N.J. Judge Attributes Obscenities to Stressful Events
A New Jersey judge told a disciplinary panel last week that his use of obscenities on the bench was the result of several stressful events.
Judge F. Michael Giles of Essex County is accused of directing profanities at lawyers on two occasions, the New Jersey Law Journal reports.
He is accused of becoming angry at a lawyer in April 2006, saying: “I said get the [expletive] out of my courtroom. What the [expletive] don’t you understand? Shut the [expletive] up and get the [expletive] out of here. I have a meeting this afternoon.”
He is also accused of asking a lawyer in December 2007 if she woke up on the “wrong [expletive] side of the bed.”
Giles’ lawyer told the hearing panel that he was upset because of the deaths of his 40-year-old daughter and his mother-in-law within a week’s time. Health problems were also a worry. A growth in Giles’ brain caused blindness in one eye, and he had to undergo surgery for a ruptured aorta.
