Legal Ethics
Was Judge Transferred Because of His Facebook Activity?
Posted Oct 16, 2009 6:39 AM CST
By Molly McDonough
A Staten Island criminal court judge who detailed aspects of his personal life on his Facebook page is being transferred to a court in Manhattan.
The transfer of Judge Matthew A. Sciarrino Jr., who presides primarily over misdemeanor cases, reportedly involves his social-networking while on and off the bench, the Staten Island Advance reports.
The Staten Island Advance reports that Sciarrino had updated his FB status while on the bench and once posted a photo of his crowded courtroom. The judge's profile is set to private.
When reached by the ABA Journal via e-mail, Sciarrino noted that he'd been instructed not to comment.
Hat tip: The Gothamist
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Comments
B. McLeod
Oct 17, 2009 10:12 AM CST
Gosh, I don’t know. I gather from the title and the story that Molly doesn’t know. Anybody out there know? If so, please write in and give us the scoop.
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Bob
Oct 21, 2009 7:04 AM CST
Oh… what a riveting article. How about including a ‘moral of the story’? Like, don’t play on facebook while you are on the job! Especially behind the judges bench snapping photos of the crowded courtroom.
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Jamie
Oct 21, 2009 10:14 AM CST
Yeah, I know personally that this happens. I don’t think it’s a big deal. Once you spend that much time in court, you know when you can tune in and tune out. If they weren’t on Facebook, they would just be on some other website or their email.
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BMF
Oct 21, 2009 10:48 AM CST
What #3 said. Everyone who has to go to court deserves an attentive judge. That being said, despite occasional rumors to the contrary, judges are human; and there’s a limit to the whiny-a$$ excuses one should have to tolerate in an 8-hour day, for a salary that is often less than that of a school district administrator of a union organizer for sanitation workers.
At least it’s not teh evil pr0n!
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Matt
Oct 22, 2009 3:45 PM CST
Any good Facebooker who’s played Mafia Wars and/or Farmville knows that those are very time-sensitive applications. I’m surprised he didn’t call a recess so he could re-plant his artichoke fields.
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LHS
Oct 29, 2009 10:38 AM CST
It doesn’t sound like he had anything inappropriate up, even according to the SI Advance. The pic of the court room would be bizarre, but not illegal that i know of; aren’t cases sealed from cameras individually, like in big murder trials? You’d also need some more tracking records of when in court he was online, to determine whether it was while cases were being heard. I know that a lot of civil courts have huge amounts of time where the judge is not doing anything at all, so although this judge is gross and weird, I wouldn’t be too quick to jump to accusations (I don’t see how they would just trasnfer him anyway if he had actually done anything very wrong).
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Joseph A Guagliardo
Oct 29, 2009 7:31 PM CST
there is a new site up honoring his honor - So he will always be remembered as the Waht not to do as a Judge 101. Look him up in FB
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