Nome Judge Faces Accusations of Violations of Judicial Conduct

Superior Court Judge Timothy Dooley, who was appointed by Governor Sean Parnell in March of 2013 is facing  accusations of violating the Alaska Code of Judicial Conduct filed by the Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct on May 26th. Image-State of Alaska
Superior Court Judge Timothy Dooley, who was appointed by Governor Sean Parnell in March of 2013 is facing accusations of violating the Alaska Code of Judicial Conduct filed by the Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct on May 26th. Image-State of Alaska

According to the Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct, they have filed a complaint of formal charges against sitting Nome Superior Court Judge Timothy  Dooley on May 26th.

In the complaint, six examples of statements made by Dooley were listed by the ACJC as conduct by Dooley that violated “AS 22.30.01 l(a)(3)(C), (D), and (E) and Canons 1, 2A, 3B(2)(a), 3B(3), 3B(4) and 38(5) of the Alaska Code of Judicial Conduct.” The first example cited occurred on may 29th, 2013. This was only two months, three weeks after his appointment by then governor, Sean Parnell.

In that first example, Judge Dooley told the defendant during sentencing in a case, “Has anything good ever come out of drinking other than sex with a pretty girl?”

Six months later, ACJC says, during an October 29th sentencing, as he addressed the defendant, “What you have done with this young girl, it’s a strange thing, routinely done in Afghanistan where they marry 6 year-old girls. In our society, and in the society of the local tribal communities, supposed to be totally forbidden.”

One week later, in another sentencing, Dooley said of a fourteen-year-old girl, “This is not someone who was, and I hate to use the phrase,, “Asking for it,” There are girls out there that seem to be temptresses. And this does not seem to be anything like that.”

ACJC pointed out that on August 12th, 2014, during a litigation trial with “unrepresented litigants,” Dooley told those in court, “I’m gonna enforce these oaths and they’re enforceable with a 2-year sentence for perjury. And I’d be the sentencing judge. I also have a medieval Christianity that says if you violate an oath, you’re going to hell. You all may not share that, but I’m planning to populate hell.” 

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Then, according to the ACJC, eight days later, Dooley told a jury when he was inquiring if they could hear the witness in the case, “I’m sorry folks, but I can’t slap
her around to make her talk louder.” 

ACJC also said in the complaint that Judge Dooley violated AS 22.30.011 (a)(3)(C), (D), and (e) and Canons 1, 2A, and 3B(2)(a) of the Alaska Code of Judicial Conduct when he told a defendant in a criminal case that if he pled no contest he would receive a specific sentence. Judge Dooley said on September 14th, 2014, “Now I’m not permitted to negotiate a deal with you but, in the past year and a half when someone has pled ‘no contest’ to this offense, I have given them time served. And I would do that today, probably, but I can’t promise you that.”

According to the formal complaint, a response to the complaint is required to be filed within 20 days. It was served to Judge Dooley as well as his attorney William Satterberg.

The filing can be seen here.