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Friday, May 13, 2016
Pretty Little Liars of Kill Devil Hills — Episode III
http://outerbanksvoice.com/2016/02/08/pretty-little-liars-of-kill-devil-hills-episode-iii/
Pretty Little Liars of Kill Devil Hills — Episode II
http://outerbanksvoice.com/2016/02/07/pretty-little-liars-of-kill-devil-hills-episode-ii/
Pretty Little Liars of Kill Devil Hills – Episode I
http://outerbanksvoice.com/2016/02/05/pretty-little-liars-of-kill-devil-hills-episode-i/
‘The NeverEnding Story’ starring Kill Devil Hills
‘The NeverEnding Story’ starring Kill Devil Hills
By Sam Walker and Russ Lay on February 4, 2016
Before you go looking for Falcor, this isn’t about a boy who needs a friend and finds a world that needs a hero in a land beyond imagination.Although, some of what we’ve been told borders on outright fantasy.
It’s really about the leaders of a town that just don’t want to do what an ice queen sang three decades later, and “Let It Go!”
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The critics came from two different camps.
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The first simply appeared to be bored by the entire story, considering it old news and implying the Voice was just ‘stirring the pot’ by keeping it alive.The other group consisted of the same handful of people who have posted on behalf of Kill Devil Hills police chief Gary Britt, including Britt himself, in every online forum in Dare County.
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No, we’re not kidding. Dan Brown would have a field day exploring the fertile mind of these folks.
Things on that front have gotten so bad that Britt even ‘sees’ Freemasons who don’t exist, identifying in comments to the Voice the local attorney who wrote the columns as a member, when in fact he is not now and never has been part of that fraternity.
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It’s those that said they’d had enough of the story that gave us pause.
First of all, it isn’t the media, including the Voice, that has kept this absurd story alive for so long.
That responsibility lies squarely with the Town of Kill Devil Hills, which has not only refused to accept their “wins” graciously, but have now taken actions that are literally historic and unprecedented in the history of North Carolina and the State Bar.
If a five-year crusade by a town to have an elected judge removed from office in an unprecedented manner isn’t newsworthy, then maybe we should just shut the Voice down.
Or follow the lead of local bloggers who seem more concerned with what hotels commissioners stay in or who shot a bear on county property.
As to what is keeping the story in the news, let’s look at the facts.
In 2011, four former and current police officers filed a petition with the courts to have Chief Britt removed as the town’s top cop.
The four men also filed a civil suit against the town.
Shortly thereafter, the chief was placed on suspension and the then-District Attorney sent the Town a letter stating he was, indeed, filing a petition himself to remove Britt. Sounds like news to us.
By January, 2012, the District Attorney had performed an about-face and chose not to file the removal petition.
The town, not the media, trumpeted this fact in a press release, although they were unable to avoid taking a swipe at one of the officer’s involved, basically calling him a liar in print.
In July, 2012 a visiting Superior Court judge tossed the civil suit, stating it was a personnel matter and noting the officers did not have standing in a state that employs people at will.
Thus, as of July, 2012 the Town had turned back both a petition to remove their police chief and saw a civil suit dismissed without so much as a trial.
Their chief was safely ensconced in his job, where he has been free to preside over the highest turnover rate among police officers in Dare County, and the Voice and other media had turned their attention to other issues.
Moreover, there was zero interaction in any way between the Town and the Judge.
Seems to us the story should have ended there and everyone appeared to have moved on.
But Kill Devil Hills was far from done.
In 2012, the Town decided to file complaints against Judge Tillett with the Judicial Standards Commission.
So the story was back in the news for another year, courtesy of all the public filings and a pipeline of leaks coming from the JSC to a newspaper in Elizabeth City that has a ‘Jones’ for Dare County and Judge’s Tillett and Barnes in particular.
The ‘Daily Advance’ ran stories, editorials and even whined about the outcome, and KDH town staff, particularly Assistant Town Manager Shawn Murphy gleefully reprinted and emailed each anti-Tillett story to town officials and employees as we discovered in our Freedom of Information Act requests.
On March 14, 2013, the Judicial Standards Commission, backed by the North Carolina Supreme Court, issued Judge Tillett a slap on the wrist.
One might have thought the town would have seen this as either a victory, or at least, the actual end of the road, since there is no other constitutional method in North Carolina to remove a judge.
Unless the town could get two-thirds of the General Assembly to impeach and convict Tillett.
An unlikely scenario, and once again, we thought the story was over.
And once again, the Town of Kill Devil Hills immediately revived the story, filing complaints against Tillett and former town attorney Dan Merrell with the State Bar within days of the Judicial Standard Commission decision to leave Tillett on the bench.
Nothing happened for almost two years.
But in mid-2015, the Bar suddenly filed complaints against both Tillett and Merrell and once more made this a media spectacle.
This time, the actions were so unprecedented, and perhaps outside the scope of the Bar’s power that state legislators entered the fray and a prestigious state publication, North Carolina Lawyer’s Weekly, has run at least two articles examining the situation.
We think we’re in good company in our continued coverage of this story.
Indeed, this writer found himself subpoenaed and forced to go to the Bar hearing against Merrell, where once again, the town failed in their goal to have him disbarred.
But taxpayers will be happy to know the entire town management made the trip and Chief Britt even stayed over night to watch the second day of the hearings.
If it’s so important that the town manager, assistant manager, clerk, police chief and assistant police chief need to abandon their posts in order to try to punish a local attorney, who are we at the Voice to decide this story is no longer important?
And so, not only will the coverage continue, it will expand.
Stay tuned.
Another view: Bar is judge, jury, executioner against Tillett
Another view: Bar is judge, jury, executioner against Tillett
By Submitted Story on January 11, 2016
Nags Head Attorney Neil W. Scarborough submitted the following article for publication in The Outer Banks Voice.
This is the third part of a three-part article. The first two examine the story involving Superior Court Judge Jerry Tillett’s son and the events afterward and introduces the people responsible for publicizing it and their likely reasons.The third part examines the State Bar’s conduct in more detail and reveals the injustice they’re not only perpetrating but are trying to hide.
All the court documents and other materials related to this case are available for review at www.scarboroughlawfirm.com.
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Like our sister states and the federal government, North Carolina’s government consists of three branches: the executive, the legislative and the judicial.
Also like our sister states and the federal government, the three branches are independent, meaning no branch can impede, interfere with or control the others except as expressly permitted by the N.C. Constitution. [13]
The North Carolina State Bar was created by the General Assembly in 1933 [14] as an agency of the legislative branch. It was formed to enable the bar to provide more effective service to the public by, among other things, giving the Bar authority to control admission to practice and to discipline attorneys for misconduct. [15]
In short, the primary purpose of the State Bar is and always has been to regulate those who practice law in the State.
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- Conviction or plea of guilty or no contest to a criminal offense showing professional unfitness;
- Violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct; or
- Knowing misrepresentation of any facts or circumstances surrounding any complaint, allegation or charge of misconduct issued by or in the name of the Bar. [16]
The Model Rules of Professional Conduct are just what they say they are, rules and guidelines that practicing attorneys are to follow, the violation of which can result in discipline by the State Bar.
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Whereas attorneys are subject to the Code of Professional Conduct and the discipline of attorneys is to be handled by the State Bar, judges are subject to the Code of Judicial Conduct, and the discipline of judges is to be handled by the N.C. Judicial Standards Commission.
This regulatory scheme isn’t a minor detail; it was established pursuant to express Constitutional mandate.[18] General Statute §§ 7A-374.1 – 378, which created the Judicial Standards Commission, was the General Assembly’s answer to that mandate. It expressly provides that “the procedure for discipline of any judge or justice of the General Court of Justice shall be in accordance with this Article” (emphasis added). [19]
Turning back to the complaint against Judge Tillett, the Bar therefore faces at least four insurmountable hurdles in its attempt to discipline him — and we haven’t gotten to “double jeopardy” yet.
In the first place,Tillett is a judge and thus, a member of the judicial branch. As mentioned above, our three branches of government are independent and may not interfere with one another in the absence of express authorization by the Constitution.
And the Constitution contains no exception that would even arguably allow the Bar to regulate the judicial branch. Consequently, the State Bar, as an agency of the legislative branch, does not have authority to discipline Tillett, an officer of the judicial branch.
Second, even assuming that the legislature may regulate the judiciary, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference in this case: N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-374 expressly provides that the exclusive procedure for disciplining judges is before the Judicial Standards Commission, and our Supreme Court has held that it has exclusive original jurisdiction over such claims. [20]
Consequently, the State Bar doesn’t have jurisdiction to discipline Tillett.
Third, let’s assume for the sake of argument that the Bar does, in fact, have authority to discipline Tillett.
In that case it must allege that Tillett has engaged in one of the three types of conduct listed above for which the Bar may impose discipline.
The Bar went with door number two, alleging that Tillett violated the Rules of Professional Conduct by engaging in conduct “prejudicial to the administration of justice.”
The problem with this theory is that the Rules of Professional Conduct only apply to attorneys; that is, lawyers engaged in the private practice of law. Judges are not attorneys; in fact, judges are forbidden from practicing law by statute. [21]
As discussed above, judges are subject to the Code of Judicial Conduct, and the discipline of judges is the exclusive province of the Judicial Standards Commission, not the State Bar.
The fourth and final problem with the theory is also proof of how far the responsible parties are willing to go to harm Tillett.
Again, Tillett’s alleged wrongdoing is engaging in conduct “prejudicial to the administration of justice.” [22]
Vagueness aside, in this case the charge against Tillett is ludicrous on its face.
Tillett requested the DA to investigate the conduct of a police chief against whom multiple complaints had been filed by his own officers — including at least four who filed lawsuits against him and KDH.[23]
Kill Devil Hills Town Attorney Steven Michael effectively stopped the investigation. For Michael to then accuse Tillett of engaging in conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice is the proverbial pot calling the kettle black: In my limited experience, if anyone is engaged in conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice, it is the person who stops an investigation, not the one calling for an investigation.
A likely counterargument is that the State Bar and the Judicial Standards Commission have “concurrent” jurisdiction, meaning that either agency can hear a complaint against a judge.
In the first place, that wouldn’t explain how Tillett can be disciplined for the same conduct twice, once by each agency.
A second more fundamental and telling problem is the most obvious: the General Assembly wouldn’t have gone through the trouble of creating a Judicial Standards Committee, adopting Rules of Judicial Conduct and enacting an entire statutory procedure for the discipline of judges if the State Bar already authority to do the job.
Finally,the argument that the Bar and the JSC have concurrent jurisdiction leads to a specific legal problem for the Bar, which is discussed in more detail in the next section.
But if the Bar doesn’t have authority to discipline Tillett (and it does not), then how are they doing it? Simply put, because they can.
In a twist that turns irony on its head, the State Bar is literally judge, jury and executioner: It makes the laws; it “charges” people for violating the laws; it selects the judge and jury to try the case; it decides the case; and it then imposes a sentence of its choosing.
There are no “checks” or “balances,” no oversight from an outside agency. Everything hinges uon the character and honesty of those involved, and if there’s one point to take away from this case it’s that any such trust is misplaced.[24] In what government would the practicing bar be permitted to discipline judges?
The obvious answer is “none.” but when the agency attempting to discipline a judge is permitted to determine whether it has authority to do so, the inevitable answer is “North Carolina,” making it the only sovereign State in the western world to have earned the distinction.
And don’t think for a second that the Bar only appears to be manipulating the rules. The first lines of the complaint against Tillett belie the truth: well aware that Tillett isn’t an attorney, at no point in the 11-page complaint does the drafter allege that Tillett is engaged in the practice of law [25] – yet it is careful to append “attorney” after Tillett’s name in the caption.
Double jeopardy
Recall the second question posed at the end of the last section: In what government could a sitting judge be disciplined for the same conduct twice?
Once again, “North Carolina” would appear to be the only sovereign State in the western world to have earned the distinction. But this time Tillett will have earned a distinction as well: He’ll be the only sitting judge to have been disciplined by the State Bar in the more than 80 years of its existence.
Part of the reason why that’s the case was discussed in the last section; the other part will be addressed here.
Some readers may not have been aware that this is the second time Tillett has faced discipline on the basis of the same facts.
The first Complaint against him was filed in 2011 with the Judicial Standards Commission, where it was alleged that his conduct violated the Rules of Judicial Conduct by engaging in conduct “prejudicial to the administration of justice.”
After two years of defending against the allegations, Tillett decided to admit certain facts and, as they say, take his medicine.
He did so, however, not because the allegations were true but only to bring an end to what had become a lengthy and expensive battle [26] — I know this because I was among those who counseled him to go that route.
Of course, neither I nor anyone else involved had any idea that Michael would file another complaint against him with the State Bar; indeed, we all knew that wasn’t “possible.”
The Complaint filed against Tillett with the Bar is not only based upon the same facts that formed the basis for the Complaint with the Judicial Standards Commission but is also based upon the same claim; namely, that Tillett’s conduct was “prejudicial to the administration of justice.” [27]
This is important in more ways than one.
Ordinarily, when a fact is found or admitted to be true in one legal proceeding it is taken to be established in any other proceeding and cannot be refuted. The doctrine is known as “issue preclusion” or “collateral estoppel,” and it makes good sense.
It’s a rule of fairness intended to protect the integrity of the judicial process by preventing relitigation of the same facts.
Since Tillett stipulated to certain facts in the proceedings before the Judicial Standards Commission, he would therefore ordinarily be estopped from disputing those facts in the proceedings before the State Bar.
But there’s a flip side.
Pursuant to the same principle, when a decision is reached in one legal proceeding the claim has been adjudicated and cannot be relitigated.
The doctrine is called Res Judicata or “claim preclusion,” akin to the 5th Amendment protection against “double jeopardy,” and it serves the same purpose as collateral estoppel.
Since the claims against Tillett have already been adjudicated in the proceedings before the Judicial Standards Commission, the State Bar would therefore ordinarily be estopped from bringing the claims against him a second time. [26]
That is, of course, if we weren’t in the land of Oz.
The Bar is attempting to have its cake cake and eat it too: It’s attempting to use Tillett’s admissions in the previous proceedings against him in the second when, ironically, the principle it claims to prevent Tillett from refuting the facts in the second proceedings is the same principle that should prevent it from disciplining him a second time! [27]
Put another way, the Bar wants the facts in the proceedings before the Judicial Standards Commission to be deemed established but the claims in the proceedings before the Judicial Standards Commission not to be deemed established, because to hold otherwise would mean that the Bar is precluded from disciplining Tillett a second time, which is simply unacceptable.
And that’s not the end of it. The Bar is going one step further in this case by attempting to avoid creating any record of its conduct.
If the Bar has its way, the “record” will consist of a Complaint, an Answer, and an adjudication — next to nothing in between, and nothing explaining how and why they did what they’re doing. And that’s for good reason, if you’re the Bar.
In the first place it appears the Bar wants to keep the whole affair in the dark so that as few people as possible know what it’s doing. In the second place, it appears the Bar wants to make it difficult for anyone to figure out what it’s done after it’s done it.
That’s because in deciding an appeal from a lower “court,” the appellate court is generally limited to reviewing the decision for legal errors; that is, whether the lower court applied the correct law and applied it correctly.
The less of a record the Bar creates of how it reached its decision the more difficult it will be for an appellate court, in this case the North Carolina Supreme Court, to determine whether the Bar made legal errors.
So how is the Bar attempting to avoid creating a record?
Well, in response to the Bar complaint, Tillett filed motions that raised many of the points mentioned in this article, points which preclude the Bar from proceeding against him.
The Bar’s response?
It summarily denied the motions without a hearing — meaning there’s no record.
Meanwhile, as mentioned earlier, the Bar filed a motion for summary judgment contending that the doctrine of res judicata precludes Tillett from refuting any of the admissions he made in the proceedings before the Judicial Standards Commission.
A motion for summary judgment is a procedural mechanism whereby the moving party argues that there are no genuine issues of fact in dispute and that it is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. If the motion is allowed, you guessed it, there’s no hearing; they win without so much as a whimper, let alone a fight.
And that’s exactly what happened: on Dec. 10, the Bar allowed its own motion for summary judgment, ruling that Judge Tillett is precluded by the doctrine of res judicata from refuting the admissions made before the Judicial Standards Commission. Simultaneously the Bar denied Tillett’s motion for summary judgment, in which he argued that res judicata precludes the Bar from prosecuting him a second time.
Conclusion
Recently Tillett and the Bar, through counsel, sat down for an impromptu meeting to discuss the possibility of settling the case.
When asked what the Bar would be willing to accept to settle, Tillett was told that Bar would accept nothing short of his resignation.
This brings to light the likely motivation behind the Bar Complaint: One of them wants Tillett’s seat on the Superior Court.
And there’s no better time than now to make such a “move.”
With Michael and Baker’s political connections, one of them is virtually assured of getting appointed to Tillett’s seat — or perhaps the seat of J.C. Cole, our other Superior Court judge, who will likely be retiring soon. [28]
I’ll close with this, which seems fitting: Article I, Section 14 of the N.C. Constitution reads, “Freedom of speech and of the press are two of the great bulwarks of liberty and therefore shall never be restrained, but every person shall be held responsible for their abuse.” (emphasis added).
Let’s hope so.
Footnotes:
[13] It’s a basic, bedrock principle of American Constitutional law known as “separation of powers.” “The legislative, executive, and supreme judicial powers of the State government shall be forever separate and distinct from each other.” Article I, Section 6 of the North Carolina Constitution. “The judicial power of the State shall, except as provided in Section 3 of this Article, be vested in . . . a General Court of Justice. The General Assembly shall have no power to deprive the judicial department of any power or jurisdiction that rightfully pertains to it as a co-ordinate department of the government. . .” Article IV, Section 1 of the North Carolina Constitution.
[14] N.C. Gen. Stat. § 84-15 et seq.
[15] Baker v. Varser, 240 N.C. 260 (1954).
[16]N.C. Gen. Stat. § 84-28(b)
[17] The American Bar Association, Status of State Review of Professional Conduct Rules as of September 14, 2011. http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/migrated/cpr/pic/ethics_2000_status_chart.pdf-63k-2012-09-07; see also, Rotunda, Ronald D., Legal Ethics: the Lawyer’s Deskbook on Professional Responsibility § 1-1(f) (2015-2016 Ed.)
18] “The General Assembly shall prescribe a procedure for . . . the censure and removal of a Justice or Judge of the General Court of Justice for willful misconduct in office . . . or conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice. . .”N.C. Constitution, Article IV § 17
[19] N.C. Gen. Stat. § 7A-374.1. See also, In re Hardy, 294 N.C. 90 (1978); In re Renfer, 345 N.C. 632 (1997), in which the court noted that “original jurisdiction to discipline judges lies solely within the Supreme Court by virtue of statutory authority.”
[20] In re Renfer, 345 N.C. 632 (1997), in which the court noted that “original jurisdiction to discipline judges lies solely within the Supreme Court by virtue of statutory authority.”
[21] N.C. Gen. Stat. § 84-2: “No . . . judge . . . shall engage in the private practice of law.”
[22] Language one commentator has described as “too vague and loose to be a criterion in a legal code” and about which another said, “there is a basic unfairness in asserting the power to take away one’s livelihood, one’s ability to practice law, practice law, based on a standard so undefined, vague, and amorphous that it varies with the eyes of the beholder.” Rotunda § 8.4-2(e)
[23] And the allegations against Britt, even if only partly true, beg the question why Tillett or KDH officials haven’t long since removed him from office.
[24] “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, either external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.” Madison, James, The Federalist Number Papers 51 (1787).
[25] Indeed, the drafter alleges that Tillett “at all relevant times a Superior Court Judge”)
[26] Anyone who has ever been involved with litigation can no doubt sympathize.
[27] Although the Bar Complaint is based on the allegation that Tillett violated the Rules of Professional Conduct (RPC), whereas the Complaint against him with the Judicial Standards Commission alleges that he violated the Rules of Judicial Conduct (RJC), the specific “violation” he is alleged to have committed is the same – conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice, a rule that the RPC and RJC share in common.
[27] And to think: the doctrine was intended to protect the integrity of the courts and the judicial process.
[28] And lest anyone think that this thought experiment is motivated by my own political views, please note that I am a registered Republican and have been since I was old enough to vote.
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Another view: A tight cadre controls Tillett’s future
Another view: A tight cadre controls Tillett’s future
By Submitted Story on January 9, 2016
Nags Head Attorney Neil W. Scarborough submitted the following article for publication in The Outer Banks Voice.
Judge Jerry Tillett
Steven Michael
The third part examines the State Bar’s conduct in more detail and reveals the injustice they’re not only perpetrating but are trying to hide.
All the court documents and other materials related to this case are available for review at www.scarboroughlawfirm.com.
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Most readers know that “the story” is the basis for a complaint against Superior Court Judge Jerry Tillett with the N.C. State Bar, which was covered in Part 1 and linked below.
The North Carolina State Bar isn’t merely the body of practicing lawyers in the State; it is the State agency that governs those of us fortunate enough to practice law in North Carolina, or in this case, is attempting to govern those of us unfortunate enough to be Judge Jerry Tillett.
Getting to know some members of the N.C. Bar and their allies will shed light on who’s behind the war being waged against Tillett and why they might be waging it.
The latest complaint against Tillett is, in fact, the second one that’s been filed against him on the basis of the same facts. Both complaints, however, were initiated by Steven D. Michael, a partner at Sharp, Michael, Graham & Baker in Kitty Hawk.
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Michael is the past president of the State Bar. He occupied that post at the time that he, while also serving as attorney for KDH, filed the first complaint against Tillett with the N.C. Judicial Standards Commission.
He’s also the chair of the Bar’s Disciplinary Hearing Commission, giving him authority to select the members who will decide the complaint against Tillett. Michael’s successor as State Bar president is Ronald G. Baker.
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Serving with Baker on the State Bar’s Executive Commission is another local attorney, C. Everett Thompson, who also serves on three other Bar commissions. [8]
Thompson is also the State Bar Councilor for the 1st Judicial District — this one. His immediate predecessor at that post was Donald C. Prentiss, yet another local attorney.
Prentiss, who practices with Hornthal, Riley, Ellis & Maland in Elizabeth City, also serves with Steve Michael as one of 12 members of the State Bar’s Disciplinary Hearing Commission, the very commission deciding the complaint against Judge Tillett.
Another member of Prentiss’s firm, Ben Gallop, serves on the State Bar’s Ethics Commission. And the founding member and senior partner of the Hornthal firm, L.P. Hornthal, Jr., is one of only 13 members of the North Carolina Judicial Standards Commission, the group that Michael filed his first complaint against Judge Tillett with back in 2011.
For those counting, that’s six local attorneys, including two past State Bar presidents, one of whom filed both complaints against Judge Tillett.
Five of the six attorneys hold high-level posts with the N.C. State Bar, two serve on the Disciplinary Hearing Commission, and one is on the 13-member Judicial Standards Commission.[9] If something is starting to smell fishy, it’s probably for good reason.
So there’s the “who”; but why might they be doing it? Finding the answer to that question is a two-step exercise, the first of which involves a brief history lesson.
The Game
Judge John Herbert W. Small was a legal fixture in eastern North Carolina for over half a century. [10] He was admitted to the North Carolina bar in 1949 and practiced in Elizabeth City for many years before being elected to the bench.
He went on to become the Senior Resident Superior Court Judge for the 1st Judicial District, the seat currently occupied by Tillett.
In 1991, after 17 years on the Superior Court bench and only a few months before his term ended, Small retired. And guess who was appointed to fill his seat through the end of term?
That’s right, Steve Michael.
In the election for Small’s seat several months later, Tillett backed Michael’s opponent, Richard “Dick” Parker, who defeated Michael handily. Parker went on to serve on the Superior Court bench until retiring in 2009.
Up until Small retired, Michael was a card-carrying Democrat. Then as now, judicial appointments must be confirmed by the governor, and the governor at the time was Jim Martin, a Republican. So Michael switched parties, andthe newly-minted Republican got the appointment over Democrat Dick Parker.
Of course, switching political parties to win an election happens often enough. Still, for most people changing parties is more significant than, say, changing one’s brand of toothpaste.
The point is this: Michael switched parties to secure his appointment, which shows that he had more than a passing interest in becoming a Superior Court judge.
And running for political office is much more than a hobby — it takes hard work, dedication and spending a lot of one’s hard-earned money. Michael no doubt put all of that into his campaign — only to lose. He not only lost; he lost to a Democrat after he had switched parties.
For years since his defeat by Parker, he put his efforts into climbing the ladder of the N.C. State Bar until, in 2010, he assumed its highest post, President.
Sound like a cheap substitute for a judgeship? Not if you understand the power the State Bar has come to wield. The State Bar has become one of the most powerful agencies in North Carolina government.
To grasp that, one only need consider the war the Bar has been able to wage against Tillett and consider the following questions: In what government would the practicing bar be permitted to discipline sitting judges?
In what government could a sitting judge be disciplined for the same conduct twice?
These questions also serve to highlight the extent of the injustice being perpetrated against Judge Tillett, which is the next topic.
Footnotes:
[6] Like Judge Tillett, Merrell has faced not one but two complaints against him with the State Bar, at least the second of which was also initiated by Michael.
[7] Appointments Advisory, Finance and Audit, Issues, Nominating, and the Executive Commission.
[8] Bar’s Administrative, Distinguished Service, and Grievance Commissions.
[9] Reading the list of State Bar officers, particularly past presidents, is like reading a family tree — most are part of a relatively small group who either went to law school together or are friends.
[10] The federal courthouse in Elizabeth City is named for him.
Tuesday, May 3, 2016
My experience with HughesNet
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dave
February 9, 2016 5:12 pm