N.H. Judge Acquitted at Impeachment Trial
C O N C O R D, N.H., Oct. 10 -- New Hampshire Chief Justice David Brock was acquitted of all counts today at his Senate impeachment trial.
The vote to acquit Brock was overwhelming. Fifteen votes, two-thirds of the 22 participating senators, wereneeded to convict. The most any of the four articles got was fivevotes.
Brock, 64, smiled and hugged his tearful wife at the end of thehistoric trial, the first of its kind in state history. He was charged with making an improper call to a lower-court judge, soliciting then-Justice Stephen Thayer’s comments about apanel in his divorce case, lying to House investigators androutinely allowing justices to comment on cases from which theywere disqualified.
Early Acquittal IndicationsBrock’s acquittal seemed imminent when 11 senators indicated during deliberations they were not inclined to vote against him.
“I feel the chief is one of the great justices,” said Sen.Fred King. The New Hampshire Constitution says the goal ofpunishment is to reform, “not to exterminate mankind,” said King,a Republican. “Surely this judicial extermination is a most severepunishment.”
But Sen. Mary Brown, also a Republican, took the other side,saying, for example, that she did not believe Brock when he deniedcalling a lower-court judge in a politically sensitive case.
“I thought it was overwhelmingly obvious that he did,” Brownsaid.
The House voted in July to impeach Brock, a high court justicesince 1981 and chief justice since 1986. It is the first time a NewHampshire public official had been impeached since 1790.
Testifying last week, Brock admitted to some accusations, butinsisted they were errors in judgment or misstatements due toconfusing questions or poor legal advice — not intentional,impeachable acts.
“I never lied to the House Judiciary Committee, and I neverintentionally misled the House Judiciary Committee in itsinvestigation,” he testified.
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