Case ID: so2d_557/html/0842-02.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "RUSSELL, Judge. INGRAM, Presiding Judge,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Ex parte Donna Jean Gaither WOODARD. (Re Jimmy Earl WOODARD, Jr. v. Donna Jean Gaither WOODARD).
    Civ. 7314.
    Court of Civil Appeals of Alabama.
    Jan. 3, 1990.
    
      Bruce N. Adams of Wilson, Pumroy, Rice & Adams, Anniston, for appellant.
    William W. Lawrence of Wooten, Thornton, Carpenter, O’Brien & Lazenby, Tal-ladega, for appellee.
   RUSSELL, Judge.

This is a petition for writ of mandamus.

The petitioner and her husband are parties to a divorce action pending in the Circuit Court of Talladega County. Following the petitioner’s motion to recuse and an examination of the trial judge by attorneys for both parties, the trial judge denied the motion. This petition for writ of mandamus followed. We deny the petition.

The petitioner argues that, because the trial judge has had certain contacts with her husband’s father, Canon 3C(1) of the Canons of Judicial Ethics mandates that he recuse himself. It states:

“C. Disqualification:
“(1) A judge should disqualify himself in a proceeding in which ... his impartiality might reasonably be questioned, including but not limited to instances where:
“(a) He has a pérsonal bias or prejudice concerning a party, or personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts concerning the proceeding.”

However, prejudice on the part of a judge is not to be presumed. Duncan v. Sherrill, 341 So.2d 946 (Ala.1977). Rather, a judge is presumed to be qualified and unbiased, with the burden on the moving party to prove the contrary. Street v. Hutto, 46 Ala.App. 324, 241 So.2d 848 (Ala.Civ.App.1970).

We find the evidence insufficient to support the petitioner’s contention of bias on the part of the trial judge. Evidence was presented of the limited contacts said to exist between the trial judge and the husband’s father, who is not a party to this action. Such contacts include the trial judge’s having once drafted a deed for the husband’s father; his having acted as a radio personality for a radio station owned by the husband’s father, for which, the trial judge testified, he was not compensated; and his having attended several Christmas parties given by the husband’s father on behalf of employees of the radio station.

The trial judge testified that any past association he might have had with the husband’s father would not predispose him to make any particular assessment of the father’s credibility or veracity if he were to be called as a witness. We find that the petitioner has failed to meet her burden of establishing bias on the part of the trial judge so as to require his recusal.

WRIT DENIED.

ROBERTSON, J., concurs.

INGRAM, P.J., concurs specially.

INGRAM, Presiding Judge,

concurring specially.

I concur with the majority, but I feel compelled to draw an operational distinction between disqualification and recusal. I view a judge’s disqualification in a proceeding as emanating from the peculiar, personal, and often private knowledge of the judge, a knowledge that should alert his senses that he could not be impartial in his judgment because of a personal bias, or his personal awareness of disputed eviden-tiary facts, or other reasons contained in the Alabama Canons of Judicial Ethics. In other words, the introduction of a disqualification as embraced within the canons is initially the responsibility of the judge, because the canons require as much from him. The procedure is outlined in Canon 3, Alabama Canons of Judicial Ethics, supra, including a remittal to be used when appropriate.

Recusal, on the other hand, is equally effective in removing a less than impartial judge from a proceeding, but it embodies a different method in that it is initiated by motion of counsel. Counsel has the burden to put the circumstances creating the absence of impartiality before the judge, and the judge is thereby called upon to rule on the motion. The pertinent circumstances presented to the judge are, of course, known to counsel and may also be known to the judge. The ruling of the judge on a motion for recusal is subject to appellate review generally by petition for writ of mandamus.

Clearly, upon the factual basis of the instant case, I find that the petitioner has failed to adequately demonstrate any bias and prejudice on the part of the judge which would warrant his recusal. Taylor v. Taylor, 387 So.2d 849 (Ala.Civ.App.1980). For this reason, I agree with the majority that the motion to recuse was properly denied.