Judicial Panel Clears Judge of Alleged Insubordination

A judicial panel has cleared Orange County Superior Court Judge Theodore E. Millard of alleged insubordination for refusing to hear a case assigned to him.

The state Commission on Judicial Performance decided “not to impose or recommend formal discipline” and to dismiss the proceedings against Millard.

“I’m very happy that I finally got people to read the rules of court the way I do,” said Millard.

The state court rule at the time allowed a judge to refuse to take a case assigned to him by the court’s presiding judge.

Since the case arose, the rule has been changed to require that a judge state the reasons for refusing to accept a case and to allow the presiding judge to determine if the reasons are valid.

“I have some reservations about the constitutionality of (the new) rule, but I’ll save them for an appropriate time,” Millard said.

Former Presiding Judge Richard J. Beacom had claimed that Millard was insubordinate early last year when he refused to do all the work assigned to him during a two-month stint on a panel that decides pre-trial issues.

The panel at the time was the court’s busiest, as three judges grappled with more than 350 cases a week.

Beacom’s complaint to the commission, which is empowered to investigate complaints against judges and to recommend disciplinary action, resulted in a letter to Millard indicating that he would be privately reprimanded but would have the right to challenge the decision. Millard said he refused to accept the reprimand and insisted on a full hearing.

A four-day closed hearing was held last spring. State law prohibits the commission and witnesses from disclosing anything about the commission’s private disciplinary actions.

At the time of the hearing, former Superior Court Judge William Sheffield called Millard’s alleged insubordination “. . . less than a spitting-on-the-sidewalk offense.”

Millard had been assigned to the pre-trial panel to fill in for Sheffield, who was serving temporarily on the state Court of Appeal.

“I thought it was just a personality conflict between Beacom and Millard,” Sheffield said.

Differences With Beacom

Millard said he has had differences with Beacom stemming from their days in the district attorney’s office in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Beacom could not be reached for comment Monday. He previously had declined to discuss his complaint to the commission but denied that any feud with Millard had prompted it.

In February, 1984, Millard rebelled against a workload he said was the heaviest he had encountered since being elected to the bench in 1978. He wrote letters to Beacom stating that there was no reason why some judges should go home at 5 p.m. or so while judges on the panel had to read cases often until 11 p.m. He claimed that under the state Constitution the work of the Superior Court must be divided evenly among all the judges. And a state court rule allowed a judge to refuse to hear cases assigned to him.

Millard posted a notice outside his courtroom door saying he would not hear oral arguments in any case in which he had not finished reading the written motions and arguments by 6:30 p.m. on the previous day.

Lawyers Turned Away

In one case, lawyers who had come from San Francisco for a scheduled hearing were turned away by Millard, a move that infuriated Beacom. As presiding judge, Beacom said then, he could have reassigned the case to another judge but did not because other judges were just as busy.

Millard claimed that at least two other judges were free that day to hear the case.