Husband and Wife are long since divorced.
In their California divorce, Husband agreed to pay Wife a portion of his military pension benefits as he collected them, and the agreement was adopted in a divorce court order.
Some twenty-odd years later, Husband has become a California judge and Wife has relocated to Arizona. At this time, Husband begins to collect his military pension.
Husband makes no payments to Wife.
Husband gives no notice to Wife.
What Husband does allegedly do is:
- misrepresent to others that Wife’s former attorney, now also a judge serving with Husband, advised him not to pay Wife or notify Wife that he is collecting his pension now
- have conversations with various judicial officers regarding the previously agreed and ordered calculations of Wife’s share of Husband’s pension benefits, and state that he would keep Wife’s share if she didn’t ask for it or died first
- have conversations with various judicial officers regarding following an irregular procedure for obtaining court approval of the resolution of Husband’s payments to Wife
- fail to disclose his long-standing friendship with an attorney who regularly appears before him in unrelated matters.
For all of the above reasons, plus several more, the body that supervises judges opened an inquiry into Husband’s judicial conduct.
The judge’s case has not been decided yet.
Read more in
- this CalCoastNews article: Judge John Trice accused of violating a divorce court order and
- this San Luis Obispo Tribune article: SLO judge accused of misconduct .
