The bankruptcy proceedings for the City of Detroit are making good use of mediation. Judge Steven Rhodes, who is overseeing the bankruptcy, appointed U.S. District Judge Gerald Rosen as lead mediator last August, and Judge Rosen assembled a team of mediators, comprised of four federal judges as well as Attorney Gene Driker, an esteemed Michigan mediator who received the State Bar of Michigan ADR Section’s Distinguished Service Award in 2012.

The mediation team has experienced both successes and setbacks. Today was another success story: the mediation team announced that Detroit reached a tentative agreement with 14 of its unions. The team also brokered a deal recently with the Retired Police and Firefighters Association involving pensions and health care benefits. A setback occurred in January when Judge Rhodes rejected the deal hammered out with two banks that are major creditors of the city, UBS and Bank of America. Last week, Judge Rhodes ordered officials from Detroit and Oakland, Macomb and Wayne Counties last week to go into closed mediation to continue talks toward creating a regional water authority.

Mediation is not often used in municipal bankruptcies but perhaps Detroit’s experience will open doors for new opportunities in the future.

It happened again last week: a shooting after a mediation. As a divorcing couple was leaving the attorney-mediator’s office in Manchester, Tennessee, last Wednesday, the wife pulled out a handgun and shot her estranged husband. The husband, Dr. Henry Bartee, is recovering in hospital, and the wife, Brenda Bartee, has been charged with attempted murder.

According to one account, the wife left the law office before the husband, retrieved a gun, and came back and shot him. This version sounds eerily similar to the post-mediation homicides in Phoenix in January, where the plaintiff left the mediation, went to his car to retrieve his gun, and returned to the lobby just as the defendant and his attorney were exiting the building. The plaintiff shot both of them dead, then killed himself.

Could this have been prevented? It’s recommended protocol in domestic cases to screen for domestic violence, and screening might have elicited cause for concern: apparently Mrs. Bartee shot at her husband last year, while they were sitting in his car. She was charged with aggravated domestic violence for that incident. Did the mediator know this history? If so, did the mediator take any precautions?

Mediator Paula Marie Young recommends mediators take these steps:
1. Keep people in separate waiting rooms.
2. Make sure adequate staff is present to handle a situation.
3. Ask people to leave guns with the mediator’s secretary.
4. Get skill in dealing with threats.
5. Get skill in dealing with overt acts of violence.
6. Escort people to their cars after sessions.
7. Create staggered departures.
8. Adequately train yourself and your staff to spot and properly intervene in potentially violent situations.
9. Hold telephone/Skype mediations instead.
(posted at http://www.abajournal.com/mobile/comments/woman_charged)

I might add: consider holding the mediation in a facility with a metal detector, such as a courthouse. That will at least prevent the shooting from occurring within the building, as happened in Boca Raton in 2002, where a brother shot and killed his sister during a probate mediation.

Unfortunately, as more people are permitted to carry concealed weapons, there are likely to be more shootings in connection with mediations. Mediators cannot prevent this, but we can sure try.