Ethics Forum: Questions and Answers on Professional Responsibility

More direction and guidance is needed to protect and educate judges on social media use.

I am a judicial officer and I use the internet to communicate with friends. What is the bottom line on my use of the internet?

Samuel C. Stretton.

The question of social media and judges has been raised before, but it is a timely issue. Many judges feel upset that they might be limited in their use of social media or the internet. They consider that their private world. But one's private world can be regulated to some extent if it interferes directly or indirectly with a judge's judicial duties. If the internet reflects badly on a judge's performance then, of course, that should be prohibited and potential discipline could arise. A classic case was out of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit involving then Chief Judge Alex Kozinski. In 2008, apparently, he had some images on his computer that were sexual in nature. Somewhat surprisingly, he did that during a pending obscenity case before him. He did recuse himself from the case when this was brought to his attention. There was an investigation. Apparently, the sexual content of his emails were in a location on his social media account which due to his carelessness was allowed to become public. The U.S. Court of Appeals of the Third Circuit's council was assigned to review the case. Kozinski was then admonished for creating embarrassment to the judicial institution. Because the judge apologized, no more punitive action was taken. The council found the judge's failure to take corrective action created a risk of embarrassment. Surprisingly, the judicial council for the Third Circuit did not find a violation for the sexual contents. This case, which occurred in 2008, has a footnote. In 2018, Kozinski resigned due to alleged improper conduct to certain of his female law clerks.