Cert Petition Claims Campaign Contributions Required Judicial Recusal

U.S. Supreme Court

Cert Petition Claims Campaign Contributions Required Judicial Recusal

Posted Aug 4, 2008, 07:26 am CDT
By Debra Cassens Weiss

A cert petition filed with the U.S. Supreme Court claims West Virginia Supreme Court Justice Brent Benjamin was required to recuse himself in a business interference case because of $3 million in campaign contributions made by a litigant.

Former Solicitor General Theodore Olson filed the petition on behalf of the president of the losing company in the West Virginia case, the National Law Journal reports. Don Blankenship, the CEO of the winning litigant, Massey Energy Co., made $3 million in judicial campaign contributions, most of it to a group that supported Justice Benjamin.

"Although judicial elections—and contributions to elected judges—are a well-established means of selecting a state judiciary, there will be rare cases where campaign expenditures by a litigant create a constitutionally unacceptable appearance of impropriety,” the cert petition says. “This is such a case."

Benjamin voted with the majority in a 3-2 decision in April that overturned a $50 million verdict against Massey Energy. Two other justices had recused themselves in the case, including Chief Justice Elliott Maynard, who had vacationed with Blankenship.

Benjamin said in a concurrence that recusal is not required unless a judge has a "direct, personal, substantial, pecuniary interest" in the case before him, the story says. Benjamin said a U.S. Supreme Court precedent, Aetna Life Insurance v. Lavoie, established that standard. The case was argued and won by Olson in 1986, the story says.

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