LA County Judge Robert Draper removed for willful misconduct

The California Commission on Judicial Performance cited, among other instances of misconduct, the judge's rambling discourse on race relations and Black football players when a Black attorney made her first appearance before him.LOS ANGELES (CN) — The California Commission on Judicial Performance on Tuesday ordered Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Robert Draper removed from office for numerous counts of misconduct, including making inappropriate racial and sexual comments.“Judge Draper persistently violated the standards governing judicial behavior and engaged in extensive and severe misconduct,” the commission said in a statement. “Judge Draper’s misconduct reflected either a concerning lack of familiarity with ethical precepts, or an unwillingness to conform to those precepts.”The judge’s misconduct, the commission added, was aggravated by his refusal to accept responsibility and his lack of insight or remorse for his misconduct and its effect on others. Moreover, the commission said, Draper’s testimony during the proceedings against him showed a lack of candor.Draper, 84, engaged in nine instances of willful misconduct, eight instances of prejudicial misconduct, and one instance of improper action, the commission said in its 87-page decision.Among the formal charges that were examined at a 6-day evidentiary hearing this year was Draper’s conduct during a February 2023 posttrial hearing in a sexual harassment case.A Black attorney made her first appearance for the defense at that hearing, which prompted Draper, without any apparent need, to launch into a rambling discourse about Black players on football teams and the history of race relations in the South.While the commission found Draper’s comment on skin tone, miscegenation, Black football quarterbacks, and Lyndon Johnson’s successful efforts to enact the Civil Rights Act were “irrelevant and gratuitous,” they didn’t rise to level of willful misconduct. They did, however, amount to conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice that brings the judicial office into disrepute.Likewise, comments Draper made to two female attorneys in the case while in his chambers — to the extent that lawyers at his prior law firm would tell their secretaries “you better be able to fuck better than you can type,” amounted to prejudicial misconduct rather than willful misconduct.On the other hand, the commission found that Draper’s so-called ex parte communication with another lawyer in the case, in which he falsely claimed that the commission had asked for a review his handling of the sexual harassment trial, amounted to willful misconduct.Likewise, the commission said Draper committed willful misconduct when, after he had recused himself from the case in March 2023 but the defendants still sought his disqualification, he himself presided over the disqualification hearing and threatened to refer the attorneys who had sought his disqualification to the state bar.“Judge Draper acted in bad faith because he had previously recused himself from the case and he knew he had no power to make further rulings,” the commission said. “His argument that he believed he was doing what the appellate court had ordered him to do is unsupported. Once a judge has recused from a case, the recusal is irrevocable and the judge has no power to take any action in the matter.”The commission’s decision also cited other instances in which Draper had interacted in a demeaning manner with a femalepresiding judge and female court personnel, sent a group email to colleagues, retired judges, and commission staff that attached confidential juvenile dependency records with photographs of naked minors, and attached another email which included a photograph of himself taken from behind, without clothing.An attorney who represented Draper in the proceeding didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.In his formal response to the charges filed in February, Draper said that the charges “were contrary to all credible evidence and/or taken wholly out of context.”Draper was first appointed to the bench by California Governor Jerry Brown in 2012, and he was twice reelected to six-year terms. In June of this year, however, he lost a third reelection bid after the Los Angeles County Bar Association had rated him “not qualified” for judicial office.Categories / Courts, Law, RegionalSubscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads