A deep, dark secret within the magical community of lawyers is that the phrase “with all due respect” is an insult. It’s the facially acceptable way of saying “that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” but since saying that to a judge would make them unhappy with you, which rarely serves any good purpose, we pose it in more genteel language. But that’s what it means.
With all due respect, Broward County Circuit Judge Kathleen McHugh, your sentencing Chad Ochocinco to 30 days rather than probation as was agreed in the plea offer was arbitrary, improper and abusive.
What is it? Are you not a football fan? Football players give their teammates a slap on the butt as a sign of appreciation. Did you not just ask whether he was satisfied with the efforts of his lawyer, Adam Swickle? You asked? You went out of your way to compliment Swickle’s work. And so, in conformity with your question, your statement, he was a bit demonstrative in his showing of appreciation. So what?
It probably embarrassed you a bit that others in the courtroom started giggling when Chad gave Swickle the slap on the butt. You realized then that you, not he, started the chain of events that culminated in the butt slap. You thought it made you look foolish?
Not nearly as foolish as when you chastised the defendant for having “not taken the proceeding seriously,” even though your comment reflected nothing about his conduct, but your own.
True, it’s only 30 days, hardly a blip in the scheme of sentences imposed on defendants by judges in the Land of the Free. There are certainly far harsher sentences to be alarmed about, outraged about, and similarly needlessly imposed. But yours, judge, was captured on video and played widely because Chad Ochocinco was a football player. It’s part of the reason why you felt compelled to try to vindicate your dignity, not wanting the world to see you look weak or realize that this was your lack of self-esteem on trial rather than his lack of seriousness at the sentence.
But judge, we expect you to be bigger, smarter, more secure in your own competence, than to react like a petty tyrant trying to clean up her own mess before anybody notices who caused the problem. Had you let it pass, no one would have noticed, or thought ill of you. But it apparently struck a chord with you, enough so that you felt compelled to salvage your dignity. With all due respect, your dignity issues are your problem, not Chad Ochocinco’s.
Your job, and your only job, was to impose sentence for the violation of probation. If the sentence of probation with community service was the proper sentence before the butt slap, it was the proper sentence afterward. What you did, and what can’t be explained any other way, is punish Chad Ochocinco not for the offense that brought him before you, but for the offense of innocently causing others in the courtroom to laugh. Oh, the humiliation of having people laugh during your sentence. How will you ever live that down?
“The whole courtroom laughed because you just slapped your attorney on the backside.”
Rarely has a judge provided as clear a path to her troubled self-esteem than this.
The only “act” taken by Chad was to show his appreciation to his lawyer in the manner that comes naturally to him. By no stretch of the imagination can this be construed as an affront to the court. There is no rational basis to find him responsible for others in the courtroom laughing. They thought it was funny? How is that his fault?
While it’s easy to be dismissive of a judge behaving foolishly, even self-indulgently, at the expense of a defendant when the sentence is only 30 days, it’s wrong to do so. The lifer might scoff, but if someone who was supposed to walk out of court on a plea ended up doing time in the pokey, that’s his time, his days and nights, his life, that shouldn’t be behind bars even for a minute. That’s how it works.
So Judge McHugh, with all due respect, your conduct in the sentencing of Chad Ochocinco was a disgrace. If you can’t control your low self-esteem needs long enough to appropriately fulfill your duties as a judge, then you have no business being on the bench. Sometimes people will laugh in your courtroom. Toughen up and get over it. That’s not a justification for your to indulge your fragile desire for the veneer of respect by taking it out on a defendant.
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She would have preferred he stab step his attorney.
What (IMHO) we call “due respect” more closely resembles courtesy, which, unlike respect, needs not be earned and can be feigned.
The trick is that it’s only as much respect as the judge is “due.”
Do we know, or do we merely assume, that the judge bound herself to the plea deal before the slap or that the acceptance of the deal was a reasonable expectation of the defendant in context? I don’t practice in that state so my speculation is of low or no value, but I don’t trust reporters to get these sorts of details right.
In Maryland I have seen cases where a defendant asked for probation, the State argued for a conviction with no actual time and each agreed to make those arguments, expecting the bench to land within those frontiers on sentencing, But some judges think that touching a handgun without a permit on the streets of Maryland merits 120 days in the box, prosecutorial discretion be damned, and so the defendant marches frog, bewildered, to the county detention center, with mild shock on the face of the prosecutor and horror on the face of the defense atty.
One may argue that blowing off one’s probation agent repeatedly, as Mr. Johnson appears to have done, simply doesn’t justify 30 days backup time at a VOP hearing, even if the delinquent probationer is playing a little slap-ass at the trial table. The case – fair or unfair – is useful as a real world caution to young CDLs not to assume without proof that a deal is just going to go through. Sometimes if it can go wrong, it will.
In the absence of any suggestion to dispute the information that the court had already approved the deal, particularly given the extreme scrutiny of the situation, it would be more than fair to presume the information to be accurate, and any assumption to the contrary to be erroneous.
When I first heard the butt-slap story I assumed, quite wrongly, that he had a female attorney and that this was an inappropriate touching in the courtroom.
Now looking at the video, it is clear that this was a classic way-to-go-teammate slap after the judicial compliment, the kind of slap he has likely done a few thousand times since the time he was playing in the Pee Wee leagues.
Funny how a quick assumption from a headline can be in such stark contrast to a video of what actually happened.
What happens if you raise your eyebrows?
As soon as I saw the name “Ochocinco” I assumed it was going to be something ridiculous and thoroughly rewarding of jail – like all his other end zone shenanigans. But, once I saw the video and how he didn’t have some huge smirk on his face, didn’t do it overtly, and seemed like an involuntary “good game” to the lawyer, rightfully, after being praised by the judge, I was really surprised. This is the true mark of a petty tyrant. “With all due respect” indeed.
Why take the chance? I shave mine off before every court appearance. I insist my attorney do the same, male or female.
In case you’re not familiar with Yes Minister, I heartily recommend it to your attention.
Humphrey: And, with respect, Minister-
Hacker: Don’t-don’t use that filthy language to me, Humphrey.
Humphrey: Filthy language, Minister?
Hacker: I know what “with respect” means in your jargon. It means you’re just about to imply that anything I’m about to suggest is beneath contempt.