LONG LINE OF BROTHERS’ KEEPERS
It’s an unpleasant job, but apparently a lot of jurists are willing to do it.
More than 100 judges from around the state applied this year to serve as special masters, or fact-finders, in the most serious disciplinary cases heard by the Commission on Judicial Performance.
Last week the state Supreme Court announced that 44 of those applicants have been chosen to comprise a new pool of potential panelists. (Read the complete list here.)
The newly christened special masters will be the first to receive formal training under guidelines still being developed by the Administrative Office of the Courts, the CJP and the Supreme Court. Former masters went through a less structured CJP-led initiation before hearing cases.
The new training program doesn’t stem from problems with past special-master panels, said Beth Jay, principal attorney to Chief Justice Ronald George. “This was done in an effort to improve the system, promote consistency, and be a vehicle for providing training for those participating in this important process,” Jay said.
The Supreme Court appoints three-master panels to hear evidence in disputed cases where severe punishment, including censure or removal from office, is threatened. The panels � three to five are convened on average each year � then make recommendations to the 11-member CJP.
In the past, potential panelists were recommended to the Supreme Court by presiding judges.
But when it came time to appoint a panel, Supreme Court justices sometimes had trouble finding jurists with the time or even the interest in serving, Jay said. So this year the chief justice solicited applications and nominations. The final panelists were chosen based on their racial, gender and geographical diversity as well as leadership history and experience, Jay said.
The new special masters, including 13 appellate court justices, should undergo training early next year, she said.
� Cheryl Miller
CORRIGAN GETS COMFORTABLE
As her one-year anniversary on the California Supreme Court approaches, Justice Carol Corrigan seems to have found her comfort zone.
Which means, woe be it for lawyers who aren’t on their toes during oral arguments.
Last week, when the justices held hearings in Los Angeles for two days, Corrigan � who joined the high court on Jan. 4 � had hard questions in a couple of high-profile cases.
In Tuesday’s argument in Taus v. Loftus, S133805, Corrigan all but scoffed at an answer given by Thomas Burke, a partner in Davis Wright Tremaine’s San Francisco office. Burke represents two well-known academics who were sued for defamation after authoring an article debunking the controversial case study of a young woman who claimed repressed memories of sexual abuse.
During arguments, Burke was asked why the study subject, Nicole Taus, shouldn’t be allowed to sue Elizabeth Loftus and Melvin Guyer for publishing comments obtained from her foster mother allegedly through deception.
Burke responded by saying the comments concerned the foster mother’s own experiences with Taus, and Taus had no right to sue over them.
“That’s a little facile,” Corrigan said, “to say that it’s only the foster mother’s experiences.” The comments in question related to allegations that Taus had used drugs and slept around with boys while growing up.
“To say there is no reasonable expectation of privacy,” Corrigan said, “just because it [involved] the foster mother’s experiences doesn’t fly with me.”
On Wednesday � during arguments in California Statewide Communities Development Authority v. All Persons Interested in the Matter of the Validity of a Purchase Agreement, S124195 � Corrigan kept cornering Deputy Attorney General Zackery Morazzini.
Morazzini was arguing that the California Constitution prohibits religiously affiliated schools from receiving indirect state aid through so-called conduit financing that allows them access to tax-exempt bonds.
Corrigan said Morazzini’s answers � that “pervasively sectarian” schools had no right to state aid � indicated a “hostility to religion,” especially when conduit financing “wouldn’t cost the state a dime.”
Corrigan, a devout Catholic who’s on the board of directors of Holy Names College in Oakland, said Morazzini made it sound as if it’s “OK to be hostile” to religious schools if the state believes they are “really, really religious.”
To be fair to Corrigan, though, Morazzini also was hit with hard-to-answer questions by Chief Justice Ronald George and Justices Joyce Kennard and Marvin Baxter.
Corrigan’s comments just seemed to have more of a zing to them.
� Mike McKee
