BOSTON — District Court Judge Shelley Joseph back in a courtroom, this time to answer questions before the State Commission on Judicial Conduct about a case that’s been catapulted into the national debate over immigration.
Judge Joseph is accused of helping an undocumented suspect escape an ICE agent who was ordered to wait in a hallway, by releasing the suspect through lockup and a back door at Newton District Court in 2018.
The commission toured Newton District court before the hearing began.
Judge Joseph was suspended in 2019, but reinstated three years later when the government dropped federal charges against her.
But at Suffolk Superior court, the Commission on Judicial Conduct is considering its own disciplinary action.
At a hearing, the special council argued Judge Joseph violated policy by going off the record when the plan to let the suspect go out the backdoor was created, and when others stated asking questions about it.
“She did not tell them all of what happened. She did not volunteer information that she should have volunteered to meet her obligation,” said Judith Fabricant.
But Judge Joseph’s attorney argued the Judge simply didn’t know the suspect would evade an ICE agent when she allowed him to return to lockup.
“Judge Joseph thought that her responsibilities with respect to this defendant were finished, that the security people would take over, that ICE would do their job and that there was nothing more that she needed to do,” defense attorney Elizabeth Mulvey said.
The Commission has thirty days to issue its findings and recommendations to the state’s highest court.
The SJC could remove Judge Joseph from the bench.
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