By Cory Shaffer
CLEVELAND, Ohio — A state disciplinary attorney issued a 118-page complaint against a Cleveland Municipal Court judge who, in spring 2020, ignored a directive to stop holding hearings because of the pandemic.
The new complaint filed Friday against Judge Pinkey Carr says she routinely flouted court rules and antagonized defendants, lawyers and court staff from the bench. It accuses the former city and county prosecutor of making inappropriate jokes about fictional strip clubs and says she issued arrest warrants for people who did not show up to court hearings that she scheduled without telling them.
Carr ran afoul of rules that require judges to conduct themselves fair and impartially, uphold the public’s confidence in the judiciary and maintain proper courtroom decorum.
The sweeping complaint comes as Carr is already facing disciplinary proceedings for violating an administrative order limiting court hearings due to the coronavirus. She also made false statements to a TV station and another judge denying that she issued warrants for people who did not show up for hearings after the court announced it was postponing them.
Other findings in the complaint say Carr:
- Negotiated plea deals with defendants without a prosecutor or defense attorney present
- Cracked jokes at the expense of defendants
- Waived court costs and fines without asking whether they could afford to pay them and filing fictitious paperwork with the court
- Presided
over court hearings in workout clothes and no robe, prompting one
defendant to ask court staff if a judge planned to attend the hearing
Assistant disciplinary counsel Michell Hall wrote that Carr’s conduct violated multiple rules of professional conduct. Hall requested that the Board of Professional Conduct and the Ohio Supreme Court sanction Carr.
A request for comment from Carr sent to court spokesman Ed “Flash” Ferenc was not immediately returned Friday evening.
Friday’s complaint says Carr conducted several improper hearings with defendants charged with low-level misdemeanor charges who appeared without an attorney. She quizzed them about the facts of their cases, the complaint says.
Many of the cases involved people charged with alcohol-related offenses. She mocked one man charged with violating open-container laws for drinking cheap beer and joked in the courtroom about how long it would take him to pay a $25 fine.
She also prevented defendants from leaving her courtroom so she could continue to joke about them with her staff, the complaint says. One man was accused of violating a protection order for texting a woman that a man she was with was a “f--k boy.” After he left, Carr joked with her bailiff about asking him what that term meant. She then directed someone from the court to get the man from the hallway and bring him back so she could ask him. When he returned, she asked him what it meant, then told him not to bother answering and told him to leave again. She then laughed with her staff and continued talking about the case while the next defendant waited for their hearing, the complaint said.
Carr also made jokes from the bench about P-Valley, the name of a Starz TV show about a strip-club in Mississipi, the complaint said. She joked about taking a court bailiff there and then asked about a female attorney who appeared in her courtroom who she referred to as “cute.”
The complaint also said that Carr once yelled at an assistant public defender when he told a man charged in connection with a shootout that he didn’t have to answer when Carr asked what the word “firefight” meant. Carr chastised the attorney and said she could ask any question she wanted to.
The attorney asked Carr to wear her mask if she was going to yell. The next day when the same attorney was in her courtroom, Carr wore her mask below her chin and asked her bailiff to use a tape measure to count the number of feet the attorney was away, then continuously mocked the attorney for his concern over the coronavirus.
She routinely berates defendants who call her “ma’am” by referring to them as “little boy” and “little girl.” One elderly defendant repeatedly answered Carr’s questions with “yes ma’am” and “no ma’am.” As the woman walked out of the courtroom, Carr muttered loud enough for people in the courtroom to hear about how she wanted to punch the woman in the face.
The complaint also criticizes Carr for abusing the capias process in cases where she ordered people to pay fines without going through the clerk of court’s office. She regularly orders defendants to pay fines by a specific date, then schedules a hearing on their ability to pay a few days later if they fail to meet the deadline. If the defendants don’t show up to the hearing, she issues an arrest warrant that also includes an order barring them from qualifying for programs that allow them to pay their fines through community service, guaranteeing their arrest, the complaint said. In at least one case, Carr never told the defendant that she set the hearing, the complaint said.
When he didn’t show up, she issued the warrant, and he spent a total of five days in jail because he didn’t pay a fine for a misdemeanor traffic case, the complaint said.
Friday’s complaint is in addition to disciplinary counsel Joseph Caligiuri’s complaint recommending Carr be disciplined for violating six rules of judicial and professional conduct. Among other things, those rules require judges to promote public confidence in the judiciary and bar attorneys from engaging in “conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation.”
Cleveland.com reported last March that Carr held court hearings in violation of the order that Administrative Judge Michelle Earley issued order postponing all court hearings for defendants who were not already in jail to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The March 13 order was posted on the court’s website and distributed to media outlets, who reported that the court hearings had been closed.
Cleveland.com reported on March 17 that Carr had held hearings that did not follow Earley’s order on the previous two days and issued capiases -- or arrest warrants -- for people who did not show up.
Carr, who did not return requests for comment from cleveland.com at the time, granted an interview to WJW Channel 8 reporter Peggy Gallek and said while on the bench in her courtroom that cleveland.com’s report was false and that she worried it would make people think they had to come to court or else she would issue arrest warrants for them.
After the interview concluded, courtroom video obtained by cleveland.com showed Carr went on to issue arrest warrants for 17 people who did not show up to her courtroom and issuing bonds for their eventual arrest. The video also showed Carr mocked an assistant public defender who had asked if he could tell his clients they didn’t need to come to court the next day in keeping with Earley’s order. Carr rejected his requested, and after the lawyer left the room, Carr turned to a member of her staff and referred to him as “little idiot.”
Cleveland.com later reported on the videos, and Carr, who again did not return cleveland.com’s requests for comments, told WJW Channel 8 that she did not know that when she marked a defendant’s failure to appear that a warrant would be issued for that person’s arrest.
Caligiuri’s complaint also included a text message exchange between Carr and Earley later that day. Carr again called cleveland.com’s reporting “reckless” and “inaccurate.” Earley asked Carr if she issued arrest warrants, and Carr responded that her journal entries clearly stated “no warrant to issue,” according to the complaint.
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