Judicial Misconduct, Proportionality and… Lip-Syncing on TikTok?

So begins a 2020 Reuters article about American judges who have been found to have committed professional misconduct in some fashion, yet remained on the bench, often following a relative wrist slap for punishment.

In Hayes’ case, despite admitting to being in breach of 10 different parts of the Alabama’s judicial conduct code, including a failure to “respect and comply with the law,” Hayes wasn’t thrown off the bench. He did receive an 11-month unpaid suspension, after which he returned to wearing robes and holding a gavel. Hayes told Reuters that until he had been disciplined by the state, “I never thought I was doing something wrong.”

Hayes’ case, as with other examples cited in the Reuters article, demonstrates how hard it is for judges (or lawyers, for that matter) to land themselves in truly hot water, even when they disrespect and ignore the law – something that we generally associate with the defendants in courtrooms, not the jurists hearing the case.

On the other hand, a more recent example of disciplining a judge suggests that there are things a judge can do, in his or her private life – and which are totally legal – which can get them in nearly as much trouble as Judge Hayes.

Judge Gary N. Wilcox of Bergen County, New Jersey now likely regrets ever publishing videos under his chosen nom de Tik Tok, “Sal Tortorella.”

In character as Sal, Judge Gary created, uploaded and shared videos that the Supreme Court of New Jersey Advisory Committee on Judicial Conduct found to violate rules “requiring judges to observe high standards of conduct so that the integrity and independence of the Judiciary may be preserved,” including the rule which requires judges to “avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety and to act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the Judiciary,” and another requiring them to “conduct their extrajudicial activities in a manner that would not cast reasonable doubt on the judge’s capacity to act impartially as a judge, demean the judicial office, or interfere with the proper performance of judicial duties.”

And what did Judge Wilcox do that violated these rules? In short, he uploaded videos to TikTok in which he pranced about, acting like a jackass.

To put it in the parlance of the complaint received by the Advisory Committee on Judicial Conduct, Wilcox, “wearing a T-shirt with his face close to the camera,” proceeded to lip-sync lyrics from “Jump” by Rihanna:

“If you want it let’s do it. Ride it, my pony. My saddle is waitin’, come and jump on it. If you want it, let’s do it.” (The complaint doesn’t specify whether any TikTok users subsequently indicated an interest in riding the judge’s pony.)

Making matters worse, Wilcox also recorded a second video, in which he was “in chambers with law books visible behind him” and lip-synced the following:

“All my life, I’ve been waiting for somebody to whoop my ass. I mean business! You think you can run up on me and whip my monkey ass? Come on. Come on!”

Sadly, the Advisory Committee decided to go ahead and accept Wilcox’s invitation to whip his monkey ass. Specifically, the Committee decided Wilcox’s conduct “warrants a suspension, without pay, within the range of one to three months.”

Sure, it’s not the harshest punishment ever handed down, but when you compare the conduct of judges Wilcox and Hayes, who would YOU rather find yourself in front of as a defendant, the guy who hands out sentences of over 16 months for failing to pay parking tickets, or the one who overshares and lowkey cosplays on TikTok?

To be fair, I did omit one of the more serious allegations against Wilcox. The unforgivable sin of lip-syncing to “Touch It” by Busta Rhymes.

As noted by the Committee, “the following lyrics are audible” during the video:

“For the record, just a second, I’m freakin’ it out. While she tryin’ to touch, see, I was peepin’ it out. She turned around and was tryin’ to put my d**k in her mouth. I let her.”

As you can see, the Committee couldn’t quite get themselves to spell out the word “duck,” such was their horror at the spectacle they’d observed.

Still, I think we can all agree that you don’t have to be a member of PETA to understand it could undermine the public’s confidence to learn that a sitting judge might be inclined to permit a woman to chew on, or even potentially swallow, what should be a beloved pet.

Duck image by Pixabay from Pexels