Court Opinion

ID: 9519655
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 01:21:29.499388+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:44:35.208992
License: Public Domain

Quirico, J.
(concurring). I concur with the opinion in so far as it states the facts found, and with the discipline imposed on the basis of those facts. However, as indicated below, on the basis of the entire evidence and the inferences drawn therefrom, I would find facts in addition to those found by the court in that part of the opinion identified as “B. Charges Related to the Events at the Arlington Street Church on April 5, 1978. Findings of Fact.”
Finding 2. I would insert before the last two sentences of the first paragraph of this finding an additional finding that the ticket seller’s answer to the Chief Justice’s question about “what Boston/Boise was all about” was heard and understood by the Chief Justice.
Finding 4. I would insert after the first two sentences of the first paragraph of this finding an additional finding that as part of the conversation described in the first two sentences Mr. Orfanello told the Chief Justice that Mr. McMenimen represented a defendant in the Revere cases and that the meeting at the Arlington Street Church was to be a fund raiser in connection with those cases.
Finding 5. Based on the two additional findings suggested above, I would change the first sentence in the second paragraph of this finding to read as follows: “The Chief Justice knew before he went to the meeting at the Arlington Street Church that it would at least in part be a partisan rally in the interest of criminal defendants in cases pending in *728the Superior Court, that the Revere cases were likely to be discussed, and that the proceeds of ticket sales might be used in part for the benefit of the defendants in those cases.”
Finding 8. I would insert after the first sentence in the second paragraph of this finding an additional finding that as a part of the same conversation described in the first sentence the Chief Justice showed Mr. Orfanello one of the tickets to the Gore Vidal lecture, said that it did not say it was for a defense fund, and that it was important to the Chief Justice that he knew only that the meeting was for a “gay” group or a “gay” affair; whereupon Mr. Orfanello said that if that was what the Chief Justice wanted him to say, he would say that.
Finding 9. I would add to the second paragraph of this finding an additional finding that the two sentences quoted from the Chief Justice’s press release of April 7, 1978, were false and misleading.
Finding 10. As to question (a) and the answer thereto, quoted from the transcript of April 11, 1978, I would find that when purchasing the tickets at the Arlington Street Church on April 3, 1978, the Chief Justice made inquiry as to the nature of the Boston/Boise Committee, and that therefore his answer to question (a) is false.
As to question (b) and the answer thereto quoted from the same transcript, I would find that before attending the meeting at the Arlington Street Church the Chief Justice had been informed by Mr. Orfanello in effect that the meeting was to be a fund raiser for the benefit of defendants in the Revere cases. I would therefore also find that his answer of “I did not” to question (b) was false.
I recognize that the additional findings which I have suggested above depend on preliminary decisions concerning the credibility of the oral testimony of witnesses. Those are decisions which must be made by each of the Justices in his or her capacity as a finder of the facts in this proceeding. I respect the preliminary decision reached by my fellow Justices, but I differ from them to the extent stated above. If the additional findings which I propose were made, the *729disposition of this proceeding would, in my opinion, require that Chief Justice Bonin be suspended as a member of the bar of this Commonwealth, and probably would warrant consideration of even more severe discipline.