Boyce F. Martin Jr. - Knowledge (XXG)

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has deteriorated. In fact, one of the most clear examples of the arbitrariness of the death penalty is the common knowledge that those defendants with decent lawyers rarely get sentenced to death. Death has more to do with extra-judicial factors like race and socio-economic status than with whether death is deserved. A system, whose basic justification is the interest in retribution and general deterrence, is not served when guided by such irrelevant factors. Nor should a system of life and death hinge on the proficiency of counsel. I have no delusions of grandeur and I know my place in the judiciary. My oath requires me to apply the law as interpreted by the Supreme Court of the United States. I will continue to do as I am told until the Supreme Court concludes that the death penalty cannot be administered in a constitutional manner or our legislatures abolish the penalty. But lest there be any doubt, the idea that the death penalty is fairly and rationally imposed in this country is a farce.

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entire amount to conclude the matter. According to an affidavit by Martin's lawyer, outside counsel for the special committee had suggested his resignation and payment of the money would "conclude the matter and it would remain confidential." But the judicial conduct committee opinion says those statements represented only advice or suggestions on how Martin could improve his legal position rather than a promise.

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investigation into Martin's alleged actions in handling the Grutter case was flawed by the acting chief judge's decision to make certain findings of fact as "undisputed" without asking Martin whether he disputed them (although the report agreed that certain of the findings, such as dates and the sequence of events, were truly undisputed).

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I have been a judge on this Court for more than twenty-five years. In that time I have seen many death penalty cases and I have applied the law as instructed by the Supreme Court and I will continue to do so for as long as I remain on this Court. This my oath requires. After all these years, however,

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on September 25, 1979, and received his commission the following day. He served as Chief Judge of the Sixth Circuit from October 1, 1996, until September 30, 2003. During his tenure as Chief Judge he steered the circuit through a turbulent period when up to seven of the sixteen judgeships were vacant

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Appeals from these courts went to the Kentucky Court of Appeals whose decisions were of high quality, but could take two or three years to be handed down. The reform efforts bore fruit on November 4, 1975, when an amendment to the state constitution was passed by 54%. The amendment cleared the way to

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In May 2013, he agreed to pay back all of his $ 138,500 worth of travel expenses over the contested time period, despite the fact that only a portion of those expenses were alleged to be improper. Judge Martin contested some of the expenses and conceded mistakes with others, but offered to repay the

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As noted above, while the system suffers from many flaws, much of the arbitrary imposition of the death penalty stems from the exceedingly distressing fact that during all my years on the bench, the quality of lawyering that capital defendants receive has not substantially improved. In many cases it

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Jason Getsy and John Santine are not hypothetical players in a criminal law final exam. They are real people who committed real crimes, indeed, the same crimes. That Getsy will be put to death while Santine will be spared, and that the law (at least according to the majority) actually sanctions this

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Martin wrote forcefully about what he perceived to be the many failures in the American system of capital punishment. In one case involving a debate regarding a jury's decision to sentence a defendant to death while a co-conspirator was not sentenced to death, Martin dissented from the majority that

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In January 2014, nearly six months after Judge Martin's retirement from the federal judiciary, allegations surrounding government-reimbursed travel expenses were referred to the U.S. Justice Department, according to an opinion by the Committee on Judicial Conduct and Disability of the U.S. Judicial

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The Grutter case was surrounded in controversy. Conservative judges on the Sixth Circuit claimed that then-Chief Judge Martin had improperly steered the case to a more liberal panel. They also claimed the en banc review of the case was tainted because it was delayed until two conservative judges of

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Martin's style both on the bench and in written opinions was characterized by "no-nonsense jurisprudence," clear and concise writing, and a focus on common sense. He was cited as an example of how common sense helps "sustain the law, not destroy it." In his opinion, the purpose of an opinion is to

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In the 1970s, Martin worked behind the scenes lobbying to reform the Kentucky judiciary. The Kentucky court system had been little changed since 1850, and it had a host of problems. "Kentucky had a multiplicity of misdemeanor courts that were presided over, for the most part, by non-lawyer judges.

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considered this an insufficient remedy as the Act requires the corrective action be "voluntary action taken by the subject judge", and Martin "did not participate in taking the corrective action". Relations between conservative and liberal members of the Sixth Circuit reportedly remain strained.

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In this respect, the report found that the investigation was conducted in a manner inconsistent with the letter and spirit of the court's rules. At the same time, however, the report took issue with the acting chief judge's decision to drop the complaint due to "corrective action". The committee

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took the unprecedented step of filing a "Procedural Appendix" as part of his dissent from Grutter, in which he explicitly accused Martin and the rest of the majority of improperly tampering with the case. The majority took umbrage with Judge Boggs' decision to publish this appendix, with Judge

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The handling of the complaint itself was reviewed by the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act Study Committee (the "Breyer Committee"), which reviewed how complaints were being handled under the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act of 1980. The Breyer Committee report observed that the internal

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noting that Boggs had not raised any complaint with the composition of the en banc court when the en banc petition was circulated or when the case was argued before the en banc court, suggesting that Boggs's dispute was with the outcome of the case, rather than the procedures of the court.

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Martin's goals at the time were to speed up the appellate process, reduce cost, and create an efficient chain of justice, while maintaining a high level of conscientious decision-making. These goals were accomplished and the Court of Appeals was generally viewed as an unequivocal success.

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The case was significant because complaints against federal judges are rarely made public, and most do not result in disciplinary action. Referrals to the Department of Justice, which conducts criminal investigations, are rare. The Chief Judge of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals,

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There were county courts, magistrate courts, municipal courts, and police courts. It was not uncommon for the judges of these courts to be totally untrained in the law, politically partisan, and, in some cases, of dubious literacy."

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foundation filed a formal complaint with the court alleging administrative improprieties, and subsequently wrote a complaining letter to Rep. Sensenbrenner of the House Judiciary Committee requesting an impeachment investigation.

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However, such a complaint could have been characterized as an ex ante attempt to influence the outcome of the case by manipulating the composition of the en banc panel, the very problem Boggs alleged. The

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As a reformer and the first Chief Judge of the newly created Court of Appeals, Martin quickly got the new court off the ground and cleared the backlog of cases that had developed under the old system.

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only one conclusion is possible: the death penalty in this country is arbitrary, biased, and so fundamentally flawed at its very core that it is beyond repair.

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which praised him for his "innate fairness, temperament, experience, and training necessary to become an outstanding circuit judge." He won by a landslide.

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in 1979, Martin served as chief judge of the circuit from 1996 to 2003 and wrote more than 1,100 opinions during his 34-year tenure. Martin lived in

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See Mortensen v. C.I.R., 440 F.3d 375, 385 (6th Cir. 2006); Seawright v. Amer Gen Fin Serv, 507 F.3d 967, 980 (6th Cir. 2007) (dissenting).

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result, makes it virtually impossible for me to answer in the affirmative what Justice Blackmun viewed as the fundamental question in

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In March 2014, the Justice Department notified Judge Martin that it had completed its review and would not be pursuing the matter.

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After discussing many of the studies and cases that have noted the numerous flaws in our system, he concluded,

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could take into account an applicant's race in making admission decisions. Grutter and its sister case,

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in 1957. After graduating, he first worked in banking. Later, while serving in the

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United at Last: The Judicial Article and the Struggle to Reform Kentucky's Courts

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United at Last: The Judicial Article and the Struggle to Reform Kentucky's Courts

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the Sixth Circuit had retired, giving the court a liberal majority. Judge

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to fill a vacancy on the Jefferson County Circuit Court in early 1974.

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for the Western District of Kentucky. He left for private practice in

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held that the principle of proportionality did not apply. He wrote,

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Judges of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit

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Judicial complaint - investigation into improper travel expenses

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United States court of appeals judges appointed by Jimmy Carter

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United States Attorneys for the Western District of Kentucky

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Martin retired from the federal bench on August 16, 2013.

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create a unified court system with a new intermediate

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In the November 1974 elections he was endorsed by the

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in 1963. Immediately after graduation he served as a

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