Northpinellas: Court clerk says she wasn't told of glitch

CLEARWATER -- Employees in Pinellas Clerk of Court Karleen DeBlaker's office were shocked to learn in March that a computer bug led to the outcome of at least 60,000 traffic cases not being reported to the state.

DeBlaker wasn't shocked. That's because she didn't know.

DeBlaker, 71, said in an interview last week that none of her subordinates informed her in late March about the computer bug that led to everything from speeding tickets to DUI cases not being reported. The final tally of unreported case outcomes came to 76,394.

In her first interview since the St. Petersburg Times reported the problem Aug. 9, DeBlaker said her workers didn't tell her until the last week of July. She doesn't know why they waited so long.

"I think they figured it was all fixed and there was no need to tell me," said DeBlaker, who had been vacationing overseas and was unavailable to comment until Friday. "They probably should have reported it. On the other hand, if it's already fixed, why bring it up? It's already corrected and done."

Bert Swanson, a University of Florida professor of political science who is an expert in urban and local government, said elected leaders should have a handle on significant problems in their offices. "That's inexcusable," he said of DeBlaker's lack of knowledge on the traffic glitch. "I'm not saying anybody is being lazy. But there's management. And then there's management. Voters have a right to expect their leaders to know about this kind of stuff."

DeBlaker, who has been the clerk since 1981, earns $130,680 a year overseeing an office with a $35.7-million budget and 614 employees. She said it is impossible in such a large office to know about every detail.

Her employees "are getting told that they need to report things from now on," DeBlaker said. "I'm telling them that. They should have reported it (to me). It's a little late now to worry about it. . . . I think maybe somebody did drop the ball. But not to any great degree."

Asked why her workers waited until late July to tell her, DeBlaker said, "You'll have to ask them."

Carol Heath, assistant director of the clerk's court services division, learned about the problem in a March 29 memo from the county's information technology office. The unreported cases ranged from 1996 to early 2002.

Heath did not return a call for comment on Tuesday on when she specifically told DeBlaker, though she said in previous interviews that DeBlaker had been told.

DeBlaker acknowledges the problem was a significant one. Drivers whose licenses should have been suspended or revoked because of infractions were able to stay on the roads. Some drivers got an undeserved break on their auto insurance.

Hints of the problem surfaced in 1999 when county computer personnel first discovered the glitch. But they say they didn't know about the significance of the problem until early 2002.

In any case, DeBlaker's subordinates said in interviews last month that they incorrectly assumed computer personnel had fixed the problem in 1999.

DeBlaker similarly doesn't recall being told about any computer problem in 1999. "I don't ever remember being told," she said.

DeBlaker acknowledged that her office, the official custodian of millions of court and county records, bears responsibility for the traffic infractions not immediately being reported to the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.

The data was finally reported by August.

While acknowledging the traffic glitch was significant, DeBlaker downplayed the impact on citizens.

"These people are guilty," she said, speaking of drivers whose traffic infraction dispositions weren't reported.

"They did whatever they did and they deserve to pay whatever penalty there was."

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