'Seen and not heard' Jury commissioner and head bailiff Pete Barnes recounts 33 years

One time in 33 years.

That is how often Pete Barnes slipped his sidearm from its belly holster and pointed its cold muzzle in the direction of another human.

In this case, it was three humans and the call to which Barnes, the First District Court jury commissioner, responded seemed as sinister as one he remembered from the news.

“The first thing I thought about was the Beltway snipers,” Barnes said.

Barnes, a former deputy, jailer and bailiff, oversees a cadre of more than 20 Kootenai County court employees charged with providing security and ensuring order in the 14 county courtrooms spread across three Coeur d’Alene locations.

It’s a job he enjoys in part because, despite appearing mundane to the general public, the work requires the ability to transition from filing records to calming a court disturbance, often a moment’s notice.

The incident in the Kootenai County Justice Building parking lot unfolded with a car backing into a judge’s parking space. Its trunk was pointed at the judge’s court entrance. Three people were hidden inside the trunk as if waiting to do harm.

Less than a decade earlier, in Washington, D.C., a group of teens hidden in a car’s trunk shot through a keyhole, killing 10 people.

Barnes and a deputy ordered the people in the courthouse parking lot out of the trunk at gunpoint. They were teenagers engaged in a gag.

Nothing serious.

“That was really a spooky episode, even though they meant no harm,” he said.

Although he doesn’t often resort to the tools on his utility belt, such as the 9 mm Glock or the stun gun, one of Barne’s pacification efforts is documented for posterity in a YouTube video by a man whose tilty demeanor seemed threatening to courthouse patrons. When bailiffs a few years ago prohibited Coeur d’Alene resident Robert Peterson from bringing his video camera into the courtroom where he was contesting a traffic ticket, Peterson told him to step aside. The confrontation escalated until Barnes used his Taser to stun Peterson.

The incident brought Barnes an unwanted 15 minutes of fame. The YouTube video got mixed reviews.

“There’s not much to say about it,” Barnes mused.

When Barnes joined the county as a floor bailiff in the 1990s, he had worked as a deputy, a jailer and a bailiff in Bonners Ferry and Sandpoint. He joined the staff of six bailiffs in the courthouse, which did not have security screeners to ensure no weapons passed through the door.

The number of courthouse security officers has grown since then to 17 bailiffs and seven screeners.

“We’re feeling the effect of the population increase,” Barnes said.

Since he joined the force, the daily court dockets have expanded. The Coeur d’Alene jurisdiction sees 110 to 135 jury trials annually; 5,000 jurors take part in the process. Bailiffs make sure that 50 inmates are safely transported to court rooms each day. They act as public information officers to the court’s daily grind of visitors. One key component that every bailiff must provide is great customer service .

“They must be polite and cordial,” Barnes said. “They must be good decision makers and have confidence in their abilities.”

Many bailiffs have military or law enforcement backgrounds, but it’s not a requirement. Former tech workers are just as likely to be hired.

“Being a good typist never hurts,” Barnes said.

Caring for jurors is among a bailiff’s main duties aside from courthouse and courtroom security.

“We have to take good care of jurors, provide them with everything they need, so the trial runs smoothly,” he said.

That means guarding jurors as well as ensuring they follow the judge’s orders in and outside of the courtroom.

Barnes’ most memorable experience as a bailiff was the Aryan Nations trial in Coeur d’Alene. Local and national media, law enforcement and the public converged on the courthouse for weeks, providing the small bailiff’s office with security challenges that required enlisting local police, deputies and even the FBI.

Less grandiose but just as real are the attempted prisoner break-outs.

Not long ago, bailiffs walked a young man from a courtroom after the judge ordered his arrest. The man, his hands cuffed behind his back, made a run for it.

“There were a lot of people behind him,” Barnes said. “He could run pretty good with his hands cuffed behind him.”

He was snagged near the Paul Bunyan burger joint a block away.

If there’s an outstanding attribute that bailiffs should possess, it’s the quiet confidence, and the poise required of people working in an emotional and often tense environment.

“The best kind of bailiff,” Barnes said, “is seen and not heard.”