Title: Mathiesen v. Michaud

State: maine

Issuer: Maine Supreme Court

Document:

MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions 
Decision: 
2020 ME 47 
Docket: 
Aro-19-265 
Argued: 
December 5, 2019 
Decided: 
April 14, 2020 
 
Panel: 
SAUFLEY, C.J., and MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, and HUMPHREY, JJ.* 
 
 
TODD E. MATHIESEN 
 
v. 
 
KARIE ANN (MATHIESEN) MICHAUD 
 
 
GORMAN, J. 
[¶1]  Todd E. Mathiesen appeals from a judgment of divorce between the 
parties entered by the District Court (Fort Kent, Soucy, J.).  Mathiesen argues 
that the court erred in denying his motion for recusal.  We affirm the judgment.   
I.  BACKGROUND 
[¶2]  The following facts are undisputed.  Mathiesen and Karie Ann 
(Mathiesen) Michaud were married on August 9, 2014, and have one child 
together.1  On June 10, 2018, Mathiesen twice slapped Michaud across the face 
and was arrested on a charge of domestic violence assault.   
                                         
*  Although Justice Alexander participated in the appeal, he retired before this opinion was 
certified. 
1  Michaud also has children from previous relationships.   
 
 
2 
[¶3]  On June 18, 2018, Mathiesen filed a complaint for divorce.  The court 
held a three-day final hearing in 2019.  At that hearing, the parties’ primary area 
of contention was the allocation of parental rights and responsibilities 
concerning their child.  
[¶4]  On April 12, 2019, after the close of evidence, but before the court 
reached a decision in the divorce matter, Mathiesen verbally confronted one of 
Michaud’s relatives at the child’s elementary school.  Michaud’s relative 
recorded the incident on her phone and provided the recording to law 
enforcement officials.  On May 8, 2019, nearly one month later, Mathiesen was 
arrested and charged with tampering with a witness and violating conditions 
of release.  See 17-A M.R.S. § 454 (1)(B) (2018); 15 M.R.S. § 1092(1)(2018).    
[¶5]  On May 10, 2019, the judge who had the divorce case under 
advisement emailed the parties’ divorce attorneys that Mathiesen “appears in 
this morning’s in-custody list, facing charges of Tampering with a Witness and 
VCR.”  Later that day, the judge presided over Mathiesen’s arraignment; 
Mathiesen was represented by the attorney who represented him in the divorce 
proceedings.  Ten days later, Mathiesen moved to reopen the evidence—not 
regarding his arrest, but regarding other matters.   
 
 
3 
[¶6]  On May 29, 2019, the court held a conference to discuss with the 
parties Mathiesen’s new criminal charges and his pending motion.  At that 
conference, the judge stated,  
[T]here’s an issue about information that the Court has in 
connection with new pending charges against Mr. Mathiesen.  I was 
doing [in-]custodies a couple of weeks ago on a Friday and 
Mr. Mathiesen appeared in front of me from the Aroostook County 
Jail, having been charged with a Class B tampering with a witness 
and some other charges.  And in the course of preparing for that 
initial appearance, I reviewed affidavits in the police report that 
outlined some of the behavior that formed the basis for the State’s 
charges.   
 
And I thought it important that having taken in that 
information, that the pertinent portion of it be made part of the 
record in the divorce proceeding, because I was, at that time, ready 
to decide or had decided the divorce case and this is material new 
information.   
The judge explained that he understood that Mathiesen’s behavior had been 
recorded and that, although he had not seen the recording, he had read 
affidavits containing transcriptions of the recording.  The judge acknowledged 
that the affidavits described troubling behavior by Mathiesen: 
 
Now, after that I became aware of a charge brought against 
Mr. Mathiesen—what we’ve been talking about here—that 
includes a recorded video that I have not seen but portions of which 
were quoted verbatim reportedly in a probable cause affidavit and 
a police report.  And I have to say if true, that changes my thinking 
in the case.  And it will result in a different decision than the one I 
was prepared to issue before I heard that.  I can’t unthink that.  I 
can’t unring that.  
 
 
4 
 
Now, judges do that all the time with respect to some kind of 
evidence, but I don’t think I can do it in this case.  And so I have to 
find a way, in fairness to Mr. Mathiesen, to put this on the record.   
Later during the colloquy, counsel for Mathiesen volunteered, as an alternative 
option, that the judge recuse himself.  The judge responded, 
 
I would but frankly, we have months of litigation in this, and 
the better way is for me to acknowledge on the record, as I have, 
the evidence that came to me inadvertently.  I didn’t seek it out.  It 
came to me in the course of doing my work . . . . 
 
The best way is to put that information on the record in some 
meaningful way with an opportunity for Mr. Mathiesen, through 
our due process, to respond to it in a fair way.  Otherwise we’re 
abandoning a huge allocation of resource here, and I don’t think 
that’s appropriate.   
At the conclusion of that conference, the court granted Mathiesen’s motion to 
reopen the evidence.  
[¶7]  Michaud filed her own motion to reopen the evidence on June 3, 
2019, and both motions were then set for hearing on June 13, 2019.  On the date 
of the hearing, Mathiesen filed a motion for recusal.2  At that hearing, the court 
orally denied the motion for recusal:   
Now, the fact that the Court is privy to the allegations made, is just 
an [un]avoidable fact of the practice that we have here in the 
District Court.  So our duty in a situation like that, I don’t think is to 
recuse, having stumbled across evidence that has bearing on the 
case.  I think our duty is to be candid with the parties regarding 
                                         
2  For reasons we cannot discern, this motion was never docketed.  
 
 
5 
whether or not it is material in some nature.  And if it is, to give the 
parties an opportunity to address it, fairly, openly in court, which 
is what we’re here to do today.  
 
[¶8]  On June 17, 2019, the court issued a divorce judgment that, among 
other things, awarded primary physical residence of the parties’ child to 
Michaud.  Mathiesen timely appealed.  See M.R. App. P. 2B(c)(1).   
II.  DISCUSSION 
[¶9]  On appeal, Mathiesen argues only that the court abused its 
discretion in denying his motion for recusal.  We review decisions on motions 
to recuse for an abuse of discretion.  In re J.R., 2013 ME 58, ¶ 16, 69 A.3d 406. 
[¶10]  Pursuant to the Maine Code of Judicial Conduct, a judge must 
recuse in a matter if the judge’s “impartiality might reasonably be questioned,” 
including if “[t]he judge has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party or 
a party’s lawyer, or the judge has personal knowledge of facts that are in 
dispute in the proceeding when the personal knowledge that would form the 
basis for disqualification has been gained outside the regular course of present 
or prior judicial proceedings.”  M. Code Jud. Conduct R. 2.11(A)(1)(2017); see 
Robertson v. Gerakaris, 2015 ME 83, ¶ 10, 119 A.3d 739.  In this case, the judge 
received information concerning Mathiesen’s new criminal charges through the 
regular course of in-custody initial appearances.  As we have explained, 
 
 
6 
“information gained or opinions formed by a trial judge based on events or facts 
presented in the same or other judicial proceedings do not constitute a basis 
for recusal except in the extraordinary circumstances that demonstrate a 
deep-seated favoritism or antagonism that would make fair judgment 
impossible.”  State v. Boyce, 1998 ME 219, ¶ 8, 718 A.2d 1097 (quotation marks 
omitted); State v. Bard, 2018 ME 38, ¶ 43, 181 A.3d 187.   
[¶11]  Perhaps recognizing that the judge’s receipt of new information 
from this subsequent judicial proceeding did not require his recusal in the 
divorce proceeding, cf. State v. Rameau, 685 A.2d 761, 763 (Me. 1996) 
(“Generally, knowledge gained in a prior proceeding is not a sufficient ground 
to recuse a judge in a subsequent matter.”), Mathiesen nonetheless contends 
that he was denied an impartial judge.  That argument is wholly unpersuasive, 
as there is no evidence of judicial bias or prejudice in this case.   
[¶12]  This judge did precisely what judges should do.  He heard three 
days of a highly contentious divorce proceeding and, while he had that case 
under advisement, he continued to do his job.  In the course of that job, he 
learned that he would be presiding over Mathiesen’s arraignment and realized 
that Mathiesen was one of the parties from his recently-heard divorce case.  The 
judge prepared for the arraignment by reviewing the documents accompanying 
 
 
7 
the criminal complaint against Mathiesen and then took the extra step of 
alerting the parties’ attorneys that Mathiesen would soon be in court on new 
criminal charges.   
[¶13]  District Court judges in Maine are “general practitioners.”  They 
are called upon to hear juvenile, civil, family, and criminal cases—sometimes 
all in one day.  Especially in Maine’s less-populated counties, a judge will 
frequently be called upon to adjudicate one case and then oversee a related 
criminal matter involving a party to that case.  If the handling of the second 
case—or anything else—does cause a judge to develop some bias or prejudice, 
we expect that judge to recuse.  See State v. Marden, 673 A.2d 1304, 1308 (Me. 
1996) (“No judge should preside in a case in which he is not wholly free, 
disinterested, impartial and independent.” (quotation marks omitted)).  But, 
“[a]bsent a showing that the trial judge . . . could not be impartial, or reasonably 
be seen to be impartial, because of particular information he had learned in the 
criminal matter, [a party’s] mere belief that [the] judge might not be completely 
impartial is insufficient to warrant recusal.”  In re Children of Crystal G., 2019 
ME 9, ¶ 4, 200 A.3d 267 (third alteration in original) (quotation marks 
omitted); see DeCambra v. Carson, 2008 ME 127, ¶ 8, 953 A.2d 1163 (explaining 
 
 
8 
that a judge’s knowledge concerning a party, but stemming from another 
criminal matter, is not enough to compel recusal).   
[¶14]  Here, the judge promptly alerted the parties of his inadvertent 
receipt of new evidence, placed the matter on the record, acknowledged that 
the information about Mathiesen—if accurate—was damaging to Mathiesen’s 
demand that he be granted sole parental rights and responsibilities for the 
parties’ child, thoughtfully considered Mathiesen’s motion to recuse, and then 
denied the motion.  After denying that motion, as due process requires, the 
judge provided Mathiesen with an opportunity to be heard regarding his 
behavior that led to the arraignment.  Mathiesen did not, and could not, dispute 
the video depiction of his abhorrent and out-of-control confrontation of a 
family member.  Nonetheless, the court provided Mathiesen with an unfettered 
opportunity to address that new evidence at the hearing.3   
[¶15]  Given the circumstances presented in this case, the judge’s 
decision not to recuse himself was entirely proper, and we affirm the judgment. 
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed.   
                                         
3  Moreover, once the judge determined that he was not required to recuse himself, he was 
duty-bound to oversee the proceedings.  See Schafer v. Schafer, 2019 ME 101, ¶ 7, 210 A.3d 842 
(pronouncing that “[w]hen there is no reasonable basis for a recusal, a judge is as much obligated not 
to recuse when it is not necessary as the judge is obligated to recuse when it is necessary”). 
 
 
9 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
John W. Tebbetts, Esq. (orally), Tebbetts Law Office, LLC, Presque Isle, for 
appellant Todd Mathiesen 
 
Alan F. Harding, Esq. (orally), Hardings Law Office, Presque Isle, for appellee 
Karie Ann Mathiesen 
 
 
Fort Kent District Court docket number FM-2018-39 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY