Project to Block Appointment/Re-Appointment of Anti-Gay Judges In Virginia

Virginia is one of a small number of states where state court judges are appointed by the General Assembly. Unlike federal judges where appointments are lifetime, Virginia judges come up for reappointment. Given the current rampant homophobia in the Virginia judiciary it seems time to begin a project where dossiers can be assembled on judges that have displayed homophobia and refused to abide by the Virginia Canons of Judicial Conduct and submitted to gay friendly members of the General Assembly as ammunition for opposing the reappointment of such judges. Coupled with this would be an effort to make sure that complaints are filed with the Virginia Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission to further document the behavior of judges. While the Commission seems generally worthless from my experience, still I suspect it must report the number of complaints received against any particular judge up for reappointment.

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To start this project, I would like to hear from anyone who would like to get involved and it will also be necessary to come up with forms and other documentation so that we could have consistent information, etc. I am also going to make some contacts with the ACLU, Equality Virginia, and other LGBT rights related organizations to see if (1) we can have a coordinated effort state wide on this front and (2) assemble a list of gay friendly allies in the General Assembly that would be well positioned to bring up a judge's homophobic conduct and failure to abide by the Canons of Judicial Conduct.

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Obviously, the other thing that will be needed is for LGBT Virginians who have been mistreated in court by biased members of the judiciary to take the time to contact this new organization and share their story so that a file can be built up on each homophobic judge. It will take some time to get this project off the ground, but in time it can hopefully (a) assist in blocking reappointment of bigoted judges and (b) become a deterrent to homophobic judges by its mere existence.

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Let me know your thoughts and whether you would like to get involved (e-mail me a michaelinnorfolk@gmail.com). Also, be thinking of a name for the new organization. So much injustice is done to LGBT litigants virtually daily by anti-gay judges and it is time that we devise a mechanism to strike back and work to have these judges removed from office and/or not reappointed.