TRAVIS COUNTY, Texas -- Chimene Onyeri is accused of trying to kill State District Judge Julie Kocurek to avoid going to prison in 2015.
Onyeri's trial could last well into May.
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The case forced Texas to improve security at courthouses statewide. Part of that included hiring Hector Gomez as the state's first court security director. Gomez served in the U.S. Marshals Service for more than 30 years before taking on the new role.
"It is all about making our courthouses safer," Gomez said. "The primary mission of the Marshals Service was the protection of the judiciary, so that had been honed into my experience way back 30-plus years ago."
The Judge Julie Kocurek Judicial and Courthouse Security Act of 2017 did the following:
- creates a judicial security division to serve as a central resource for best security practices
- requires presiding municipal and administrative judges to create court security committees for all courts served by that judge
- makes sure court security officers receive specialized court security training in their first year
- changes the way security incidents at court buildings are reported, making it law enforcement's responsibility to report security incidents instead of the judges
"(Law enforcement is) mandated to report within three days to the Office of Core Administration any incident that happens in a courthouse," Gomez said.
Gomez has been on the job three months now and said because of the changes, he's already seen a 175 percent increase in incident reporting.
So far, Gomez has reviewed security practices at several Texas courthouses, making tailored security recommendations for each one.
"The public, the court participants, the employees and the judges all have an expectation of being secure in the building," Gomez said.
In the future, Gomez will be working on a plan for analysts to monitor threats to judges on a 24/7 basis. The goal is to make sure a case like Kocurek doesn't happen again.