Keeping Maryland judges safe shouldn’t require lessening transparency | STAFF COMMENTARY

In March, the Maryland Senate approved legislation to give Maryland’s state and federal judges — along with the state’s governor, lieutenant governor, prosecutors and their “immediate family members” — the right to keep their home addresses and phone numbers out of public records. It would have applied to both current and former public officials. Anyone who posted such information without permission, on social media for example, would be given 72 hours to remove it. Failure to do so could result in a bill for civil damages. The late-session proposal had been sought by Maryland’s legal community, but failed to get a vote in the House Judiciary Committee before the 90-day session adjourned, however.

That should have been the end of the matter. Transparency and accountability from public officials requires that such individuals not have their financial assets and other records shielded from public view. Creating a cloak of secrecy around them denies journalists and other watchdogs a key tool in tracking personal finances — and a home is often an individual’s largest single investment. A residential address also is critical in tracking down public records that could touch on a variety of potential civil and criminal entanglements. What if, for example, a wealthy individual with business before a judge (or a governor or a prosecutor), deliberately overpays to purchase that person’s home? How would anyone discover this potential bribe? Think rich people seeking to influence judges is an unlikely scenario? You haven’t been keeping up with the U.S. Supreme Court.

The shooting death of Maryland Circuit Court Judge Andrew Wilkinson, 52, outside his home in Hagerstown on Oct. 19 has prompted a pledge from the chair of the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee to revive the legislation next month, however. Sen. Will Smith has suggested it might even be the first bill on his chamber’s agenda. Investigators believe the man accused of the judge’s killing, 49-year-old Pedro Argote, who was found dead a week after the murder, was motivated by Judge Wilkinson’s decision in a court proceeding to award custody of Argote’s four children to his estranged wife.

There’s no question that the slaying of Judge Wilkinson is a terrible thing, and our hearts go out to his family, friends and colleagues. There is also rising concern nationally about such attacks, and we fear some excellent candidates will choose other career paths because of it. At the same time, we recognize the need to hold public figures — including governors, prosecutors and judges — accountable for their actions.

We can appreciate the appeal of shield laws. In Fiscal Year ‘22, the U.S. Marshals Service investigated more than 1,300 threats and potential threats) against people associated with the federal court system. Though most such acts of intimidation are never acted upon, some have been. Three years ago, a U.S. District Court judge in New Jersey was ambushed by a disgruntled lawyer disguised as a FedEx deliveryman who shot and killed her 20-year-old son. That state subsequently approved “Daniel’s Law,” the privacy measure on which the Maryland Senate bill was based. And last year, a 68-year-old retired Wisconsin state court judge was shot and killed by a man he had sentenced to prison more than 15 years earlier.

But where exactly does one draw the line in choosing whom to protect, and does such shielding even make a difference? Judge Wilkinson was shot in his home’s driveway. Could he also have been ambushed outside the courthouse, on his way to lunch? And if judges and governors merit protection, what’s to keep lawmakers from expanding the eligibility list? Who wouldn’t want to protect police officers, firefighters, teachers, nurses, doctors and so on? Yet they, too, would then be insulated from public scrutiny.

Here’s an alternative course to pursue: Let’s put an end to the kind of anti-judicial vitriol we’ve seen coming out of the mouths of certain elected leaders that may be giving rise to some of this aggression. When prosecutors put up good-faith legal cases against Donald Trump and the ex-president still vilifies the judiciary, members of his Republican Party and his own lawyers should be rising to object.

As retired U.S. District of Maryland Judge Paul Grimm wrote in an essay for Bloomberg Law: “Lawyers and bar associations need to step in and support better protections for judges.” Judges aren’t allowed to publicly comment about cases on the docket before them. But members of the bar are under no such restriction, when the judges they respect are falsely and recklessly accused of bias.

Regardless, greater secrecy will not provide a meaningful assuranceof the integrity of the judicial branch. It would more likely do the opposite.

Baltimore Sun editorial writers offer opinions and analysis on news and issues relevant to readers. They operate separately from the newsroom.