More than 130 Federal Judges Broke the Law by Hearing Cases Involving Their Own Financial InterestsAlana Mastrangelo 28 Sep 2021
More than 130 federal judges might have broken the law — some accidentally — by hearing court cases that involved their own financial interests, breaching a bedrock principle of American jurisprudence, which maintains no one should be a judge of their own cause, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.
An investigation conducted by the newspaper found 131 federal judges violated U.S. law and judicial ethics by overseeing cases involving companies in which they or their family owned stock. The judges reportedly failed to disqualify themselves from 685 cases across the country since 2010.
Moreover, when the judges participated in such cases, about two-thirds of their rulings ended up being in favor of their or their family’s financial interests.
In New York, for example, Judge Edgardo Ramos handled a lawsuit between an Exxon Mobil Corp. unit and TIG Insurance Co. over a pollution claim while owning between $15,001 and $50,000 of Exxon stock. Judge Ramos ultimately accepted an arbitration panel’s opinion that TIG should pay Exxon $25 million, and added $8 million of interest.
In Colorado, Judge Lewis Babcock oversaw a court case involving a Comcast Corp. subsidiary, in which he ruled in its favor. Meanwhile, the judge or his family reportedly had between $15,001 and $50,000 in Comcast stock.
And at an Ohio-based appeals court, Judge Julia Smith Gibbons wrote an opinion that favored Ford Motor Co. in a trademark dispute while her husband held stock in the auto maker. And before the ruling, her husband’s financial adviser bought more Ford stock for his retirement account.
Judges offered a variety of explanations for their violations, Wall Street Journal reported, which added that some judges blamed their clerks, while others said their recusal lists had misspellings, which caused the court cases to make it past their conflict-screening software. Other judges simply pointed to trades that resulted in losses.
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/09/28/more-130-federal-judges-broke-law-hearing-cases-involving-own-financial-interests/
