Judges

The U.S. Supreme Court put elected judges on notice Monday that they must step aside from deciding cases involving big-money donors who helped them win their jobs. The decision comes after a decade in which corporate interests and trial lawyers have waged increasingly costly campaigns for 21 states' supreme court seats. Most are in the Great Lakes region or the South.

Attorney Gary Dubin was in a Honolulu hospital, sedated and suffering from depression after the death of his son, when U.S. District Judge Manuel L. Real had him handcuffed and taken to court -- still in his hospital gown -- to answer charges of failing to file tax returns. Real allowed him to send for clothes but refused to postpone the hearing, recalled Dubin, who had to defend himself in a medicated fog without his case files. Judged guilty by Real after a two-day bench trial, Dubin spent 19 1/2 months in federal prison, while his home went into foreclosure and his credit was ruined by identity thieves.

A panel of federal judges, accusing California officials of obstruction, on Thursday denied the state's request to delay an order to produce a plan for reducing its prison population by 40,000 inmates. Aides to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said they would take their request to the U.S. Supreme Court today. The judges issued their order on Aug. 4 in two long-running lawsuits by inmates. The state asked for a delay pending its appeal of the order to the U.S. Supreme Court, which was filed separately Thursday.

When Sonia Sotomayor goes before the Senate next month for her Supreme Court confirmation hearing, the questioning is likely to focus on her work as a civil rights advocate in the 1980s as much as on her nearly two decades on the federal bench. That is because she was a board member of a Puerto Rican advocacy group that sued to overturn New York City's civil service exams and to win more police and firefighter jobs for Latinos.

For most of his eight years on the California Supreme Court, the low-key and affable Carlos R. Moreno largely blended in with the six other justices, building a reliably middle-of-the-road record. Then came Proposition 8, the initiative that reinstated a ban on same-sex-marriage. In May, Moreno cast the court's only vote to overturn it. Now, with the court's term concluding last month, the jurist chosen because of his moderate views is getting a second appraisal from legal analysts, who say his unexpected boldness may signal a growing independence.

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor sidestepped questions on abortion, gun rights and gay rights Wednesday -- including whether a state could forbid aborting a 38-week-old fetus -- leaving both conservative and liberal activists troubled. Sotomayor, relying on her long judicial record, gave detailed explanations of her court decisions but steadfastly refused to engage Republicans who were interested in her views on abortion, the 2nd Amendment and same-sex marriage.

A battle has been roiling in the courts over whether judges in Los Angeles County are entitled to a long-standing benefits program that boosts their pay well above that of their colleagues all across California. The California Supreme Court last week refused to review an appeals court decision ruling unconstitutional more than $46,000 in benefits each judge receives from the county, opening up the possibility that judges here might be taking a steep pay cut in the near future.

Justice John Paul Stevens quietly marked his 89th birthday last week by showing once again his powerful influence on the law. Over the last decade, he has led a series of liberal victories on issues such as the death penalty, gay rights and Guantanamo Bay -- and he has done it on a court that often leans to the right. Many times his views have prevailed, even decades after he staked out his position.

Fresh from his appointment of the first Latino to the U.S. Supreme Court, President Obama has named four new federal judges for California, three of them Asian Americans, who have long been underrepresented on the federal bench. Two of the appointments are to the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California in Los Angeles, and two are to the Northern District of California in San Francisco. They will be brought before the Senate for confirmation after its summer recess.