Joel Jacobsen

One of the things I learned by living abroad is that every generalization about the United States is true, in part.   Such as: its entire history, beginning with the founding sin of slavery, is a history of the most brutal racism; it's the most successful multi-racial society in history.  Or: its people are almost quaintly religious; their society is permissive to the point of depravity.  Or: it's the model of a freedom-loving, democratic polity; it's a dangerously violent 800-pound gorilla, with something less than a gorilla's capacity for understanding history, nuance, and other people's cultures.

I think everyone will immediately - almost involuntarily - think of examples that prove the partial truth of each of these propositions.  America's population today is approximately the same as the entire world's population at the time of Jesus and Augustus, and while education, governmental coercion and the persuasive power of mass media have (as we might delicately put it today) narrowed the diversity of lifestyle choices during the intervening 2,000 years, the universe of basic personalities probably hasn't shrunk by much. 

It's a reasonable working assumption that somewhere in America, people are at this very moment doing everything that a person is capable of doing, including several things you didn't think were possible.  That's one of the reasons (in addition to the intrinsic interest of the stories) why I try to include stories of judicial activities from around the globe.  The details are vastly different, the overall systems are night and day, but in moral terms the temptations facing a judge in, say, Yemen are not so very different from those confronting a judge in New York City.  (See post 109 and post 111.)

As I've mentioned before, it's difficult to follow the Greek judicial scandal in the English-speaking press - American newspapers just ignore it.  (See post 12.)  Which is a shame, because it's pretty spectacular.   As one particularly vivid lede put it, "When justice is not blind, she is greedy, as Greece's burgeoning judicial corruption scandals have amply shown." 

It began with an audio tape of Piraeus judge Antonia Elia allegedly telling a drug convict that in order to get off the hook he had to pay a hefty sum to Athens lawyer Sakis [allegedly Kehayoglou], who in turn would pay off an appellate prosecutor.

Criminal lawyer Costas Koutras, whose 30-year practice includes a string of sensational nationally publicised cases, says that judicial corruption includes policemen, investigating magistrates, court secretaries, prosecutors and judges. "Each precinct and police directorate - like narcotics, homicide, immigration and robbery - channels cases to specific lawyers. The police get a 20 percent commission," Koutras explains.

One judge, Konstantina Bourboulia, fled the country, living the exciting life of an international fugitive for several months after her 43 secret bank accounts were discovered.    She was eventually arrested in France and is now doing time.  In August ex-judge Leonidas Stathis was sentenced to (according to one's on-line source) 25 years or even 86 years for his corruption.  (I'd be curious to know  what those figures mean in terms of actual time inside.)   Compare that to the sentences American judges get for planting drugs in the cars of those who oppose their zoning variance requests.  (See post 78.)

One Greek sculptor gives a historical perspective on his country's scandals:

[H]ere comes the traditional "Greek" solution, having its roots in the ages of Turkish domination, when masters did favors to good slaves. In a very similar way, VIPs in Greece (e.g. politicians who are in need of votes), or those who have money to pay, have many opportunities to acquire some benefits not accessible to ordinary mortals.

Thinking in terms of power relations - of masters doing favors for their good slaves - helps to explain the New York Times' findings about Ohio Supreme Court Justice Terrence O'Donnell, who was found to decide cases in favor of his large contributors about 90% of the time.  (See post 176.)  (But then, who's the slave and who's the master?)

A major part of the Greek scandal, from what I understand, involves payoffs to prosecutors, who apparently shared the proceeds with judges.   A similar form of corruption, involving investigating magistrates, is alleged to have been widespread in Bulgaria.  Given the vast sums of money changing hands in the drug biz, it would be foolish to imagine such things never happen here.  Certainly I've heard rumors, which I believe but am too prudent to repeat, of sweetheart plea deals getting even sweeter at sentencing hearings.

For a time, the worst thing former Green Bay DA Joe Paulus had to worry about were the tape recordings of him bragging about having sex in the office during business hours.  PDFs of documents pertaining to the subsequent bribery charges, for which he is currently serving time, can be found here. 

What tripped Paulus up was (1) his lack of subtlety, which (as the tape recording reveals) was a personality trait and not just a lack of a savvy; (2) his co-conspirator's decision to cooperate with authorities, and in general his failure to surround himself with dishonest people who owed him - some of his own prosecutors began keeping tabs on him; and (3) his failure to cut judges in on the action - some of the judges of northeast Wisconsin, to their credit, noticed and reported "what appeared to be unusual dispositions in certain cases."

This list suggests the circumstances that would have to be present to replicate the Greek scandal in America: an operation run by a slick pro; careful selection of henchpersons; and compliant judges.   The first of these can take care of itself, and generations of Mafia types have demonstrated that the second requires only a combination of due care and a sociopathic lack of sentimentality. 

But how can a would-be briber be sure a given judge will be willing to play ball?  This, I think, is the easiest of all.  What you need is a judge with a substance abuse problem.  All the judge has to do is accept cocaine once, and you have him for life.  New Mexico has seen two judges recently booted from office on account of cocaine use - one of them a presiding judge, i.e., with the power of assigning cases - and I'm confident judicial use isn't unique to this state.  Here's a Pittsburgh story describing how easy it is for a courtroom worker to pinch cocaine without, apparently, going to the trouble of thinking through how best to do it.

While I have no particular reason to think the New Mexico cocaine-using judges were being blackmailed by / providing services to their suppliers, it doesn't seem totally out of the realm of possibility that other using judges might earn their stash.

But cocaine and meth are merely the best possible hooks, not the only ones.  I would imagine videotape of the judge drooling drunk, or staggering into his or her car, would work, too.  Sex, of course, was an old standby of the KGB, and say what you will, they were pros.   Legalized gambling, I'm sure, also provides lots of opportunity for shady loans that could prove very embarrassing to a judge if leaked to the media.   Look at post 214 and consider the possibilities.

In short, I think we should look at the ongoing judicial scandal in Greece, a country of 11 million people, as a window into something that is almost certainly happening somewhere in our country of 300 million.  One more pair of opposing generalizations is, I'm afraid, as true as those with which this post began: America has a superb  judicial system; we tolerate enormous corruption in our judicial system.