Opinion ID: 1496361
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Harassment of Judge Who Continued Jury Trial

Text: Mr. Madison represented the plaintiff in a personal injury case filed in September 2002. The case was set for a jury trial in Jackson County circuit court beginning Monday, August 15, 2005. Because of a unique family situation that arose, the judge informed her staff that she was unable to be present for the scheduled trial that day. She asked them to attempt to find another judge to try the case in her place, as is the practice in Jackson County when a judge is unable to hear a case for some reason. Unfortunately, it turned out that another judge was not available that day, and the matter had to be continued. The judge's staff did not provide details to Mr. Madison or other counsel regarding the reason the originally assigned judge could not be present, although he claims that someone told him that it was not an emergency. Mr. Madison took great offense at not being told the reason for the judge's absence. He thought that it was his right to know exactly why the judge did not appear and that the failure to appear caused his client to believe that the court must be involved in a conspiracy against her. [4] Mr. Madison, therefore, sent the judge a letter, stating in part: I am extremely disappointed in your conduct. You arbitrarily failed to show for this extremely important trial without excuse or apology.... Apparently, you think that you are the most important person in this process and are beyond such apology and explanation. He also accused the judge of having filed a bar complaint against a black attorney because that attorney did not appear for a hearing of which he had no notice and wondered if the judge ever had made such a complaint toward a white attorney. In the final paragraph of the letter, Mr. Madison asked the judge to recuse herself from the case. At Mr. Madison's hearing, the judge testified that when she received Mr. Madison's letter, she found the accusations of racism insulting and offensive. She testified that she did not know who Mr. Madison was and did not know the black attorney against whom she allegedly filed a bar complaint. [5] She could not read the entire letter at first because she found it very hostile. She recused herself as Mr. Madison requested and so advised Mr. Madison by return letter. Despite her recusal, a few days later, Mr. Madison sent her a second letter, [6] parts of which stated: [Y]our system of justice allows you on the one hand to berate and unjustly file a bar complaint against an African-American attorney, [name omitted] for being late to an un-noticed hearing and on the other hand nonchalantly failing to appear to preside over a very serious case in which a person, who was seriously handicapped negligence alleged in the petition, has their very life hanging in the balance..... Your indulgence in Argumentum ad Hominem towards me is not justice. It is a denial of justice. But for the gravity of the harm done, I would do what most have done. I would have ignored the tyranny.... I want you to be clean. I passionately desire to show my client that you are not drunk with power.... I do have profound doubts concerning your fitness to preside fairly over cases. Because the judge already had recused herself, she did not respond to the second letter. Two months later, and despite the case's reassignment to a different judge, Mr. Madison wrote her a third letter that stated in part: Your decision to withhold an honest explanation for your absence has propelled us all into inauspicious entanglements.... If you had timely explained your absence, [my client] would not have been cast into dark paranoia about you and the defendants conspiring to deny her justice. That paranoia not only lead [my client] to settle her case for pennies on the dollar, it has lead her and her family to a firm belief that your system of justice is corrupt. That belief will permeate the community and people will know you and the 16th Circuit for this act of infamy. Your robe is forever stained because you have failed to avoid impropriety or even the appearance of impropriety. It is the opinion of attorneys and non-attorneys that you and your evil network will seek vengeance upon me for challenging you in this manner. The judge testified that on receiving the third letter, she feared Mr. Madison's letters never were going to stop. She had learned that Mr. Madison had a conviction for felony aggravated assault and became worried about her physical safety and that of her family. She began locking the door between the jury box and her chambers, something she never had done before. She advised her staff and the sheriff's office to let her know if Mr. Madison came into the courthouse. At her request, the sheriff's department began to watch over her each evening when she walked from the courthouse to her car.