Court Opinion

ID: 9662552
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 23:12:47.361731+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:40.660515
License: Public Domain

Steele Hays, Justice, dissenting. I do not share the view of the majority that the appellants have shown such prejudice by the trial judge that an appellate court can conclude the chancellor should have recused from the case. This was a long, involved trial with complex issues, including class certification, yet the majority offers only subjective interpretation of isolated excerpts from a voluminous record to sustain its position. In their strongest sense, these segments fall considerably short, I believe, of the sort of “objective, demonstrable prejudice” which our cases require. Matthews v. Rodgers, 279 Ark. 328, 651 S.W.2d 453 (1983). In their weakest sense, they are merely ambiguous. Nor is it unusual for trial judges to express tentative views on the merits of a case from the moment they have read the pleadings. Those are not indicative of a prejudice that taints a trial. We have said, correctly I submit, that recusal is a matter which must be left largely to the discretion of the trial judge. Sloss v. Farmers Bank & Trust Co., 290 Ark. 304, 719 S.W.2d 273 (1986); Narisi v. Narisi, 229 Ark. 1059, 320 S.W.2d 757 (1959). If that language of the law is to have any meaning, the appellants should not prevail on this contention. I would affirm.