Minnesota Justice Found to Have Cheated on Bar Exam Resigns

Minnesota Supreme Court Associate Justice John Todd, who was found guilty of cheating on a bar exam and faced possible removal from the bench, submitted his resignation Friday.

In his resignation letter to Gov. Rudy Perpich, Todd said he was stepping down because of “attacks on my personal integrity.” A three-judge panel recommended last month that Todd be unseated for cheating on the test.

Todd, who said he had made “an honest mistake,” made the decision to step down from the $68,400 position he has held since 1972 only three days before the full state Court of Appeals was scheduled to hear oral arguments on his case.

“I assure you and the citizens of Minnesota that I have never cheated in my entire life,” Todd said in his resignation letter. “Although I do not agree with the finding of the referees and the Court (of Appeals) may have rejected it, I wish to avoid further agonizing over it by the judicial system as well as my family and myself,” he added.

He said the resignation would become effective April 1.

The governor’s office said Perpich would formally accept the resignation Monday. Perpich will not appoint a successor to the Supreme Court because the recent creation of the state Court of Appeals reduces the high court from nine to seven members by attrition.

Todd, 57, would have been the first member of the Minnesota Supreme Court to be removed from office if the Court of Appeals had followed the recommendations of the three-judge panel.

The panel, which was appointed last November by the Court of Appeals, found Todd “guilty of conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice or conduct unbecoming of a judicial officer.”

The Court of Appeals served as the Supreme Court in the disciplinary proceedings.

Last November, the appellate court rejected an offer by Todd to accept public censure for using reference books during a multistate bar examination in July, 1983, in the office of Richard E. Klein, the director of state bar examinations. That exam helps attorneys qualify to practice law outside Minnesota, which Todd had considered doing in retirement.