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Rowland Sowed Judicial Scandal(Hartford Courant, The (CT) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Apr. 30--The scandal over the actions taken by former Chief Justice William J. Sullivan to help his ally on the court succeed him as head of the judicial branch has roots in the cronyism cultivated on the state's highest court by former Gov. John G. Rowland. Judges and others said Rowland's appointment of fellow Waterbury natives and close friends to be chief justice - Sullivan and his predecessor, Francis M. McDonald Jr. - politicized the judicial branch in an unprecedented way. It was revealed last week that Sullivan secretly held up publication of a controversial ruling that computerized court dockets are exempt from the Freedom of Information Act to help Justice Peter T. Zarella's confirmation prospects. Sullivan and Zarella voted with the majority in the 4-3 ruling. When confronted with his conduct, Sullivan acknowledged he had done it to help Zarella, but said he had done nothing wrong. "I trace it all to the Rowland regime and the mentality that it's OK to manipulate the system," one judge said. "It's the Waterbury connection, the last gasp of the Rowland mentality. It started with McDonald. You got a creeping sense things were not always above board. It accelerated with Sullivan." Sullivan put a hold on publication of the ruling on March 14, the day before he sent a letter to Gov. M. Jodi Rell saying he was going to resign as chief justice and assume senior justice status, meaning he could still hear cases. Three days later, Rell announced Sullivan's resignation and her intention to nominate Zarella to succeed him. Ironically, Sullivan's actions and the controversy that has resulted may have been the death knell for Zarella's prospects of being nominated by Rell after the session ends. Her formal nomination on March 24 was destined to die on the Senate calendar because there was no time to hold a public hearing. In an apparent tactical move, Zarella asked Rell to withdraw his name from consideration on April 24 - the day the scandal broke - and Rell did. A provision in the Code of Judicial Conduct prohibits judges from allowing "the judge's family, social or other relationships to influence his or her judicial conduct or judgment." Legislative sources said the judicial review council, the body that disciplines judges, is investigating Sullivan's actions. This could not be confirmed, however, because complaints to the council are confidential unless and until council members decide there is sufficient evidence of misconduct to warrant a public hearing. Sullivan's assertion that he did not violate the Code of Judicial Conduct prompted one judge to ask: "What else is he doing if he's this ethically challenged?" The judges who spoke for this story did so on the condition that their names not be used for fear of retribution, such as being assigned to a courthouse a long drive from home. "It's the Politburo," another judge said. "You don't dissent or you get sent to Siberia. That's clearly the way the branch has been managed. Our job as judges is to hear both sides of the case, but the judicial branch doesn't want to hear both sides. It's very ironic." Several judges cited the case of Superior Court Judge Carl Schuman, who was presiding over the complex-litigation docket in Waterbury last year when he fined Sullivan's son, attorney Timothy Sullivan, in connection with a perceived transgression in a case. Schuman, the judges said, was nearing the end of his three-year term in complex litigation and had requested to be assigned to criminal cases. He got his wish - but was assigned to criminal court in Danbury. He lives in West Hartford, at least an hour's drive away. "Can I tell you that's why he's in Danbury?" one judge said. "Schuman would probably tell you that's not why. But Carl's not as cynical as the rest of us. We know why he's in Danbury. It's a terrible commute, and it did happen after the fine occurred. "The biggest problem during Sullivan's administration was that people lived in fear that if they made a misstep, they were going to be punished. To me, that speaks volumes," he said. Schuman has an unlisted phone number and could not be reached for comment Saturday. "There is an inner sanctum, or management team," a judge said. "If you're not part of that you're really on the outs." Sullivan's confidants include Zarella, Judge William Lavery, who was elevated to chief judge of the Appellate Court by McDonald and appointed chief court administrator by Sullivan in February; Appellate Judge Joseph Flynn, another Naugatuck Valley native, promoted by Sullivan in February to succeed Lavery as chief appellate judge; and judge referees G. Sarsfield Ford and Howard Moraghan. Sullivan, 67, has been a judge since 1978. Rowland appointed McDonald, a former veteran Waterbury state's attorney and judge for 15 years, to the state Supreme Court in 1996 and made him chief justice in 1999. McDonald served only 16 months before reaching the mandatory retirement age of 70, but "he ushered in the Waterbury era," one judge noted. When Rowland elevated McDonald to replace retiring Chief Justice Robert J. Callahan, he plucked Sullivan from the Appellate Court, where he had placed Sullivan in 1997, to fill the vacancy on the high court. When McDonald retired at age 70 less than two years later, Rowland tapped Sullivan to replace him. The week before Rowland nominated Sullivan to be chief justice, the Connecticut Law Tribune took the rare step of running a front-page "Open Letter to the Governor" endorsing the court's senior member, Justice David M. Borden, for the top spot. Rowland eschewed seniority and named Sullivan. Political insiders said Sullivan would consult routinely with or inform Rowland of appointments or promotions he was making inside the branch, even those that required no gubernatorial action or legislative approval. "It was unseemly," said one judge with inside knowledge. "The same people who are now jumping up and down about separation of powers are the same folks who have undermined it for years through backdoor deals and conversations back and forth with the governor's office." Zarella, a former Republican town chairman in West Hartford, is a staunch Republican who held a fundraiser for Rowland in 1994, two years before Rowland appointed him a Superior Court judge. Zarella, 56, rose swiftly through the ranks of the judiciary, being named to the Appellate Court by Rowland in 2000 and to the Supreme Court the next year. The year after Zarella's appointment to the high court, Sullivan named him chairman of the powerful rules committee. Soon after that, the Connecticut Law Tribune and The Courant broke stories on the "supersealing" by some judges of court files that were so secret that there was no public trace of their existence. As outraged lawmakers threatened to address the problem with laws governing judicial files, Sullivan and Zarella pleaded with them to let the judicial branch address the problem. Zarella and the eight other judges on the rules committee scrambled to draft a rule that court files are presumed to be public documents and outlined steps judges would have to take before sealing documents or an entire file. But Zarella simultaneously pushed for a rule sealing financial affidavits in all divorce cases, which caught most judges off guard and passed in the rules committee by the slender margin of 5-4. "The public policy behind it was terrible," one judge said. "It was a rich and powerful people's rule." Zarella was the driving force behind the financial affidavits rule, and he and Sullivan telephoned judges to lobby for its passage at the upcoming judges' meeting in May 2003. Some judges perceived the lobbying to be "heavy-handed," they said at the time. And the genesis of the proposed rule was clearly in doubt. Zarella told a gathering of judges that the rule had to pass because he and Sullivan had cut a deal with the legislature. But on the day the judges were to vote, Sullivan addressed them and said there was never any deal with the legislature, and that the rule should pass because it's the right thing to do. The rule to automatically seal financial affidavits in divorce cases passed by a vote of 110-65. "With Zarella, it was very clear he took dissent personally; it was always whether you were with him or against him," one judge said, adding with reference to Sullivan and Zarella, "Loyalty was important to them." But another judge contacted for this story said he likes Zarella and finds him open-minded. "He cares about getting it right. He's his own man," the judge said. Sullivan and Zarella have declined requests for media interviews since the revelation of Sullivan's conduct regarding the FOI case broke last Monday. No evidence has come to light that Zarella knew of Sullivan's actions, and Sullivan told another justice that he did not apprise other judges on the case that he was holding up publication of the decision. Judges cited, as another example of the communications blackout between those running the judicial branch and the judges, the edict handed down by Lavery, the chief court administrator, several months ago that judges can no longer serve on the boards of nonprofit agencies. The order was accompanied by a five-page document listing the agencies that are off-limits, ranging from alcohol abuse councils to the YMCA. Many of the programs serve as alternatives to incarceration, giving judges an added option in sentencing. The director of one nonprofit said the presence of judges on the boards is "mutually beneficial" and educational for the agencies and the judges. The judges involved in her agency dutifully resigned. "It's a very punitive environment right now," she said of the judicial branch. "That's part of the legacy of the Sullivan regime. Average people look at judges as having autonomy in what they do. The administration has set itself up in such a way that there is genuine fear in being autonomous." One judge called the ban on serving on nonprofits bizarre. "If you have a concern, why not talk to the judges about it?" he asked. "There's no discussion of anything." Sullivan's actions came to light when one of the justices on the FOI case inquired about its status April 17 and learned of the secret hold. When confronted, Sullivan said he had done so to aid Zarella by delaying release of the opinion. Borden, who is senior associate justice and acting chief justice, advised the chairman of the legislature's judiciary committee of Sullivan's conduct in a letter dated April 24, and delivered just hours before the committee was to vote on Zarella's nomination. "The intent and effect of Chief Justice Sullivan's actions was to deprive the legislature of the timely knowledge of Justice Zarella's vote in that case," Borden wrote. Borden's letter unveiled the biggest controversy ever to rock the state's highest court. "Some members of the bench are horrified by what Borden did," one judge said. "But I think the bad days are over. A lot of people have been heartened." |