26 thoughts on “Should a judge be disqualified from a case if they previously worked in the same firm as one of the lawyers or experts? Poll #19”
It would be better if they become a judge ,that they would be required to move to a different county or state. The problem would be the same as to funding for reelection would still come from the lawyers for favors.
I’ll second your suggestion. I similar option is to insert a multiyear period after leaving the firm before becoming eligible to be a Judge in his/her current district. Districts are close enough that it’s not an “Undue Burden” for them to move. – we all know they will readily force us to do even more. This “clean” approach not only stems conflict of interest in cases involving his/her prior firm but all cases involving all prior attorney associates period. The reverse should also be barred – leaving Judgeship and immediately entering practice.
Absolutely. This is a nightmare and this system is corrupt enough.
Judges and guardians who in open court admit to being friends should also recuse themselves. Guardians should not be friends with the judge nor the lawyers…Guardians should not be hobnobbing with their employers or their bosses….clearly that is not acceptable.
I also believe that NO mediators or GALS should be court appointed.. and that ONE is not enough for both parties. A list of GALS/MEDIATORS should be supplied to both parents.. and parents should PAY for their use of said moderators. A GAL should not be able to take money from both parents for the calls and nit picky behaviour of one of the parents. Bill separately. If the GAL is unable to itemize his work, then he/she is surely not qualified to make any comments of the best interest of the child/ren.
What I have encountered was my own lawyer was not only friends with the judge and opposing lawyer she had already consulted with my ex wife. None of this was disclosed until police reports were released.
My lawyer removed her self because those records not only named her representing my ex wife it also exposed the relationship with the judge.
My ex wife’s lawyer was ordered off the case.
What replaced her was another man hating lawyer who demanded the judge remove him self from the case only to replace him with another judge friends with my ex wife’s new lawyer.
I believe a judge should NEVER be appointed in the State or Provence they worked in.
This should remove all bias connections
Family courts are evil in its entirety which are created by the greedy lawyers and their cronies. Unless these scums are made to fear for their life, this system will not change.
Shouldn’t even have to file a motion for that… automatic disqualification… it’s bad enough they, judges and lawyers are all members of the same elite club.. the state bar..
Agreed. But of course the litigants do have to discover the connection themselves. The judges and attorneys will not likely come forward themselves.
Well let’s put it this way. Can we allow someone accused of murder to select a jury of 12 people they used to work with? Of course not, because then it would not be impartial.
Why is there an assumption that judges are capable of a higher ethical standard than you or I, and they will put past friendships and relationships aside in exchange for justice? In law school, do they injected with some super serum that removes their human nature to side with friends and family? I doubt it. From what I’ve seen, they get injected with intolerance, bigotry, anger and a giant dose of, “stupid”.
If I had to choose who decided the fate of my child, I would sooner pick a random name from the phone-book than place that responsibility in the hands of a Family Court Judge. Most people are generally well intentioned; judges are not.
The idea that someone else can decide the fate of your child while you are still alive, able and willing to care and love your child, is odious. But such a concept is widely and readily accepted in society. Kids are not pets. They are not cattle to be driven to the yards. Yet kids are transacted back and forth like they are no more than “goods” in the milieu in which these family courts and family law judges operate. Something is very wrong with such as society. It is sickening. Family court judges are but the henchmen that carrry out a society’s dictates.
YES! judges should be disqualified or recused for a lot of reasons..their past work in another office/agency can directly result in parents losing their kids…and continuing the abusive orders to justify corrupt & totally wrong behavior…my judge ordered a drug dealing gun trafficker to prison..taking her kid from her–then ordering me from my home a few years later–and ordering my husband the sole custodian of our 5 kids–but by this point–my husband brought home to roost this felon woman & her daughter–all so lovingly in my once sacred peaceful home…my children were destroyed by all the perverts now surrounding them..My attorneys would not recuse the judge–but I pro se filed 32 page petition–which was accepted…and amazed me..i then moved on to getting the rest of the filth out of my 5 kids lives…I succeeded with all but my later X-husband–who still abuses our adult children…but what they heck–they are used to dealing with that crap–abusive violence–they barely remember how to love…I love them always–just to prove to them–they are lovable!!
It’s all about those bar association dinners, continuing legal education, fraternization at social events, and parties for incoming and outgoing judges. A divorce lawyer with enough experience to be appointed judge, will likely have interacted already with all of the divorce lawyers in their county.
Judges need an annual and thorough conflict of interest check. This means that they submit the same financials they ask the litigants in court to submit – so the judge should know how to do this. The judge’s calendar and phone bill should also be scrutinized, as well as the little notebook they take notes in during court sessions. This should all be publically available under the FOIA and state laws for government transparency.
Time to roadmap all of the money the Federal Government sends to states and see how much of it is generated by Family Court and then goes into judges’ pension plans or other places accessible the judge. That is the true corruption in the family court system and explains so much of the unfair and uneven treatment of the breadwinner.
Without a doubt they should be removed ASAP.
What should also not be allowed is a Judge who has finding of bias, racism and corruption in one County be allowed to sit as a judge in another.
Happened to me
Having a judge not hear a case where he was a lawyer at a firm would not only protect the people in court it would also protect the judge from any allegations of being impartial.
Since most judges in this state are political appointees, it doesn’t really matter. The problem is that the business of divorce nets attorneys in this country huge windfalls unlike any other country in the world.
Once again, the answer is contained in the
Question. Total conflict of interest.
My Family Law (Commissioner…not a judge) sold her practice to another Family Law Attorney, before she sat on the bench decide on the fate of families.
The Real Estate Broker, who was appointed by this female commissioner, told me he has had plenty of parties at her house. I told him it was nice to be referred business from a Commissioner to sell houses of couples divorcing. He said, this is how the Family Law system works. I was shocked that he even shared that information with me. There is no doubt in my mind that this system is so screwed up and did in fact screwed up my entire finances and children’s college education funds.
I am sick to hear what happens in these Family Law Courts. I have not doubt this shit happens all across the country. SOMETHING has to be done to fixed this system. Thanks to Divorce Corp. for exposing all the corruption that goes on in this Divorce multi-billion dollar business. I sure hope no one, man or woman, has to go through what I went through. I am 52 years old, divorced 11 years ago, and I am absolutely broke. I have to go to food banks to get food for myself and my children. I have lost my entire business due to the stress of fighting my ex in divorce court(thanks to both her and my attorney) I have lost all of my 10 rental properties due to being forced to sell them during my divorce to pay for my attorneys and all the other corrupt people involved in this VERY CORRUPT SYSTEM CALL FAMILY LAW….REFORM IS WHAT WE NEED PEOPLE….SO FIGHT FOR IT.
These posts are filled with heart-rending stories of children wrenched from their parents by the State. The gripes go on and on. Maybe there are millions of others out there – all wounded souls, their lives eviscerated by the divorce industry sponsored family law courts and courtiers, legislators and enforcement. What did all of these jokers do? Mess with the kids. Millions and millions of kids and families. Yet all anyone has got to show for it is these posts. A cry in the wilderness. Now imagine, you see hungry, greedy, mangy, wild predators snatch your neighbors child right in front of the neighbor’s eyes- ask yourself what would your neighbor do? What would you do? What if it were your child?
For a parent, the immediacy of response cannot change if the hungry,greedy, mangy, wild predators were dressed in business suits, robes, uniforms or plain attired denizens of the divorce system-judges, lawyers, custody evaluators, parenting consultants, GALs, psych evaluators, financial evaluators, mediators, family-court branded coffin-at-a-discount sellers- each a specialized predator supplied with matching federal funds for every parent-kid they help bring down for sport, profit, and a sense of accomplishment for cutting one more notch in their festering souls.
We need to go back to the time we had a local Justice of the Peace and he didn’t have to be a lawyer.
Kalpana is spot on. Two factors are keeping parents from reforming this heinous excuse of a justice system. Embarrassment and lack of funds. Most parents are reduced to shame when the Court issues a ruling against them. Their traditional beliefs and set of values are whispering to them that they a failure or unfit parent because a Judge said so. Typically these rulings are without the proper due process for the ruling or finding. Secondly, if the parents had funds to support a platform of change they would first use the funds in their crusade for justice. As an accomplished speaker I have no problem sharing my injustice, there is no platform to do so. If the people of our community knew what the Courts did to our family they would be incensed. Who gives sole custody to the convicted domestic abuser/child abductor at the abuser request for modification when the custodial parent just quietly spent years raising one National Merit Scholar, one doctor and always protected the bond between the father and his sons (even when he was an abuser)? A Court that just listened to the fact the mother is out of money and cannot hire an attorney to appeal an absurd ruling.
The answer to this poll is in my opinion so obvious.And think about it what does say about our
legal system when you can’t trust the people who are suppose to be making fair and impartial judgments over peoples lives.Maybe it’s time for a change with the way we allow our legal system to work.
It is said obsolute power corrupts obsolutely
Some firms are so huge that the lawyers don’t even know each other. I have also practiced in counties with so few judges where there may be only one good family law judge and I didn’t want to lose that one for any reason. Blanket prohibitions are rarely a good idea. This is why we have rules that govern disqualification and competent advocates who can make the argument for disqualification and preserve the issue for appeal if need be.
I recommend first and foremost, changing Family Courts and placing them either within the Civil Court system OR the Criminal court system. Where perjury, False Allegations/Accusations, bias and impartiality can be achieved and prosecuted. As it stands now, Family Courts run under their own “Court” system of “Equity”. Someone steals your belongings, they are charged within Criminal court. Someone tells a lie in Civil or Criminal courts, they go to jail for perjury under the Constitution. Family Courts do NOT have to allow ANYONE rights because they do NOT operate under the Constitution or Due Process. Women’s Shelters and Organizations will steadfastly provide a woman a pro-bona attorney for Divorce whereas men ( according to the SCOTUS ) are not obligated a pro bona attorney. This alone is bias. GAL’s, Mediators, Psychologists. They are all in for the dole. Judges are afraid to make the correct ( possibly politically incorrect ) decision as to whom the children should go and therefore pass the buck in order to keep their bench.
They should have total transparency as to their social activity and interaction, present, past and future, with attorneys that they have associations with, on an easy to access public forum AKA Web site. And then either party in the the trial should be given the right to dismiss them for another judge if they feel that there would be bias or that their case would be prejudiced.
I firmly believe that they should serve in “tours” like the military does. And be required to be reassigned in a different count in the state after a 3-5 year period.
This would cut probably 90% of corruption.
But unfortunately this is a pipe dream. Attorneys are future judges, and make the laws, and attorneys like having a judge in their pocket. So this will never happen.
It was so obvious that the judge and the opposing attorney were good friends in my divorce that Ray Charles could see it and he is,,,,,well dead. It was pathetic and a disgrace to the court system.
I was pro-se, and I tried to get discovery on if the judge and opposing attorney had worked together, socialize, or have recently conducted business with the judge/attorney, or the judges family members, The corrupt judge denied discover. What does that tell you? They were good friends and they were open and blatant with it to the point it was disgusting.
TAL
One would hope, in a perfect world, that the judge would exercise good judgment and not let any favoritism or relationship that might have been due to working situations, sway him or her in any way. Since that is not the case in the real world then it is only fitting that judges excuse themselves to prevent partiality.
It would be better if they become a judge ,that they would be required to move to a different county or state. The problem would be the same as to funding for reelection would still come from the lawyers for favors.
I’ll second your suggestion. I similar option is to insert a multiyear period after leaving the firm before becoming eligible to be a Judge in his/her current district. Districts are close enough that it’s not an “Undue Burden” for them to move. – we all know they will readily force us to do even more. This “clean” approach not only stems conflict of interest in cases involving his/her prior firm but all cases involving all prior attorney associates period. The reverse should also be barred – leaving Judgeship and immediately entering practice.
Absolutely. This is a nightmare and this system is corrupt enough.
Judges and guardians who in open court admit to being friends should also recuse themselves. Guardians should not be friends with the judge nor the lawyers…Guardians should not be hobnobbing with their employers or their bosses….clearly that is not acceptable.
I also believe that NO mediators or GALS should be court appointed.. and that ONE is not enough for both parties. A list of GALS/MEDIATORS should be supplied to both parents.. and parents should PAY for their use of said moderators. A GAL should not be able to take money from both parents for the calls and nit picky behaviour of one of the parents. Bill separately. If the GAL is unable to itemize his work, then he/she is surely not qualified to make any comments of the best interest of the child/ren.
What I have encountered was my own lawyer was not only friends with the judge and opposing lawyer she had already consulted with my ex wife. None of this was disclosed until police reports were released.
My lawyer removed her self because those records not only named her representing my ex wife it also exposed the relationship with the judge.
My ex wife’s lawyer was ordered off the case.
What replaced her was another man hating lawyer who demanded the judge remove him self from the case only to replace him with another judge friends with my ex wife’s new lawyer.
I believe a judge should NEVER be appointed in the State or Provence they worked in.
This should remove all bias connections
Family courts are evil in its entirety which are created by the greedy lawyers and their cronies. Unless these scums are made to fear for their life, this system will not change.
Shouldn’t even have to file a motion for that… automatic disqualification… it’s bad enough they, judges and lawyers are all members of the same elite club.. the state bar..
Agreed. But of course the litigants do have to discover the connection themselves. The judges and attorneys will not likely come forward themselves.
Well let’s put it this way. Can we allow someone accused of murder to select a jury of 12 people they used to work with? Of course not, because then it would not be impartial.
Why is there an assumption that judges are capable of a higher ethical standard than you or I, and they will put past friendships and relationships aside in exchange for justice? In law school, do they injected with some super serum that removes their human nature to side with friends and family? I doubt it. From what I’ve seen, they get injected with intolerance, bigotry, anger and a giant dose of, “stupid”.
If I had to choose who decided the fate of my child, I would sooner pick a random name from the phone-book than place that responsibility in the hands of a Family Court Judge. Most people are generally well intentioned; judges are not.
The idea that someone else can decide the fate of your child while you are still alive, able and willing to care and love your child, is odious. But such a concept is widely and readily accepted in society. Kids are not pets. They are not cattle to be driven to the yards. Yet kids are transacted back and forth like they are no more than “goods” in the milieu in which these family courts and family law judges operate. Something is very wrong with such as society. It is sickening. Family court judges are but the henchmen that carrry out a society’s dictates.
YES! judges should be disqualified or recused for a lot of reasons..their past work in another office/agency can directly result in parents losing their kids…and continuing the abusive orders to justify corrupt & totally wrong behavior…my judge ordered a drug dealing gun trafficker to prison..taking her kid from her–then ordering me from my home a few years later–and ordering my husband the sole custodian of our 5 kids–but by this point–my husband brought home to roost this felon woman & her daughter–all so lovingly in my once sacred peaceful home…my children were destroyed by all the perverts now surrounding them..My attorneys would not recuse the judge–but I pro se filed 32 page petition–which was accepted…and amazed me..i then moved on to getting the rest of the filth out of my 5 kids lives…I succeeded with all but my later X-husband–who still abuses our adult children…but what they heck–they are used to dealing with that crap–abusive violence–they barely remember how to love…I love them always–just to prove to them–they are lovable!!
It’s all about those bar association dinners, continuing legal education, fraternization at social events, and parties for incoming and outgoing judges. A divorce lawyer with enough experience to be appointed judge, will likely have interacted already with all of the divorce lawyers in their county.
Judges need an annual and thorough conflict of interest check. This means that they submit the same financials they ask the litigants in court to submit – so the judge should know how to do this. The judge’s calendar and phone bill should also be scrutinized, as well as the little notebook they take notes in during court sessions. This should all be publically available under the FOIA and state laws for government transparency.
Time to roadmap all of the money the Federal Government sends to states and see how much of it is generated by Family Court and then goes into judges’ pension plans or other places accessible the judge. That is the true corruption in the family court system and explains so much of the unfair and uneven treatment of the breadwinner.
Without a doubt they should be removed ASAP.
What should also not be allowed is a Judge who has finding of bias, racism and corruption in one County be allowed to sit as a judge in another.
Happened to me
Having a judge not hear a case where he was a lawyer at a firm would not only protect the people in court it would also protect the judge from any allegations of being impartial.
Since most judges in this state are political appointees, it doesn’t really matter. The problem is that the business of divorce nets attorneys in this country huge windfalls unlike any other country in the world.
Once again, the answer is contained in the
Question. Total conflict of interest.
My Family Law (Commissioner…not a judge) sold her practice to another Family Law Attorney, before she sat on the bench decide on the fate of families.
The Real Estate Broker, who was appointed by this female commissioner, told me he has had plenty of parties at her house. I told him it was nice to be referred business from a Commissioner to sell houses of couples divorcing. He said, this is how the Family Law system works. I was shocked that he even shared that information with me. There is no doubt in my mind that this system is so screwed up and did in fact screwed up my entire finances and children’s college education funds.
I am sick to hear what happens in these Family Law Courts. I have not doubt this shit happens all across the country. SOMETHING has to be done to fixed this system. Thanks to Divorce Corp. for exposing all the corruption that goes on in this Divorce multi-billion dollar business. I sure hope no one, man or woman, has to go through what I went through. I am 52 years old, divorced 11 years ago, and I am absolutely broke. I have to go to food banks to get food for myself and my children. I have lost my entire business due to the stress of fighting my ex in divorce court(thanks to both her and my attorney) I have lost all of my 10 rental properties due to being forced to sell them during my divorce to pay for my attorneys and all the other corrupt people involved in this VERY CORRUPT SYSTEM CALL FAMILY LAW….REFORM IS WHAT WE NEED PEOPLE….SO FIGHT FOR IT.
These posts are filled with heart-rending stories of children wrenched from their parents by the State. The gripes go on and on. Maybe there are millions of others out there – all wounded souls, their lives eviscerated by the divorce industry sponsored family law courts and courtiers, legislators and enforcement. What did all of these jokers do? Mess with the kids. Millions and millions of kids and families. Yet all anyone has got to show for it is these posts. A cry in the wilderness. Now imagine, you see hungry, greedy, mangy, wild predators snatch your neighbors child right in front of the neighbor’s eyes- ask yourself what would your neighbor do? What would you do? What if it were your child?
For a parent, the immediacy of response cannot change if the hungry,greedy, mangy, wild predators were dressed in business suits, robes, uniforms or plain attired denizens of the divorce system-judges, lawyers, custody evaluators, parenting consultants, GALs, psych evaluators, financial evaluators, mediators, family-court branded coffin-at-a-discount sellers- each a specialized predator supplied with matching federal funds for every parent-kid they help bring down for sport, profit, and a sense of accomplishment for cutting one more notch in their festering souls.
We need to go back to the time we had a local Justice of the Peace and he didn’t have to be a lawyer.
Kalpana is spot on. Two factors are keeping parents from reforming this heinous excuse of a justice system. Embarrassment and lack of funds. Most parents are reduced to shame when the Court issues a ruling against them. Their traditional beliefs and set of values are whispering to them that they a failure or unfit parent because a Judge said so. Typically these rulings are without the proper due process for the ruling or finding. Secondly, if the parents had funds to support a platform of change they would first use the funds in their crusade for justice. As an accomplished speaker I have no problem sharing my injustice, there is no platform to do so. If the people of our community knew what the Courts did to our family they would be incensed. Who gives sole custody to the convicted domestic abuser/child abductor at the abuser request for modification when the custodial parent just quietly spent years raising one National Merit Scholar, one doctor and always protected the bond between the father and his sons (even when he was an abuser)? A Court that just listened to the fact the mother is out of money and cannot hire an attorney to appeal an absurd ruling.
The answer to this poll is in my opinion so obvious.And think about it what does say about our
legal system when you can’t trust the people who are suppose to be making fair and impartial judgments over peoples lives.Maybe it’s time for a change with the way we allow our legal system to work.
It is said obsolute power corrupts obsolutely
Some firms are so huge that the lawyers don’t even know each other. I have also practiced in counties with so few judges where there may be only one good family law judge and I didn’t want to lose that one for any reason. Blanket prohibitions are rarely a good idea. This is why we have rules that govern disqualification and competent advocates who can make the argument for disqualification and preserve the issue for appeal if need be.
I recommend first and foremost, changing Family Courts and placing them either within the Civil Court system OR the Criminal court system. Where perjury, False Allegations/Accusations, bias and impartiality can be achieved and prosecuted. As it stands now, Family Courts run under their own “Court” system of “Equity”. Someone steals your belongings, they are charged within Criminal court. Someone tells a lie in Civil or Criminal courts, they go to jail for perjury under the Constitution. Family Courts do NOT have to allow ANYONE rights because they do NOT operate under the Constitution or Due Process. Women’s Shelters and Organizations will steadfastly provide a woman a pro-bona attorney for Divorce whereas men ( according to the SCOTUS ) are not obligated a pro bona attorney. This alone is bias. GAL’s, Mediators, Psychologists. They are all in for the dole. Judges are afraid to make the correct ( possibly politically incorrect ) decision as to whom the children should go and therefore pass the buck in order to keep their bench.
They should have total transparency as to their social activity and interaction, present, past and future, with attorneys that they have associations with, on an easy to access public forum AKA Web site. And then either party in the the trial should be given the right to dismiss them for another judge if they feel that there would be bias or that their case would be prejudiced.
I firmly believe that they should serve in “tours” like the military does. And be required to be reassigned in a different count in the state after a 3-5 year period.
This would cut probably 90% of corruption.
But unfortunately this is a pipe dream. Attorneys are future judges, and make the laws, and attorneys like having a judge in their pocket. So this will never happen.
It was so obvious that the judge and the opposing attorney were good friends in my divorce that Ray Charles could see it and he is,,,,,well dead. It was pathetic and a disgrace to the court system.
I was pro-se, and I tried to get discovery on if the judge and opposing attorney had worked together, socialize, or have recently conducted business with the judge/attorney, or the judges family members, The corrupt judge denied discover. What does that tell you? They were good friends and they were open and blatant with it to the point it was disgusting.
TAL
One would hope, in a perfect world, that the judge would exercise good judgment and not let any favoritism or relationship that might have been due to working situations, sway him or her in any way. Since that is not the case in the real world then it is only fitting that judges excuse themselves to prevent partiality.