Nominating Commission

With his wife and children at his side, Columbia attorney Neil Edward Axel was sworn in yesterday as Howard County's newest District Court judge -- amid lingering controversy over the racial makeup of the county bench.With Axel's ascent to District Court, one of its four seats remains open. Leaders of a county coalition of black interest groups are lobbying for that seat to be filled by an African-American, specifically Howard Assistant Public Defender Alice Gail Clark.The 13-member judicial nominating commission will meet today to interview the candidates for the remaining vacancy, prior to forwarding its recommendations to the governor, who makes the appointment.

Acting with speed, Gov. Parris N. Glendening reappointed yesterday two veteran Baltimore judges who had faced criticism about their records.Glendening accepted the recommendations of the city's judicial trial nominating commission by reappointing Circuit Judges Kenneth Lavon Johnson and John Carroll Byrnes, just hours after the nominations were formally announced.Johnson and Byrnes, on the bench since 1982, had strong support from lawyers and judges -- but faced questions about their conduct in cases.

In his 15 years on the Baltimore Circuit bench, Judge Kenneth Lavon Johnson has thrown lawyers into the lockup the moment they speak out of turn; sparred with defendants like a school principal handing out demerits; and commissioned a "runaway" grand jury that prosecutors decried as irresponsible.Now Johnson, 60, seeks a second term presiding over what has become known as one of Baltimore's more unpredictable courtrooms. When the city's judicial nominating commission for circuit judges meets today to determine whether Johnson is fit to stay on the bench, it will confront him with a number of cases his critics call questionable -- four of which also are being investigated by Maryland's Commission on Judicial Disabilities.

The city's nominating commission for Circuit Court judges yesterday recommended Baltimore Judge Kenneth Lavon Johnson for reappointment to the bench, despite a series of allegations that the 60-year-old judge had a record of intemperate behavior in court.Johnson, a controversial judge who won his seat by out polling appointed incumbents in 1982, has been under fire for his actions in a number of cases, four of which also are being investigated by the Maryland Commission on Judicial Disabilities.

Two more African-Americans than previously reported have applied for a vacancy on the Howard County District Court bench -- boosting the number of black candidates to four of nine.The state's Administrative Office of the Courts reported last week that seven attorneys had advanced their names for the vacancy created by the elevation of Judge Lenore R. Gelfman to Circuit Court.But yesterday, Michael O'Malley, assistant state court administrator, said two other applications "were inadvertently placed in the wrong location."

With less than two weeks of campaigning left until the March 5 primary, one question remains in Howard County's mean-spirited race for the Circuit Court bench: How low can it get?Innuendo, smears and surreptitious charges are staples of this campaign.Recent cheap shots include anonymous allegations that one of the five candidates cheated while in law school and that another failed the bar exam the first time around.Some of the low blows can be traced directly to supporters of the two major slates in the race.

The eight people -- a mix of men, women, whites and blacks -- who have applied for a Howard Circuit Court judgeship may increase the chance that the seat will be filled with someone who fits the governor's call for diversity.The list, released yesterday, includes two white men, three white women, two black women and one black man. A previous list for another judgeship includes four men and two women, all white.The Circuit Court now has three white judges, with a fourth position vacant since the retirement of a white judge in May. Yesterday's list is only for that position but the six candidates on the earlier list will be considered for both judgeships.

Judge Elsbeth Levy Bothe's term on the Baltimore Circuit Court bench officially ends today -- but the judge, snubbed for reappointment by a nominating commission, says she will remain on the bench in the hope that Gov. Parris N. Glendening will extend her career.Baltimore's 13-member judicial nominating commission voted two weeks ago not to nominate Judge Bothe to retain the seat she has held for 17 years. It was the first time in memory a sitting circuit judge has not been reappointed to stand for re-election in Maryland.

In April, the state Judicial Nominating Commission for Howard County was lambasted for not including blacks and for having too few women in its pool of judicial nominees for the Circuit Court.Yesterday, a new commission named three women, including a black, among the four local attorneys it nominated to replace retired Circuit Judge Cornelius F. Sybert Jr.Within the next month, Gov. Parris N. Glendening is expected to pick two candidates from the combined pools to fill two Circuit Court vacancies.

Baltimore Circuit Judge Elsbeth L. Bothe, turned down for reappointment by a city nominating commission in October, says she is seriously considering running for election to the bench even if someone else is appointed in her place.Judge Bothe's term on the city bench ended Nov. 3, but under the law she can stay on until Gov. Parris N. Glendening appoints a candidate to take her place.The nominating commission voted Oct. 16 not to recommend Judge Bothe as qualified to retain the judgeship she has held since 1978.

A day after the Anne Arundel Judicial Nominating Commission voted to nominate Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller's son to a District Court judgeship, a member of the panel called Miller to warn him of potential political fallout from the vote. The commissioner - whom Miller declined to publicly name, out of concern that the attorney was violating the panel's confidentiality rules - told the Democratic leader that another commissioner was organizing a group resignation in protest of the nomination, he said.

Another member of a judicial nominating commission has pledged to resign over the panel's nomination of the son of Maryland Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller and others for District Court judgeships after they had been rejected. Attorney Eileen E. Powers said yesterday that she plans to submit her formal resignation letter next week to Gov. Martin O'Malley with Paula J. Peters, who said Thursday that she would resign after serving more than two decades on the panel. While Peters said she was disturbed by political meddling on behalf of Thomas V. Miller III, the powerful Democrat's son, Powers said she decided to resign because she believed that the process was flawed.

The nomination of Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr.'s son for a District Court judgeship is prompting a vow of resignation from at least one member of the Anne Arundel County Judicial Nominating Commission and raising old questions of nepotism and political interference. Thomas V. Miller III, a 12-year veteran of the Maryland Parole Commission, was passed over by the 13-member nominating commission in February when he applied for one of three vacant positions. But after Gov. Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, issued an executive order in April requiring all such panels to produce at least three nominations per vacancy, the commission voted Wednesday night to recommend Miller and four other previously rejected candidates for a spot on the bench.

School board candidates advance The School Board Nominating Commission this week is forwarding the names of six possible candidates for two open seats on the Anne Arundel County school board to Gov. Martin O'Malley. The candidates include a Severn resident active on the countywide Citizens Advisory Committee, a key administrator under former County Executive Janet S. Owens, and an incumbent who is a longtime Davidsonville-area schools volunteer. The names, applications and letters of support for the following candidates are expected to be sent to the governor's office by tomorrow, said commission Chairman Joshua C. Greene.

Seven candidates have been recommended as "most fully qualified" for an appointment to the Harford County District Court. Their names have been forwarded to Gov. Martin O'Malley, who will appoint one of them to fill a vacancy left by Judge Angela M. Eaves, who was elevated to the Harford County Circuit Court. Harford County's Judicial Nominating Commission recommended: Yolanda Lauranzon Curtin, Theodore Mark Hart, Susan Hower Hazlett, Charles Edward Kearney Jr., Melissa Lazarich Lambert, Carl Ridgeley Schlaich and Roger Joseph Sullivan.

Imagine you've applied to become a judge. Vacancies on the bench don't happen every day - it might be good to be king, but it's not so bad to be judge either - so you've polished your application to a high sheen, compiled an all-star list of references, practiced for the nominating commission that recommends whom the governor should appoint, maybe even though you did well enough that you start testing what "The Honorable" looks like in front of your name....

Four candidates are vying for the one available judge's seat in the Circuit Court for Harford County in the Feb. 12 primary. To win the 15-year term on the bench in District 3, the candidate must garner the most votes in both the Democratic and Republican primaries. If that does not occur, the two leading candidates in both primaries will run in the November general election. "It is unique to the state," said James E. Massey, director of Harford's Board of Elections. "All the judge candidates file in both primaries and are not identified by party on the ballot.

The great Federalists from Virginia and New York, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, didn't agree with the anti-Federalist views of Maryland's Jeremiah Chase on the organization of American government. However they all saw eye-to-eye on one matter: the selection of judges. The founders would likely be appalled at Maryland's judicial system today. It has degenerated into a partisan free-for-all, with impartial judges forced to raise campaign cash in ever-larger amounts while locking out the fastest-growing political group in the state: independents.

One candidate has been chastised by an ethics panel for using what it said were misleading campaign materials. Another is a witness - and the alleged motive - in a murder-for-hire case scheduled for trial in Baltimore this fall. And the four incumbents have been accused of publicizing endorsements that they did not expressly receive. Such is this year's campaign for four judgeships on the Baltimore County Circuit Court bench - one of several courthouse races on Tuesday's primary ballot.

Seven nominated for judgeships Seven lawyers, including a former judge, a former Republican Anne Arundel County Council member and several current and former prosecutors, were nominated last week to fill the two open judgeships on the Anne Arundel County District Court. The Judicial Nominating Commission forwarded their names to Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., winnowing the list from a record 31 applications. Ehrlich must choose from these nominees: David S. Bruce, a former District Court judge who was appointed to the Circuit Court but lost that post in an election a year ago. James Arthur Johnson, a principal with Baltimore law firm of Semmes Bowen & Semmes who specializes in business-oriented disputes and stockholder litigation.