Pennsylvania Justice McCaffery to retire; judicial conduct board drops probe
Justice Seamus McCaffery. Image from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCaffery is retiring, bringing to a close the misconduct probe against him.
Pennsylvania’s Judicial Conduct Board acknowledged the retirement and said it is dropping its investigation of matters that led the state supreme court to suspend McCaffery last week. The justice won’t seek senior status, and he won’t seek elective judicial office, according to a press release (PDF).
McCaffery has apologized for sending more than 200 sexually explicit emails from his personal email account. The emails were uncovered by the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s office, which revealed that eight of its own employees sent or received explicit emails.
In addition, the Oct. 20 suspension order referred to prior published reports about McCaffery. The reports include allegations that McCaffery may have improperly contacted a Philadelphia traffic-court official in connection with a traffic citation issued to his wife, and may have authorized his wife to accept hundreds of thousands of dollars in referral fees from plaintiffs’ firms while she served as the justice’s administrative assistant.
The suspension order has been vacated, the press release says.
