Judiciary employees filed 17 complaints against federal judges over 3-year period, new report says
Judiciary employees filed 161 complaints alleging wrongful conduct over three fiscal years beginning in 2020, and 17 of those complaints concerned judges, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office released Tuesday. (Image from Shutterstock)
Judiciary employees filed 161 complaints alleging wrongful conduct over three fiscal years beginning in 2020, and 17 of those complaints concerned judges, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office released Tuesday.
Closed complaints by judiciary employees included allegations of abusive conduct by a judge, religious discrimination, and discrimination and harassment based on the employee’s pregnancy, the report said.
Some of the complaints were dismissed for lack of evidence. One complaint led to an investigation and a private reprimand. Another led to a finding that a judge created a hostile work environment.
The report did not name judges. But some investigation results have recently become public.
U.S. District Judge Joshua M. Kindred of the District of Alaska abruptly announced his resignation in July after it was requested by the judicial council of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at San Francisco. The judicial council adopted findings that Kindred created a hostile work environment for his law clerks and had a “sexualized relationship” with one law clerk.
And an unnamed federal judge acknowledged an “overly harsh” management style and agreed to take remedial training based on a law clerk’s complaint, according to an order released in March.
The most frequent allegation in an employment dispute resolution claim was discrimination, followed by discriminatory harassment and abusive conduct. The officials most frequently named as subjects of a claim by an employee were unit executives, named 91 times; followed by managers of supervisors, named 56 times; employees or co-workers, named 32 times; and judges, named 24 times.
The complaints, some of which alleged more than one type of misconduct, included 124 allegations in fiscal year 2020, 106 in fiscal year 2021, and 336 in fiscal year 2022. Officials could not identify a reason for the increase in 2022, but some suggested that it could be because of a return to more in-person work or increased familiarity with reporting options.
The report found that the judiciary’s practices addressing workplace misconduct align with 13 out of 20 recommended practices by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The federal judiciary adopted new ethics rules and a model dispute resolution plan to address misconduct allegations in 2019 in response to recommendations of a working group. The ethics rules make it clear that harassment is banned, and that judges and supervisors must take action when learning of reliable evidence of wrongful conduct.
One problem area identified in the report concerns judiciary training materials that don’t align with EEOC practices. None of the training materials reviewed explained the consequences of unacceptable behavior, and none explained the type of material that may be requested in an investigation, according to the report.
The report also faulted the judiciary for a lack of performance measures related to its judicial conduct and disability policy and its employment dispute resolution policy. The judiciary could better address workplace conduct issues if it collected data on workplace misconduct informally reported outside the employment dispute resolution process, the report said.
The judiciary is planning, however, to use results of a 2023 survey to develop performance measures. The survey results were still pending in May 2024.
A separate study by the Federal Judicial Center and the National Academy of Public Administration also found that federal courts have failed to adequately collect and analyze data on workplace misconduct. The study, released earlier this month, was commissioned by Democratic U.S. Rep. Norma Torres of California, who was one of three lawmakers requesting the GAO study.
Press releases by two Democratic lawmakers (here and here) criticized the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts for failing to fully cooperate with the GAO audit. Over the two-year study, the GAO was allowed to interview only one current judiciary employee and one former employee to gain an employee perspective, the press releases said.
The GAO was also denied access to data from the 2023 survey, which was administered in January and February 2023, the press releases said. The survey garnered 14,000 responses.
A spokesperson for the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts told Bloomberg Law that the office “went to extraordinary lengths” to ensure cooperation with the GAO study, and it “endeavored to maintain a constructive working relationship.”
The spokesperson said the current and former staffers interviewed were the only employees who agreed to participate. In addition, the GAO interviewed two judges, 10 circuit workplace relations directors, and staff members with the administrative office.
Other publications that covered the GAO report include Reuters, Law360 and Law.com. How Appealing linked to coverage and the report.
