Judicial Misconduct in State and Federal Courts

There are processes in place for reporting and dealing with judicial misconduct of federal and state court judges. For the federal judiciary, Congress has created a procedure that permits any person to file a complaint in the courts about the behavior of federal judges in every federal jurisdiction, according to the Courts website. In the states, each state has a process for dealing with complaints about judges' conduct: independent judicial-conduct commissions have been established by state constitution in 28 states, by statute in 15 states and the District of Columbia and by court rule in seven more, according to the American Judicature Society (AJS). The AJS website is a good place to find information about how states deal with judicial misconduct including a list of the organizations from each state established to investigate allegations of misconduct by state court judges; the composition of state judicial conduct commissions; and at what point confidentiality ceases in judicial discipline proceedings in the different states. AJS also provides information about federal judicial misconduct.