsletter, no spam, about the most interesting local businesses, hot spots, restaurants, community events. Thanks for watching the show. Really appreciate you. You.