South Carolina’s top judge wants to take a bold new look at domestic violence and how poor minorities are treated in the state’s criminal courts.

Jean Toal — the state’s first female Supreme Court chief justice — is expected to discuss those issues and other priorities for the state’s courts when interviewed today for a new term as chief justice.

Toal, 60, is scheduled to appear before the S.C. Judicial Merit Selection Commission, a 10-member panel of mostly lawmakers who nominate candidates to the state Legislature. The General Assembly will vote on the nominees in a joint session tentatively set for Feb. 4.

Toal became chief justice in 2000, filling the unexpired term of Ernest Finney Jr., who retired. She made state history in 1988 by becoming the first woman to join the five-member high court.

Toal, who as chief justice has moved aggressively to bring the state’s courts into the Internet age, is expected to sail through her latest election bid. She has no opposition and no complaints have been filed about her with the screening commission.

“She is a very capable person, a very capable chief justice,” said state Rep. Greg Delleney Jr., R-Chester, the commission’s vice chairman, said Monday. “She is one of the smartest lawyers in the entire state.”

Toal could face some personal questions during her hearing, including some about a May 2001 traffic accident in which she sideswiped a parked car near her Columbia home. Toal admitted she had been drinking before the accident, though she denied she was drunk.

But Delleney, a lawyer, does not plan to ask Toal about that incident. “That’s been investigated by the judicial standards committee and dismissed. If they dismissed it, I don’t see anything that would be disqualifying about it.”

The screening commission recently asked Toal to respond to a number of written questions about her views on the state judicial system. The topics ranged from broad trends in the law to technology issues.

In her 17-page response, Toal called for the creation of a “blue ribbon commission” to study issues involving domestic violence; sentencing patterns for poor, minority defendants; and the state sexual offender registry.

Toal said domestic violence cases “need to be given more attention early on.”

She said in all the death penalty cases she has reviewed in her 15 years on the court, there were only two in which the defendant was “not subjected to violent abuse as a child and teenager.”

South Carolina ranks No. 1 in the nation in the rate of women killed by men, according a study released this year by the non-profit Violence Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Laura Hudson, spokeswoman for the S.C. Victim Assistance Network, praised Toal for her ongoing commitment to preventing domestic violence.

“I don’t think it’s a new interest of hers,” she said. “I think it’s been there for quite a while.”

Regarding state sentencing patterns, Toal said current mandatory minimum terms for drug crimes have “greatly affected the level of incarceration of South Carolina’s youngest citizens and African American citizens, particularly those with lower incomes.”

She pointed out that about 25 percent of the state’s 4 million people are under 18 and about a third are minorities. The state ranks 38th in the nation in per-capital income.

“We are thus impacting a significant portion of our population when we disproportionately incarcerate the young, the poor and the minority citizen,” Toal wrote. “Sentencing and incarceration issues need to be examined not only in terms of financial costs but also in terms of human cost.”

Toal’s report also addressed a variety of issues affecting the S.C. justice system. For example, she said:

• The state’s courts are “really becoming stressed by the lack of consistent, reliable funding.” The judicial department’s general fund in recent years has been cut from $43 million to $32 million.

• There is a “disconnect” between funding for indigent defendants in death penalty cases and poor defendants charged with lesser crimes. Capital cases are “well funded,” while other defendants in other cases typically are represented by underpaid court-appointed lawyers.

• The state still doesn’t have enough minority judges, but that number will grow when there is a “greater pool” of minority lawyers. The judicial department often competes with private law firms that offer “much higher” salaries.

• “No good system” exists for assuring there are enough qualified translators for Spanish and other non-English speaking participants in the state’s courts. More money is needed to implement a statewide certification system.

Toal said she also wants to continue her push to link all court documents statewide through the Internet: 43 of the 46 main county courthouses now have reliable high-speed Internet access.

Reach Brundrett at (803) 771-8484 or rbrundrett@thestate.com.