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Abramson, Shake both 'outstanding' |
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Posted by -Chuck
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Monday, 20 October 2008 |
By: Andrew Wolfson - Courier-Journal
Louisville, Ky - Louisville trial lawyer Gary Weiss is a big fan of appointed Kentucky Supreme Court Justice Lisabeth Hughes Abramson.
"She is a brilliant woman," Weiss said.
But he's buddies with Chief Circuit Judge Jim Shake, Weiss said, so that's where his vote will go in the Nov. 4 race for Supreme Court.
Because Abramson and Shake both are so well-regarded, lawyers say such personal relationships may be key in the race to fill the unexpired term of the late Justice William E. McAnulty Jr., who died last year. The winner will serve six years; justices are paid $134,160 a year.
"Louisville and the state are very fortunate in having two outstanding candidates," said Stan Billingsley, a former judge who publishes LawReader.com, a blog and research service for lawyers. "There is truly an abundance of riches in this race."
Abramson, 52, touts her experience as an appellate judge -- three years on the Court of Appeals and the past year on the Supreme Court.
"There is a real difference in the day-to-day life of a trial and appellate judge," she said, noting that on an appeals court, "you do your work on paper, through your opinions."
She said she likes the more bookish world of the appellate judge. "I was one of those weirdoes who liked law school," she said.
Shake, 53, cites his experience as a leader. He was elected three times by his colleagues as chief circuit court judge, and by the state's judges as president of the circuit judges association.
"To be effective on the Supreme Court, you not only have to have the legal ability, you also have to be able to persuade at least half of your colleagues of your position, or you end up writing a dissent," he said.
Shake also noted that as a circuit judge, he has heard appeals of district court decisions, and decided nearly every issue imaginable.
"The only difference is that as a trial judge, I have to make the decisions alone," he said.
Qualifications are equal
Billingsley and other lawyers say neither candidate would likely tip the Supreme Court to the right or left, or in the favor of plaintiffs or defendants.
He noted that Abramson's voting record shows her to be "very moderate."
Billingsley and other observers also say the race is a tossup -- Abramson has an advantage as the incumbent, but Shake is a popular chief judge.
The candidates have raised virtually the same amount for their campaigns -- about $140,000, according to the most recent spending reports. And both have won accolades for their performance on the bench.
Shake was rated qualified or highly qualified by 87 percent of the 744 lawyers who voted in a Louisville Bar Association poll released last spring, compared to 84 percent for Abramson.
In more comprehensive bar evaluations of circuit judges, Shake has won the highest marks three times in a row.
Abramson, meanwhile, has been endorsed by Citizens for Better Judges and The Courier-Journal.
"It's a draw when it comes to qualifications," Weiss said. "It's not like you have somebody who should be disbarred running against somebody who could be dean of Harvard Law School."
Both candidates say they support reinstating the senior judge program after it expires next year, although Abramson said it may need some major tweaking. Under the program, retired judges, in exchange for enhanced retirement benefits, fill in for those who are sick or die in office.
Both candidates favor opening the lawyer disciplinary system to public scrutiny earlier in the process.
And both they say they support, in principal, a proposal pending before the Supreme Court to require lawyers to report suspected misconduct of other attorneys.
McAnulty 'favored Lisa'
Abramson's career has been strangely intertwined with McAnulty's.
After practicing law for about 15 years, she was, in 1997, the first woman from Jefferson County appointed to the Court of Appeals, but she was defeated by McAnulty the next year in a close election.
She was then appointed to fill McAnulty's old circuit court seat, to which she later won election.
In 2006, running unopposed, she won a spot back on the Court of Appeals, and last year, then-Gov. Ernie Fletcher named her to take McAnulty's seat.
"Bill McAnulty made it very clear that he favored Lisa as his successor and that was a factor in her appointment," said lawyer Sheryl Snyder, who has held a fundraiser for Abramson's campaign.
Abramson grew up in Princeton, Ky., where her father founded a car dealership that is now run by her brother and sister.
She met her future husband, Les Abramson -- Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson's second cousin -- at University of Louisville law school, where he is a professor.
She graduated second in her class and was named the outstanding third-year student.
As a circuit judge, in 2001 she sentenced two offenders to death, which she cited as her most difficult cases, and in 2004 she ruled that Louisville Metro government had miscalculated the overtime pay for city firefighters and owed them millions of dollars.
On the Supreme Court, she wrote what has been her most noted opinion, in a dissent in which she said the majority "grievously" erred in holding that a man who fathers a child during an affair with a married woman has no legal right to parenthood.
"Our world is full of inconvenient truths," she wrote. "We accomplish nothing for families, the broader community and our justice system when we deny those truths."
Shake does 'what's right'
Shake practiced law for 12 years, in private practice, as an assistant county attorney, as chairman of the state Personnel Board and as a public defender. In the last capacity, he defended Kevin Stanford, who was sentenced to death for killing gas-station attendant Baerbel Poore. Stanford's sentence has since been commuted.
Shake was appointed to the circuit bench in 1993 by then-Gov. Brereton Jones and won election that year to retain the seat.
In 1994, with nearly four dozen police offers massed in his courtroom, he rejected a plea deal that would have given the most lenient possible sentence to a man charged with attempted murder of an officer. Rejecting the suggestion he'd been bullied by police, Shake said at the time that he nixed the deal because the victim hadn't been consulted.
In 1998 Shake presided over a closely watched trial in which a jury said Humana should pay $13.1 million to a woman who claimed the insurer denied her coverage for surgery that could have cured her cervical cancer.
He also presided in the priest-abuse case against the Archdiocese of Louisville, ultimately approving a settlement of $25 million for 243 victims.
Shake said he took some flak from the public for ordering the archdiocese to turn over personnel files and secret documents accumulated over five decades, and for ruling that the lawsuits against the church could not be sealed.
He also risked the election-year wrath of the Jefferson County Teachers Association in July, when he refused to reinstate 18 teachers who had been let go for disciplinary and performance issues.
"You can't be persuaded by what the public says," Shake said in an interview. "You have to do what's right."
Shake was born in Louisville and grew up in the South End near Churchill Downs.
His father died when he was in second grade, and his stepfather died when he was a 10th-grader at Iroquois High School. His mother worked at Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp.
He met his wife, Ann O'Malley Shake, now a senior judge, at U of L law school, where she was two years behind him.
Jim Shake and Abramson were in the same class, and for nearly eight years, they sat in circuit court in adjacent divisions.
Shake say they have never disliked each other -- and both admired the man they are vying to replace.
"It is unfortunate that the opportunity for this race even exists," Shake said.
Reporter Andrew Wolfson can be reached at (502) 582-7189.
-Original Article-
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