Justice, Family Style

Martin R. Boags, 17, is a Beverly Hills High School student with a propensity for accumulating parking tickets--at least 72 of them over one five-month period beginning last September. Not to worry, though, because Martin’s father--and the registered owner of the car involved in all the infractions--is Charles D. Boags, a Beverly Hills municipal judge. Judge Boags took it upon himself to dispose of all the citations, accepting guilty pleas from his son but not imposing any fines, which could have totaled $1,206. Whether these actions were accompanied by stern lectures we do not know, since they took place in chambers rather than in open court.

The judge, who is running unopposed for reelection in June, says that he thought his son had a permit to park in certain restricted zones. When it was called to his attention that all of the tickets were for offenses other than parking in permit restricted areas, the judge said, “I didn’t know that.” Surely, though, it is a judge’s job to know the law. It’s also his job to follow those clearly written canons in the Code of Judicial Ethics that require a judge to disqualify himself when he has a personal bias in a case, or when he or a child has a financial interest in the matter.

The district attorney’s office is now trying to decide whether Boags’ conduct was criminal. It does not take a convention of lawyers to conclude that it was less than ethical. That makes it a matter that ought to come before the state Commission of Judicial Performance, which is empowered to investigate complaints against judges and recommend to the California Supreme Court whether censure or removal is called for. The Code of Judicial Ethics aims at supporting impartiality in judges. It seems not to have worked very well in one Beverly Hills court.