Chief Justice Moore Files with Selected Panel of Alabama Supreme Court

MONTGOMERY, AL -- Liberty Counsel filed a 95-page brief on behalf of Chief Justice Roy Moore with the specially selected panel of judges at the Alabama Supreme Court. The brief contains an array of legal arguments against the charges brought against him by the Judicial Inquiry Commission (JIC) and the ruling by the Court of the Judiciary (COJ).

The brief argues that the JIC does not have jurisdictional authority to review administrative orders of the Alabama Chief Justice. Review of such administrative orders are sole prerogative of the Alabama Supreme Court. In this case, the Alabama Supreme Court did not take any action to modify, set aside, and overrule the Administrative Order of January 6, 2016, which is the sole basis of the JIC charges. The COJ violated Rule 16 which requires a unanimous 9-0 vote to remove a judge from office. The 27-month suspension is a de facto removal and the COJ admitted it did not have the required nine votes to remove Chief Justice Moore. This action clearly violates Rule 16, and for this reason alone the decision by the COJ should be dismissed. The penalty of the permanent suspension from the bench is the most severe in the history of Alabama. The longest any judge has been suspended since Rule 16 was adopted in 2001 was six months. Charge 6 must be dismissed because there was never a verified complaint for this charge, never a vote by the JIC to charge, never a Letter of Investigation, and not one six-week continuing Letter of Investigation. This charge alleges that Chief Justice Moore ordered the probate judges to disobey a lower federal court order. The brief argues Charges 1-6 must be dismissed because they are not supported by clear and convincing evidence. The JIC alleged that the January 2016 Administrative Order directed the probate judges to violate the U.S. Supreme Court and the lower federal court injunction. But the Administrative Order on its face stated: "I am not at liberty to provide any guidance to Alabama probate judges on the effect of Obergefell on the existing orders of the Alabama Supreme Court. That issue remains before the entire Court which continues to deliberate on the matter." There is no evidence to support any of the charges.

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The brief also argues that the automatic suspension provision is unconstitutional and concludes that the JIC violated the confidentiality requirement by leaking to the media information about the impending charges prior to the charges being formally issued. The JIC must now filed its brief and Chief Justice Moore will then file a Reply Brief. Oral argument will be in 2017 but the date has not yet been set. "The brief dismantles the trumped up charges against Chief Justice Roy Moore. The JIC did not have the authority to review the Administrative Order. That authority belongs only to the Alabama Supreme Court and that court did not modify or overrule that order. Any objective review of this case must conclude that Chief Justice Moore did nothing wrong and should have never been charged," said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel. "The JIC violated the rule of law and the COJ shamefully violated clear law when it de facto removed Chief Justice Moore when the order admits the court did not have the required unanimous vote to remove," said Staver.