I guess Michael Hecht is my fault.

The fact that Hecht was elected to the Pierce County Superior Court only to further embarrass the local judiciary can only be blamed on those of us who voted for him, right?

Now that Hecht has been convicted of soliciting prostitutes and threatening one who might have talked about it, it’s clear we must have not been paying attention.

Or perhaps it is the system that is at fault, that judges are elected by voters rather than appointed by some select body of experts, or the governor, or both.

So much blame to go around. But since dodging blame is the great American pastime, let me give it a try. We ended up with Hecht because the incumbent wasn’t worthy of another term. The only option we had was a fairly recent member of the bar who had run and lost before.

More-qualified lawyers didn’t challenge a sitting judge. They rarely do. Fear of retaliation might be part of it. But the clubbiness of the bar comes into play as well.

It’s not that lawyers don’t have opinions about judges. In 2004, a survey of Pierce County attorneys placed Superior Court Judge Sergio Armijo at the bottom. He was last among 22 judges in decision making, last in efficiency, second from the bottom in impartiality and third from the bottom in judicial demeanor.

After that, only Hecht ran against him.

In 2008 another county bar association survey was conducted. Armijo was ranked last in legal ability, last in integrity, 20th of 22 in administrative skills and 18th in professionalism.

Again, only Hecht ran against him. So a majority of county voters decided against the guy they knew a lot about and for the guy they didn’t know enough about.

So how is it that the attorneys in the county can complain – anonymously – about a judge but never offer alternatives? What purpose does it serve to give voters information via the bar survey but never give them a way to act on that information?

Hecht’s conviction will likely be used in the continuing – though politically futile – campaign to change the way Washington selects judges. Many legal experts argue that Washington should have an appointed judiciary like the federal government or a hybrid where judges are initially appointed but then face voters in retention elections.

It is not just the risk of bad judges that fuels this point of view. It is the ill effect increasingly partisan and expensive campaigns have on the integrity of the courts. Judges who have to campaign and raise money are tempted to make rulings that please supporters – something legislators are expected to do but judges are not.

In September, former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor brought her campaign against contested judicial elections to a conference in Seattle.

“It’s the flood of money coming into our courtrooms,” O’Connor said. “You haven’t suffered too much of this in Washington, but you will if you don’t think about this and change it.”

But it was O’Connor and other members of the U.S. Supreme Court who contributed to the problem with a series of rulings deregulating state judge campaigns. Most damaging was her vote in a 5-4 decision overturning state judicial canons that prevent judge candidates from announcing their views on issues that might come before the court.

“If a state has a problem with judicial impartiality, it is largely one the state brought upon itself by continuing the practice of popularly electing judges,” she wrote in a 2002 concurring opinion in Republican Party of Minnesota v. White.

While expensive and contentious elections have hit our state Supreme Court, they haven’t reached the Superior Court level. Instead we get appointed judges who usually run unopposed because other attorneys are afraid to run against them.

No wonder then, that when voters get a rare chance to jettison a weak judge they leap at the chance, even when it’s a leap of faith.

Peter Callaghan: 253-597-8657

peter.callaghan@thenewstribune.com

blog.thenewstribune.com/politics