She was not suspended for having committed a crime, but for having been ACCUSED of committing a crime. That is unprecedented.
Another fact is that the PA. Supreme Court controls testing, licensing and discipline of attorneys, totally separate from the trial system. For example, lawyers have been suspended or disbarred for alcoholism, drug addiction, even for missing critical filing deadlines and therefore costing their clients the opportunity of pursuing legal action. So in this instance, the PA Supreme Court was not acting in its capacity as the court of last appeal in the state, but as the arbiter of law licensing.
Now keep in mind, that one of the State Supreme Court Justices was forced to resign in disgrace following Kane's revelations of multiple porn/racist/sexist emails he had sent on his state owned computer to other state employees on their state owned computers. Judges are well known to circle the wagons to even the mildest public criticism of one of their own.
A lot of judges get by with outrageous behavior because attorneys know the payback for criticizing them will be long, it will be severe, it will hurt their clients and it will be applied to other attorneys & their clients in that attorney's firm. By payback, I refer to actions like denying every one of their motions at trial, treating them with contempt in front of the jury, etc. We still have a judge on the bench in Allegheny County (Pittsburgh) who called a female attorney into his quarters - which is unethical on its own - called ex parte - a judge must include all attorneys on a case in any meeting - no private meetings allowed. He then proceeded to slap a pair of handcuffs on her, as his idea of foreplay. She got hysterical, he backed off, and she reported him for an ethics violation. He shortly thereafter called a male attorney into chambers and slapped the cuffs on him, to try to prove there was nothing sexual in his actions - this was just a whacky game he played with lawyers. Nothing came of her complaint. On another occasion that same judge was the target of a joint federal investigation (IRS & FBI) re multiple charges of bribery, corruption & kickbacks. Nothing came of that either when witnesses were too intimidated to testify.
To strip an attorney general (Democratic) for the entire state of her/his law license, and effectively her elective office,solely because of a criminal action being instigated by a county prosecutor (Republican) opens up a horrible precedent.
A mainstay of our judicial system is this: innocent until proven guilty, beyond a reasonable doubt, by a jury, after full and fair airing of all evidence. Kane hasonly had some pre-trial hearings up to this point.
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This looks like its gonna be good!
