Court Opinion

ID: 9627796
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:54:48.130069+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:50.219586
License: Public Domain

ME. JUSTICE DAVIS:
I concur in the opinion by Mr. Justice Angstman, fundamentally, because I see no good reason for the issuance of a peremptory writ requiring Judge Fall to refrain from doing what he now has no intention of doing at all. True the manner of his return made in this court to our alternative writ is irregular. He should have filed here his admission that he was disqualified in the case below, i. e., by making the formal return to this court contemplated by E.C.M. 1947, sections 93-9204, 93-9106. Perhaps he is amenable in some way to this court for charting his own course in making this admission of his disqualification a matter of record in the district court rather than by following the procedure prescribed by the statute.
Even so, I am not at all satisfied from anything before me that Judge Fall actually disregarded at any point the restraint which our alternative writ laid upon him; and, if he did step beyond bounds in any particular, I am entirely certain there is nothing anywhere in this record to indicate that in doing so he acted other than in entire good faith.
But whether I am right or wrong in these comments upon what Judge Fall did, I have no doubt he has, by acknowledging his disqualification as he did, left us no substantial grounds for issuing a peremptory writ of prohibition, which could only forbid action where admittedly no action is contemplated and which now would serve no purpose of any kind.
I think the alternative writ issued is accordingly properly dissolved, and for the reasons given by Mr. Justice Angstman that the relator should have his costs, but without an award of damages or attorney’s fees.