Comments, Commenters on Judicial Misconduct Kept Secret

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The panel of judges overseeing a historic revision of federal court rules on judicial misconduct won’t disclose the public comments they are weighing in writing the new guidelines, McClatchy Newspapers reported. “I have never heard of public comments being made confidentially,” said Abner Mikva, a retired chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. This strikes me as very strange.” Legislators, advocacy groups and legal experts said the withholding would add to public suspicions about secretive misconduct proceedings. (10/26/07)