An Alaska judge has been censured by the state’s highest court after he made a series of boorish comments from the bench, including explicit references to booze-fueled sexcapades.
Nome Superior Court Judge Timothy Dooley was admonished by the Alaska Supreme Court for five statements made in his formal capacity in recent years. The Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct recommended a formal reprimand, and additional sensitivity training.
Dooley, 62, was initially bewildered by the complaints, telling the commission he was “absolutely baffled” by the umbrage taken by employees and citizens with business before the court. He has since apologized for his remarks.
The comments which won scrutiny were often made about or in the presence of victims of assault. He told a jury in August, 2014, that he was powerless to make a domestic violence victim speak up during the course of her testimony. (VIDEO: Man FREAKS OUT In Court, Throws Feces At Judge)
“I’m sorry, folks, but I can’t slap her around to make her talk louder,” he said.
“I regret saying this because she was a domestic violence victim and the statement inferred that I would slap her around if only the rules let me,” Dooley said of the remarks in a letter to the commission.
Several weeks after his appointment in May, 2013, he asked a defendant during sentencing, “Has anything good ever come out of drinking, except for sex with a pretty girl?”
Dooley conceded the comment, “was wrong for me to say especially in view of the fact that sex offenders were present in the gallery,” in the same letter.
During a sexual abuse case involving a minor in November, 2013, he announced to the court, “This was not someone who was, and I hate to use the phrase, ‘asking for it.’ There are girls out there that seem to be temptresses. And this does not seem to be anything like that.”
Prior to his appointment to the bench, Dooley fought forest fires, killed bears and wolves encroaching on oil pipelines, and was a rancher in New Zealand.
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