In my opening statement before every municipal court session, I preface my remarks by advising my captive audience that what I am about to tell them is largely common sense. Several weeks ago, all municipal and superior court judges attended a mandatory all-day seminar to help us better understand that we need to be very mindful of the words we utter from the bench. Seems like common sense to me. But it seems like a week does not go by where a judge does not make a comment that is, quite frankly, astonishingly inappropriate.
In Recommendation 11, issued by the Supreme Court’s Working Group on Municipal Courts, the committee proposed that municipal court judicial candidates be vetted through the county Judicial and Prosecutorial Appointments Committees (JPAC), much like superior court appointments. This too seems like common sense. The need for this additional scrutiny is highlighted by these incidents. And while it will not eliminate ignorant, errant insensitive statements it, obviously, can only help.
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