On June 1st, 2022 the Commission on Judicial Performance terminated Vance W. Raye, Administrative Presiding Justice, Court of Appeal, Third District of California by way of a public admonishment. The public admonishment criticized Vance W. Raye for his failure to perform ministerial duties, causing him to retire immediately.
On May 27, 2022, Justice Raye and his counsel, Edith R. Matthai, Esq., submitted a a stipulation to the Director-Chief Counsel Gregory Dresser, pursuant to the commission’s rule 116.5, to resolve the commission’s pending preliminary investigation in Justice Raye’s delays by accepting the imposition of a public admonishment and the justice’s agreement to retire and refrain from serves in a judicial capacity in the future.
Prior to the Commission on Judicial Performance’s decision to grant the relief recommended in the order the Supreme Court of California issued on Eisenberg’s Petition for Writ of Mandate, Raye sought to oppose the allegations to no avail. In and though counsel, Raye argued, on the one hand, that Eisenberg did not have standing as appellate counsel to file a Petition on behalf of the parties adversely affected by Raye’s delays but, on the other hand, Raye denied these delays.
In his response to Eisenberg’s Petition for Writ of Mandate, which provided an undeniable factual basis for Eisenberg’s allegations of delay, Raye wrote: “I have decided that [Eisenberg’s] latest claims, set forth in a petition to the Supreme Court, … are simply wrong. He claims the Third District is “systemically” denying statutory calendar preference for many criminal appeals. Not so. There are a multitude of statutes providing calendar preferences for various categories of cases, and other priorities are established by motions in individual cases. There is no “systemic” denial of calendar preferences. Preferences are accorded when mandated.”
What is even more striking about Raye’s denials, however, are Eisenberg’s careful selection of Raye’s testimony delivered before a legislative committee in 1985. Raye wrote: “Finally, I am disappointed with Mr. Eisenberg’s claim that the systemic failures of which he complains were “presaged” by testimony I delivered before a legislative committee four decades ago on behalf of a measure supported by the Attorney General. I was doing my job as a staff member speaking on behalf of the Attorney General and don’t recall the bill, which would have apparently eliminated appeals as a matter of right in criminal cases. Mr. Eisenberg seems to suggest my remarks reflect a bias which lingers and led me to be hostile to calendar preferences for criminal appeals. Nothing could be further from the truth.”
In his Petition for Writ of Mandate, Eisenberg described Raye’s prejudice towards criminal appeals not just in terms of delay but in terms of Raye’s own tendency to prejudge appeals prima facie without the parties’ fully briefed issues. In 1979, for instance, two years before Ray was a Senior Assistant Attorney General for Legislative Affairs, a famous case, People v. Brigham (1979) 25 Cal.3d 283, 285-289 upheld the right to be free from a summary affirmation of a criminal conviction absent a full briefing with a right to oral arguments. In 1981, Raye urged the Legislature to approve a bill, Senate Bill No. 1197, the Attorney General’s office advanced for eliminating appeals as a matter of right over a trial judge’s discretionary issuance of a “certificate of appeal.” The bill failed.
At that time Raye stated: “[W]e think there should be some limitation on the right to appeal in consideration of the fact that over 90 percent of criminal appeals result in affirmation and a substantial number of that 90 percent could be characterized as frivolous appeals.” Raye’s statement from more than 40 years that 9 out of 10 appeals may be denied prima facie without briefs or oral argument underscores the reactionary character of Raye’s appointment in the first place. In light of his statement, his appointment begs the question. It is startling that Raye remained a judge for so long, let alone an appellate judge, in light of his clearly stated bias, partiality or prejudice towards a denial of appeals prima facie.
The State of California’s Commission on Judicial Performance rarely, if ever, takes action against justices, let alone justices at the Courts of Appeal. The Commission on Judicial Performance’s decision, however, to terminate Vance W. Raye for delays rather than for his decisions is carefully designed to prevent further review of Raye’s decisions, many of which are rife with injustice, especially ones not certified for publication. Raye’s termination therefore solves none of the problems in the Third District, Court of Appeal or anywhere in California. It does not provide any relief for the appellants whose lives were adversely affected.
As the disposition stated, “a significant number of cases languished for years.
Justice Raye’s oldest completed case (No. C067600) had aged seven years and nine months after being fully briefed before the parties dismissed the matter. Two of Justice Raye’s cases were delayed between six and seven years; five between five and six years; 17 between four and five years; 29 between three and four years; and 45 between two and three years. Justice Raye’s oldest pending case (No. C070732, rating of 2) is a criminal matter with youthful offenders in which supplemental briefing was requested by the parties and
authorized by the court in January 2022 after the case had been fully briefed for
eight years and seven months. Justice Raye failed to prioritize efforts so that
older cases could be resolved before work began on newer ones.”
In no less than six of the cases Raye permitted to languish for years, extreme prejudice deprived the appellants of their civil rights.”Justice Raye’s conduct caused prejudice to civil litigants and criminal defendants. Prejudice can occur in civil cases by parties suffering from uncertainty as disputes remain unresolved, or the payments of money judgments are delayed. In criminal cases, appellants are prejudiced if they have served all
or part of a reversed sentence, or when faded memories or lost evidence hamper resentencing hearings or retrials.”
None of the victims of Raye’s failure to perform his ministerial duties have been compensated for a tremendous loss of their life, liberty of pursuit of happiness with many of their lives shattered as a result of Raye’s refusal to perform his ministerial duties. The result caused “increased anxiety, mistrust, hopelessness, fear, and depression” that “[resulted] from the very thwarting of the hope that liberty will be restored through a right that the State has guaranteed — the appellate process.” (United States ex rel. Green v. Washington, (N.D. Ill. 1996), 917 F.Supp. 1238 at pp. 1277-1278.), a quote that describes not just the state of appeals in the Court of Appeals, Third District but across the United States of America generally.
It is important to take note of a subtle difference in the course of events regarding Raye’s termination. Raye’s termination did not stem from the Judicial Council’s completion of the recommendation for an investigation but from the Commission on Judicial Performance, the latter body being separate from the former. The Commission on Judicial Performance, whose name is not mentioned in the Supreme Court of California’s order for a recommendation to investigate the delays, responds to complaints, whereas the Judicial Council is largely responsible for forms the Judiciary uses.
Initially, the Judicial Council, on whose shoulders the order denying Eisenberg’s Petition for Writ of Mandate fell, declined to perform any investigation, despite the Supreme Court’s recommendation. A spokesperson for the Judicial Council recently told the Daily Journal, for instance, the following: “The language in the denial of the petition is a recommendation and the Judicial Council has not made any decision about whether it will, or even can conduct an investigation.” It is unclear whether the Judicial Council actually completed an investigation, if anything at all. It means that likely an internal struggle over how to handle Eisenberg’s Petition for Writ of Mandate ensued when the Supreme Court of California’s failure to adjudicate the “recommendation” to Judicial Council became so significant a problem to ignore, the Commission on Judicial Performance required a response, the most lenient response possible without any review of the merits of any of Raye’s decisions, compensation for the victims, or many policy changes.
It is important to note that the extreme leniency meted out to Vance W Raye, whose only punishment is to retire, underscores how the judiciary in California falls short of justice in nearly every single aspect of its existence not just in California, but especially in Sacramento, California where the Court of Appeal, Third District administers justice. In the Courts for traffic arraignments commissioners rarely, if ever, consider an indigent, unrepresented, litigant in propria persona, siding the vast majority of the time with police, sheriffs, or highway patrolmen or any representative of law enforcement. In small claims courts judges pro tem collude with local attorneys to upset, delay, obstruct, impede, upbraid, or deny litigants their rights. In landlord tenant matters, the ruling elite of Sacramento’s own landlord attorney, Gary Link, presides over evictions where less than 1% file answers to be heard. In criminal cases, the Office of Public Defenders–close to the District Attorneys’ office, offer services prompting criminal defendants to file Marsden motion after Marsden motion for the appointment of new counsel. The prosecution, for instance, refuses to provide exculpatory evidence, causing defendants to suffer Brady, lest they proceed without effective counsel.
The judiciary in California, and California as a whole, is beginning to collapse, however, under the tremendous weight of social, economic, and political upheaval in the face of double digit inflation, the rising cost of fuel (at $10 a gallon in certain areas) and working people are becoming increasingly dissatisfied with and upset at systematic and systemic failures throughout not just the judiciary but the entirety of the branches of government in California. A rising strike wave not just in California but across the entire United States of America underscores the dire need for working people throughout Sacramento, California and the U.S.A. to take heed of a pressing demand for strong leadership.
The Left Opposition encourages and recommends that working people reach out to become involved in that leadership and seeks declarants, sympathizes and or assemblers for declaring the abolishment of a form of government, sympathizing its abolishment, or assembling on behalf of a petition to abolish forms of government that are destructive to life and liberty. Join today the Left Opposition today.