Judges Are Human, But Is It Wrong to Want Them to Be Better Than That?

Are judges becoming less ethical or are they being held more accountable? There’s no way to tell with just anecdotal evidence, but the ethics of judges has been making more of a presence lately in legal headlines.

One family court judge in Pennsylvania has been accused of berating litigants, not giving proper notice to attorneys, handing out heavy-handed results, and failing to enter orders in a timely manner. She was transferred to the civil appeals division while the ethics complaints are pending.

An Ohio judge pleaded guilty to murdering his ex-wife! He had previously stepped down from the bench in 2015 after assaulting the same woman. He had also been a prosecutor, a congressional aide, and a state legislator. He served nine months in jail for the first assault, and was suspended indefinitely from the practice of law, however, the Ohio Supreme Court rejected disbarment at that time because the assault did not involve “dishonesty, abuse of his judicial office, premeditation or a pattern of bad behavior.”

In a New Jersey courtroom, a judge let his bias get the best of him when he harangued a litigant about the part she was playing in a love triangle and called her paramour a “knucklehead.” His ethics complaint centers around a lack of impartiality and impugning the integrity of the judiciary. 

The federal courts are not immune from knuckleheaded moves either, and hitting the “reply all” button clearly falls into this category. A U.S. Court of Appeals judge in Washington, D.C., did just that when he received some information about a climate change seminar from a lower court judge. His reply scolded the district court judge for getting outside of his official duties and even alleged an ethics complaint of his own. For now, the circuit court judge has been removed from any review of the lower court judge’s opinions. 

Most of these examples of bad behavior are pretty extreme. Judges are human, and certainly some mistakes can and should be tolerated, but it seems like lately this type of behavior is becoming more common. At least it is not being accepted as the norm. This doesn’t just highlight individual behavior; it reflects upon the whole justice system.