Law Technology

Ohio Judge Makes ?Anonymous? Online Comment about Litigant, Refuses to Step Down

By Huma Rashid

Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Shirley Strickland Saffold allegedly made anonymous comments online about her pending cases, using the clever moniker, ?Lawmiss.? Personally, if I was a judge making anonymous comments on my cases in an online forum in violation of ethics rules, I?d use something dignified and fun, like, ?HonorableJusticeShutYourMouth? or ?JusticeUneducatedFoot? (the opposite of Learned Hand, you see). Ah, who am I kidding? If I was a judge leaving comments online about my case, my handle would totally be ?JudgeThisHaterz.?

The Ohio judge denied a motion filed by defense counsel to recuse herself in the cases in question. She did say she hadn?t made up her mind yet about stepping down from the case of alleged serial killer Anthony Sowell, but said she would not be stepping down in three other cases in which attorney Rufus Sims is also the counsel for the defendant.

She?s going the Jesse James route and blaming the media.

(I hate myself a little for including a mention of the Sandra Bullock/Jesse James scandal in this post. Everyone grab a rock, a torch, or a pitchfork; the line forms on the right.)

Instead of blaming hippies, global warming, or 9/11, Judge Saffold blamed the Plain Dealer, a local newspaper, for launching what she calls ?one of the most vicious, mean-spirited attacks that anyone could ever make,? and said she would not be intimidated by its tactics. I thought litigators were usually the ones with the flair for drama.

Sims, attorney for defendant Sowell and three other defendants in cases before Judge Saffold, is considering an appeal of the motion to recuse to the Supreme Court of Ohio.

In addition to the online comments left by Judge Saffold as ?Lawmiss,? it appears that someone used the judge?s personal email account to reportedly criticize Sims and comment on Sowell and at least one more party Sims was representing. Saffold claims she was not the one to make such remarks through her personal email address, and her adult daughter, who was a law student at one point, has taken responsibility for some of the posts made by ?Lawmiss.? Some of the 80 comments left by ?Lawmiss? were left using Saffold?s court computer. So not only do we have a judge that allegedly isn?t up to speed on ethics rules (since only some of the posts are attributed to her daughter), but her former-law-student-daughter also appears not to have paid much attention in her Professional Responsibility class.

And remember, don’t say anything in response to this post that is sure to anger me, or “JudgeThisHaterz” is going to take you to task.

Related posts:

1. Florida: Judges Cannot be Facebook Friends with Litigants
2. Social Network Review: Counsel.Net
3. Georgia Judge Bans Twitter From Courtroom

Full post as published by Social Media Law Student on April 07, 2010 (boomark / email).