Judge Who Called Lawyers Boobs Kept on Case

SAN FRANCISCO — Ruling in a Los Angeles police shooting, a federal appeals court refused to disqualify a judge who called a family’s lawyers boobs and jailed one of them.

However, the court did grant a new trial to the victim’s family.

U.S. District Judge A. Andrew Hauk showed a lack of respect for the lawyers and engaged in “some injudicious behavior,” but did not show bias or an inability to preside over a retrial of the civil suit, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said Tuesday.

The court set aside the jury’s verdict in favor of two policemen involved in the fatal shooting of Ruben Medrano in March, 1988, ruling that Hauk had improperly prevented the family’s lawyers from challenging a prospective juror. But the lawyer whom Hauk sent to jail during the trial said the ruling was no victory.

“There’s no way we’re going to get a fair trial in front of Judge Hauk,” said attorney Donald W. Cook. He criticized the court for refusing to remove Hauk from the case, and also for upholding Hauk’s rulings that barred a plaintiff’s expert witness on police conduct and dismissed claims against police higher-ups in the shooting.

Medrano, who had locked himself in his bathroom, taken a lethal dose of heroin and left a suicide note, was fatally shot by police who broke down his door after he was heard snoring. His family claimed that the officers faked a shooting by Medrano to justify their actions, but a jury cleared the officers.

The appeals court said a new trial was needed because Hauk wrongly refused to let the family’s lawyers challenge a juror who was seated after a proposed juror was removed by the opposing lawyers.