Opinion ID: 1854995
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 18

Heading: Dee Heineman

Text: Heineman worked as respondent's court reporter from 1981 to 1991. Heineman testified that sometime during 1986 or 1987, she was in the courthouse in Chadron when she overheard a discussion between respondent and Marge Daniels Doerr, the clerk of the district court at the time. Heineman specifically heard respondent tell Doerr, `Every time I think of Dee [Heineman] and Marvin [Heineman's husband] having sex, I think of a fat glob oozing all over the top of Marvin.' Doerr corroborated Heineman's testimony. Heineman testified that she was shocked and angry and wondered why respondent was thinking of her having sex with her husband. The statement also left Doerr uncomfortable and embarrassed. When asked whether he made such a statement to Doerr, respondent answered with the following: No. Well, I have no recollection of saying such a thing, I didn't think that. You saw Dee up here, Dee looks pretty much today as she did all the time she was my court reporter, she's never been a person anybody would describe as a blob, I never, ever thought anything like that about her and her husband. What she said about her impression of the thing is exactly mine, I didn't think about her and her husband in that kind of context at all, I would not have said so if I did, and I certainly wouldn't have used those terms and there was no call for it that anybody's able to say. So it's something that has no beginning and no end and it's just stuck there and I don't believe I said it. The master found, by clear and convincing evidence, that respondent made the fat glob remark to Doerr in violation of Canons 2 and 3(B)(4) of the Code of Judicial Conduct and § 24-722(6). In reaching this conclusion, the master noted that [t]o hold otherwise means that both Ms. Heineman and Ms. Doerr concocted the whole story to the utter embarrassment of both Ms. Heineman and her deceased husband.