State sees spike in serious, credible complaints

Commission on Judicial Discipline has advanced four formal complaints against state’s judges in past year

Colorado has seen a spike in serious, credible complaints against judges in the past 12 months, according to the state’s Commission on Judicial Discipline, which is responsible for investigating allegations of professional misconduct against judges.

The commission in the past year advanced four formal complaints against the state’s judges that the panel found to have merit — as many formal complaints as had been filed in the past 12 years, vice- chair David Prince told lawmakers Wednesday.

“The judicial ethics oversight system in Colorado has not been working,” said Prince, who is a district court judge.

The spike came amid a highprofile scandal involving top judicial officials and a subsequent lawmaker-led effort to reform the system for disciplining the state’s judges, which has operated in near- total secrecy for years. Prince suggested the publicity around the scandal may have prompted more Colorado residents to lodge complaints against judges. “We have seen more serious allegations,” he said. “… I suspect it’s more reporting. I have no reason to think judges are misbehaving at a higher level than in the past.”

The commission also saw a 25% increase in the overall number of complaints it received in 2022 compared with 2021, Prince said. Historically, the commission has dismissed about 90% of the complaints it receives about judges on the grounds that the complaints do not fall within the commission’s purview, and investigates only about 10% of the allegations it receives. Of that 10%, even fewer cases are referred for formal, public discipline.

In the past 20 years, the commission has received 3,924 complaints, investigated 373 and issued 250 corrective actions of private or public discipline, according to the commission.

But public discipline has been rare. Only about a half- dozen judges have been disciplined publicly in Colorado since 2010, and most of those occurred in the past couple of years.

Judges who faced public discipline in the past decade include John Scipione, who failed to disclose an extramarital affair with a clerk; Mark Thompson, who threatened his stepson with an AR-15- style rifle; Natalie Chase, who used a racial slur in conversation with a Black colleague; Laurie Booras, who called another judge “the little Mexican”; Robert Rand, who made misogynistic and inappropriate comments; Lance Timbreza, who was charged with driving under the influence; and Ryan Kamada, who tipped a friend off to a federal drug investigation.

There are about 340 judges currently on the bench in the state.