"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life".
The "richness of experiences" of Justice Sonya Sotomayor have resulted in a series of statements, in and out of court that, for a judge, are quite bizarre.
Of course, it is bizarre for a judge to claim that a decision, reviewing the same record and applying the same law, of a white male judge and a Latina female judge CAN be different.
After all, a judge is supposed to apply the law to the facts in the record, not "draw upon the richness of her experiences", which would make a judge an unsworn witness in the proceedings.
Yet, after making that speech, Sonya Sotomayor was promoted to the bench of the U.S. Supreme Court instead of barred from the bench.
Sotomayor's bizarre "drawings upon the richness of her experience" continued in a string of in and out of court statements in May and June of 2016.
In all of those statements, Justice Sotomayor's pragmatic point of view becomes clear - the ends justify the means, whether they are based on the law or not.
I.
Attorney slave labor is good - if it serves the poor
(Violation of 13th and 14th Amendments are justified)
On May 17, 2016, Justice Sonya Sotomayor claimed that, "had it been in her power", she would have made attorneys to work for free to be entitled to a right to earn a living at all.
That statement indicated that, for Judge Sotomayor, the means, even if the means are violating the U.S. Constitution she is sworn to uphold, justify the end - in the context of her speech, providing forced-labor legal services for the poor.
Forcing people to work in exchange for a right to earn a living is, in fact, in violation of at least three constitutional provisions: the 13th Amendment, the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, and the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment (because other professionals are not required to provide free services in order to be allowed to earn a living).
II.
Jury recall after dismissal is good
Violation of Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, right to impartial adjudication
On June 9, 2016 Justice Sonya Sotomayor authored a majority opinion in a diversity case in federal court which held:
Now.
The main issue was of substantive due process - whether it was fair to allow a dismissed jury who were, for a time being, no longer under oath not to talk to the public about the case and not to read about the case, to be recalled back to additionally deliberate and correct an error.
Since the case was not a federal question case, but a diversity case (the only reason it was in federal court is because the plaintiff and the defendant were citizens of different states within the United States), Justice Sotomayor was BOUND BY LAW to apply the substantive law of the state where the car accident (the subject of the lawsuit) occurred.
That is the requirement of the Erie doctrine.
As any law student will tell you, application of the Erie doctrine is "Civil Procedure 101".
Apparently, the majority in Dietz v Bouldin, including Justice Sonya Sotomayor, failed the competency test as to Civil Procedure 101 by not even mentioning the Erie doctrine or its application.
Instead, Justice Sonya Sotomayor found an "inherent power" of the FEDERAL court to make decisions of substantive law if the end (judicial economy) justifies the means - jury recall.
Since the holding was framed as the "inherent power" of the FEDERAL court (the Erie doctrine be damned), be assured that now juries will be recalled to "correct" whatever the court deems they did wrong in "federal question" cases - civil rights cases.
Not only the recall was a violation of the Erie doctrine where the federal court made a substantive decision without regard to the state law in the state where the litigated events occurred, but committing factual findings to the already "presumed tainted" jury was a clear violation of due process right to impartial court review.
Once the jury is discharged, their oath no longer applying, the jury have had the opportunity to talk to the non-jury member of the public, research the case on their own, and any attempts to verify whether the jury had ACTUALLY done that or not, should be precluded.
The opportunity creates the taint.
That's not what Justice Sotomayor said.
For Justice Sotomayor, the means (judicial economy) justified violation of the U.S. Constitution that she was sworn to uphold.
III.
The righteous 4th Amendment dissent
After Judge Sotomayor claimed in 2001 that, while on the bench, she would draw from the "richness of her experiences" as a "Latina woman",
after Judge Sotomayor claimed in May of 2016 that she would disregard the 13th Amendment in requiring mandatory pro bono service of attorneys as a condition of earning a living, in order to "close the justice gap" (created by attorney regulation, for which the easiest solution is deregulation, not mandated slavery);
after Judge Sotomayor claimed on June 9, 2016 that for purposes of judicial economy, in civil cases, already dismissed - and tainted - juries may be recalled to deliberate some more and "correct mistakes" made before the discharge,
on June 20, 2016 Judge Sotomayor got on the white horse and authored a "fiery" dissent on a 4th Amendment issue protecting civil liberties at large, and once again drawing on the "richness of her experience".
What Sotomayor says in her dissent makes sense.
Yet, a judge shouldn't be drawing on her own experiences, as she did in her dissent, as Sotomayor does:
- nullifies the value of the dissent and reduces it to a statement of an unsworn witness in the case.
And, when a judge acts as a yo-yo justifying violation of some constitutional rights, but not others - what is the value of her "fiery dissents" anyway?
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