State Judges

Judge Amber Wolf Is Becoming A Media Star And It's Great For America

Every time this woman goes viral, the justice system gets a little better.

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judge-amber-wolf-2So Judge Amber Wolf is all over the internet again in continuing her unintentional mission on this Earth to be the antithesis to all the loutish, draconian, tin-pot dictators who suck up all the courtroom media attention and warp the American conception of justice. And when it comes to challenging the popular perception of judges, it’s not so much what she’s been doing, as what she’s not been doing — we don’t need Judge Roy Bean for every jaywalker.

As an aside, is it crazy that the two most compelling state judge stories this week are both out of Jefferson County, Kentucky? Is there something in the water?

Judge Wolf first made waves blowing up at prison officials who paraded around an inmate without pants and, more importantly, denied the woman access to feminine hygiene products. It was the sort of video that shouldn’t have gone viral, because judges should be taking jailers to task all the time over abuses big and small. Sure, on a scale of 1 to Abu Ghraib, what happened to that woman wasn’t the worst abuse in prison history, but so what? Where’s the f**king “Broken Windows” approach for jailers?

This time, Judge Wolf granted a temporary exception to her own no contact order to allow a defendant to meet his infant son.

Judge Wolf said that Ashley Roeder had been nearby during her husband’s hearing, along with their baby, who had been born 30 days earlier — a baby James had never seen.

“I saw her try to hold the baby up when he came out for his case to be called with his attorney,” Judge Wolf told WDRB on Monday. “And I thought that he hadn’t seen that. And it occurred to me after we finished this case that he had not met his baby — who was 30 days old — and that he was not going to get an opportunity to meet his baby anytime in the near future.”

Judge Wolf then allowed the defendant a few brief moments to meet his son and let the courtroom get all weepy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02XTii2qyjw

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The superficial warm fuzzy crap doesn’t really interest me. Save it for the Hallmark people. What matters is the counternarrative Judge Wolf is forging. Take another repeat YouTube star like Judge John Hurley of Florida who hands out contempt sentences measured in months and berates public defenders. That’s the kind of judge who usually gets the attention. The laughably harsh, interminably snide “getting tough” on criminals schtick may win local elections, but isn’t really becoming of someone vested with the responsibility to check the awesome power of the state.

Make no mistake, there are a lot of good judges out there, but they’re not shaping that popular conception because they aren’t the squeaky wheels.

But, improbably, Judge Wolf is drawing eyeballs for not acting like a cartoon. Every time Judge Wolf goes viral, we get to see what the world looks like when the bench endeavors to be the bigger person and not stoop to the level of the lawless by acting the bigger bully. It’s not like Judge Wolf is soft either. She’s a former prosecutor herself. But she’s also a former public defender. It’s probably a sign of bigger problems when a judge presents an even keel and people immediately brand her as soft. But if she can make this measured approach a hit, maybe more judges will follow her lead.

It’s hard to tell in some courtroom videos, but local judges theoretically aren’t just muscle for the prosecution. If you watch a judge so wrapped up in his own “tough guy” mystique that he actually beats up the public defender for zealously representing the defendant, the whole “neutral arbiter” thing seems like a rhetorical fig leaf.

We probably should get it some pants.

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Oh! See what I did there? Like, a callback to the first… ugh. Damn your saccharine baby stuff — it’s triggered the corny centers of my brain. Time to write about a law school scandal or something to get my head straight again.

Jefferson County judge allows inmate to meet 1-month-old son for first time [WDRB]

Earlier: Judge Outraged After Defendant Appears In Court Without Pants
Black Judge Ordered To Pay Up For Having Opinions

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