Note: Please see below for HALT's response to this story.

Low score on overseeing judges rankles state officials

An advocacy group assumed a level of secrecy that doesn't exist, court experts say.

May 25, 2008

When a national advocacy group put out a report this month ranking the states on how well they oversee judges, Maine's spot on the list turned some heads in legal circles.

The state ranked dead last, tied with Mississippi.

The Washington D.C.-based group HALT - Help Abolish Legal Tyranny - scolded Maine for keeping complaints against judges secret unless discipline is recommended by the committee that reviews them.

The group also took Maine to task for not having a Web site dedicated to such complaints, for not setting a dollar limit on gifts judges can receive and for allegedly stifling the free speech of people who file complaints.

''Maine's system of judicial oversight is one of the most secretive in the country,'' HALT's senior counsel, Suzanne Blonder, said in a statement.

The scathing report card was a surprise to officials in Maine, particularly the 11 members of the Committee for Judicial Responsibility and Disability. They said they've received very little criticism of the oversight system from Maine residents, and there have been no movements in the Legislature to make changes.

''I don't like to give Fs, and I don't like to get Fs,'' said committee chairman Richard Maiman, a professor of political science at the University of Southern Maine.

Maiman said that while it contains a few good suggestions - such as creating a Web site where people can learn how to file complaints against judges - the HALT report card also contains several errors.

Foremost among them, Maiman and other officials said, was HALT's assertion that Maine has a ''gag rule'' that prevents residents from speaking publicly about ethics complaints.

"There is no gag order," Maiman said. "If somebody wants to fire off a letter to the editor ... we have no concerns about that."

Maine Supreme Judicial Court Justice Jon Levy, who acts as a liaison between the court and the oversight committee, believes the producers of the report card misinterpreted one of the committee's rules, which asks participants in hearings to keep those proceedings confidential. That does not mean complainants cannot discuss their cases in public, and there are no penalties for doing so, Levy said. The committee receives about 50 complaints each year.

Officials elsewhere, including the special counsel to the Washington, D.C., Commission on Judicial Disabilities and Tenure, have questioned the accuracy of the HALT report cards since they were released May 1.

Blonder, HALT's legal counsel, was out of the office on Friday and could not be reached to respond to the officials' claims of errors. In the statement she issued earlier this month, Blonder said it was the sum of failings in several areas that gave Maine such a low ranking.

"In an era that embraces principles of sunshine and transparency, it's shameful that the system for monitoring some of the state's most powerful government officials is designed to shut out the public," she said.

HALT is a legal advocacy group that seeks greater public access to the court system and more accountability for lawyers and judges.

The nonprofit organization was created in 1978 and claims to have more than 50,000 members nationwide. Rachel Decker, spokeswoman for the organization, was not sure how many members are from Maine.

The committee that oversees judges in Maine was created by the state Supreme Court in 1978.

Its seven active members consist of three members of the general public, two judges and two lawyers. Four alternate members consist of two judges, one lawyer and one member of the general public. Members are appointed by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, and they serve six-year terms.

The committee has the power to hold hearings, subpoena witnesses and gather evidence, but it doesn't have the power to impose sanctions.

In cases where the committee members think discipline is warranted, they send the case along with a recommendation to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, which can censure, suspend and fine judges.

But only a handful of cases has ever reached the court. In fact, since 1978 only seven judges have been found by the court to have violated the Judicial Code of Conduct. They faced various sanctions, from simple reprimand to a three-month suspension and $3,500 fine.

The latest case was decided last year, when the court found that York County Probate Judge Robert Nadeau misrepresented one of his opponents during the race for his office. Nadeau was suspended one week, fined $1,000 and ordered to attend a judicial ethics course.

There are two primary reasons that so few Maine judges have been disciplined over the past three decades, said Cabanne Howard, a former state prosecutor who teaches at the University of Maine School of Law, and serves as the committee's executive secretary.

First, except for the 16 probate offices, judges in Maine are not elected by popular vote, as they are in 39 states. In Maine, judges are nominated by the governor and screened by the Legislature and in public hearings.

"Judges here are of the highest caliber," said Portland defense lawyer Rob Ruffner. "The main reason why, Maine has wisely chosen to not elect our judges. The need to raise money and campaign, which leads to nightmares in the states where it exists, simply doesn't happen."

The second reason for the low discipline statistics, Howard said, is that the oversight committee sometimes issues informal warnings to judges. For example, if a judge took too long to return a decision on a case and a party filed a complaint, the committee might warn the judge not to repeat the delay.

"We will engage that judge with that problem. If it recurs, then we would have a pattern, which might lead to a complaint with the Supreme Judicial Court," Howard said. "With most people, a word to the wise is sufficient."

Staff Writer Trevor Maxwell can be contacted at 791-6451 or at tmaxwell@pressherald.com

Trevor Maxwell's article on my organization's study of Maine's judicial oversight system tells readers only half the story ("Low score on overseeing judges rankles state officials," May 25).

The paper could have offered a more balanced analysis of our Judicial Accountability Report Card if Mr. Maxwell had appeared for our scheduled interview on May 20 or given me the opportunity to respond to questions raised by an official at the state's Committee for Judicial Responsibility and Disability.

Although our evaluation of Maine's system was based on eight different criteria, a single official in the story objected to only one piece of our study. Richard Maiman, chairman of the state's committee, stated that we incorrectly asserted that Maine has a "gag rule." But another administrator, Maine Supreme Court Judicial Court Justice Jon Levy, contradicts Mr. Maiman, acknowledging that the committee's rules ask participants to keep judicial discipline proceedings confidential.

We hope that in practice, complainants are not penalized for speaking publicly, but the rules clearly send another message. While we certainly do not fault Mr. Maiman, we do hope that committee staff will urge the court to clarify that complainants have the right to speak freely about the fact that they have filed an ethics complaint against a judge and subsequent disciplinary hearings.

Maine can then begin to transform a failed system into one that upholds the integrity of the state's judiciary.

Suzanne M. Blonder
Senior counsel, HALT, Washington, D.C.