Court Opinion

ID: 9483274
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:15:47.187006+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:31.550742
License: Public Domain

DeMOSS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I do not share the view of my colleagues on this panel that Chitimacha Tribe is determinative of this case. Rather, I think the later cases of Health Services Acquisition Corp. v. Liljeberg, 796 F.2d 796 (5th Cir.1986); the Supreme Court Decision in the same case, Liljeberg v. Health Services Acquisition Corp., 486 U.S. 847, 108 S.Ct. 2194, 100 L.Ed.2d 855 (1988); and In re *107Faulkner, 856 F.2d 716 (5th Cir.1988) establish the following principles:
A. The very purpose of § 455(a) is to promote confidence in the judiciary by avoiding even the appearance of impropriety whenever possible. Liljeberg, 486 U.S. at 865, 108 S.Ct. at 2205;
B. Scienter is not an element of a violation of § 455(a). Liljeberg, 486 U.S. at 859, 108 S.Ct. at 2202;
C. The test is whether the average reasonable person, knowing all of the circumstances, might question the impartiality of the judge. In re Faulkner, 856 F.2d at 721.
Under the facts of this case the question becomes, would the average person be reasonable in questioning the impartiality of a Trial Judge in a personal injury action where the judges’ spouse was a partner in a major law firm that represented the corporate defendant in other litigation matters, but not in the case before the judge. The circumstance that a Trial Judge has a spouse who is actively engaged in the practice of law will occur with increasing frequency as the distribution of men and women in the legal profession continues to become more equal. I think the average person looks upon the relationship between spouses as the closest of all human relationships; and rightly or wrongly, it is my perception that the average person would doubt the ability of a judge and spouse to maintain a “Chinese wall” between their professional responsibilities. Perhaps if the question were posed in the abstract, you would get a different answer; but, my gut tells me that if the average person is asked whether he would feel comfortable having his own personal injury case tried by a judge whose spouse was a partner in a law firm that represented the defendant in other matters, the answer would be, “Would the judge really be impartial?” I think that question is reasonable; and the mandatory language of § 455 requires re-cusal.
I would add two comments from the standpoint of policy and judicial administration. In our federal district courts located in large metropolitan areas, where assignments of cases are done initially on a random rotation basis and where there are several other judges to whom the case can be referred, I think the call in close cases (which is the case before us), should favor recusal. Likewise, when the issue of disqualification is raised prior to trial (as it has been in this case), a call in close cases should lean toward recusal as a matter of efficient judicial administration because the final decision making stage of the litigation is thereby insulated from the waste and inefficiency which would result from a later determination that § 455 had not been complied with.
Obviously none of my comments herein should be construed as reflecting on the integrity or suggesting actual impartiality on the part of the Trial Judge in this case or her spouse.
I would GRANT the writ of mandamus.