Georgia’s vagabond judicial commission: A tiny agency, a big target

Text of Amendment 3

Voters are asked to check “yes” or “no.”

“Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to abolish the existing Judicial Qualifications Commission; require the General Assembly to create and provide by general law for the composition, manner of appointment and governance of a new Judicial Qualifications Commission, with such commission having the power to discipline, remove and cause involuntary retirement of judges; require the Judicial Qualifications Commission to have procedures that provide for due process of law and review by the Supreme Court of its advisory opinions; and allow the Judicial Qualifications Commission to be open to the public in some manner?”

For four decades the tiny Judicial Qualifications Commission has operated without a permanent home.

The office was usually in the town where the current executive director lived — Hiawassee, Conyers, Madison, Monroe in recent years.

There is no regular location for meetings; the JQC meets in various towns around Georgia and sometimes at the Atlanta offices of the State Bar of Georgia.

The confidential files connected with complaints and investigations, until recent weeks, were kept at the Newton County home of one of the JQC’s employees.

And yet this nomadic, shoestring operation has removed dozens of judges statewide for misconduct in recent years. Many have argued that this remarkable search-and-destroy record is the hallmark of a maverick agency with no controls, too much power and an itchy trigger finger. Others say finding and disposing of misbehaving judges is precisely what the commission should be doing. Whatever the case, the commission's aggressive pursuit of judges has sparked a proposed constitutional amendment that would strip the JQC of its independence and put it under the control of the Legislature.

“All it is, is growing pains,” said former JQC Chairman Lester Tate. “Over the years, what has transpired is that the JQC has become more active.”

Still, the JQC has been caught up in an extraordinary political battle that is concerned with far more than the location of the office or the storage of records.

“There is a need to have some oversight of an agency created by the state,” said House Judiciary Committee Chairman Wendell Willard, R-Sandy Springs, who authored the push to change the JQC.

Now, however, “there is no oversight. There is no checks and blaances. Over the years they have been very good. In first 30 years it was a quiet agency no one knew … existed,” Willard said.

• In August 2013, the JQC issued a controversial advisory opinion judges could not close courtrooms to entire groups — children, tardy defendants or anyone who does not have business with the court were barred from certain courts. The JQC said judges could only exclude members of the public on a case-by-case basis after making a specific finding on the need to limit public access. The Council of State Court judges thought the JQC had overstepped its authority and asked the Supreme Court to decide. The justices heard the dispute last November but have not announced a decision.
• Until about two weeks ago, the commission has been without an investigator because Richard Hyde resigned that position under pressure and then was immediately appointed to the commission itself by Gov. Nathan Deal. (Please see note below.) A former FBI agent in recent weeks took the investigator's job on a temporary basis, according to commission member Ed Tolley.
• Less than two weeks after the Legislature passed the proposed constitutional amendment, Tate resigned from the JQC because, he wrote, "certain individuals and groups within the judicial and other branches of government have sought to interfere with the commission's work in ways that intrude upon its independence and hamper its day-to-day operations. … Routine disciplinary actions … have sparked intrusion from the legislative branch, merely because the disciplined judge or judges had powerful friends. Even efforts by the Commission to bring under control a part-time independent contractor resulted in executive branch machinations that made those efforts fruitless."
• JQC chairwoman Judge Brenda Weaver resigned from the commission in mid-August amid controversy over her involvement in bringing felony charges against a local newspaper publisher — along with his attorney — because of the wording he used in a request for Fannin County government documents. The Georgia Supreme Court replaced her on Oct. 20 with Chief Judge Tilman E. "Tripp" Self, III of the Macon Judicial Circuit.
• Mark Dehler left his job with the commission on Aug. 16, becoming the third JQC executive director to leave in less than 2½ years. Jeff Davis resigned from the JQC in April 2014 and was replaced by retired Judge Ronnie Joe Lane of Donalsonville. Lane quit after 10 months amid criticisms that he was drawing a full-time salary from the JQC while also receiving his entire state pension. The JQC was without an executive director for four months, until Dehler was hired. It has not had an executive director since Dehler left the position 2½ months ago.

“It’s sort of been a train wreck. We’ve just been trying to handle the business without a director,” Tolley told the State Bar Association’s Board of Governor’s.

The commission has a budget of about $500,000 to cover the salaries of the executive director, a case manager and a part-time administrative assistant; the costs of running an office; and the expense of investigating and prosecuting complaints. The JQC has about 550 pending cases at this time.

“The work has not stopped. We are working on these files as best we can,” Tolley said.

The commission has been criticized for how it's handled some of the complaints against judges, especially judges with friends in the Legislature. More than five dozen judges have resigned or have been removed from the bench in the past seven years because of JQC investigations.

The net result of the turmoil has been an all-out political assault on the commission’s independence in the form of the proposed constitutional amendment and a bill establishing how the JQC will operate if the amendment passes; both passed by the barest of margins on the last two days of the 2016 General Assembly.

As a result, voters will be asked on the Nov. 8 ballot whethe the state Constitution should be changed to take away the JQC’s independence and giving the Legislature control over it. Those wanting the make the change said the JQC had become rudderless and needs oversight.

Tate, a Cartersville attorney, disagreed with the characterization. “I’m not saying we had a perfect system,” Tate said, but added that the agency serves a critical purpose and needs to be free of political meddling.

Even with no permanent home, the offices established in the executive directors’ hometowns have conference rooms and space for meeting with staff, judges and the public, Dehler said. Mail sent to the JQC’s post office box is picked up daily. And calls to the JQC were usually answered by a person rather than a recording.

Point of dispute