Chief Judge Allie Greenleaf Maldonado (left) is pictured with Cultural Resource Advisor Anthony Davis of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians. Maldonado is one of the contributors to the new book ‘Tough Cases,’ which deals with a variety of difficult decisions faces by judges across the country.
– Photo by Cynthia Price
By Cynthia Price
Legal News
Should a judge who has reached a controversial decision, but one that is grounded in the facts of the case, reconsider in the face of public and legislative opposition?
Does a judge who repeatedly makes decisions to prevent maternal visitation for a young child whose well-being was threatened by her mom’s rare mental illness have any obligation to the mother herself?
What is required of a judge when a defendant refuses an insanity plea recommended by her court-appointed lawyers, and eventually a jury trial and even an appeal?
And when a young person seems irretrievably enmeshed in addiction and the drug culture, but then upon receiving a second chance fails to comply with the court’s order, should he or she be given a third or even a fourth chance?
The final question is the one that faced Chief Judge Allie Greenleaf Maldonado, of the tribal court for Michigan’s Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians.
The public is privy to what went through her mind and why she decided as she did because the dilemma is a chapter in the new book “Tough Cases: Judges Tell the Stories of Some of the Hardest Decisions They've Ever Made,” edited by Russell F. Canan, Gregory E. Mize, and Frederick H. Weisberg.
The book includes a wide variety of difficult decisions faced by judges throughout the country, divergent in subject matter, geographic location, and ethical approaches.
Maldonado said she was approached because the editors were looking for someone who had faced a tough case in the tribal courts.
“I participate in a Casey Foundation think tank on how we can reduce the number of Indian kids in foster care by 50 percent. The Casey Foundation” — for which Maldonado has high praise — “brought together a group who they feel represent forward thinkers and invited them to imagine a different future,” she said. “I got to meet some really terrific people, and I guess my name came up when these editors reached out.”
Maldonado’s chapter weaves together the story of her mentor and the significance of cleansing a soiled white eagle feather (an important symbol in the Native American community) with the case of Salmon Running, the pseudonym of a 21-year-old addicted woman who brought drugs back to the Indian community.
After Maldonado granted Salmon Running a personal recognizance bond, she fled.
When she was caught, the judge had to decide whether to trust that her remorse was real and overrule the team at the court’s Waabshkii Miigwan Healing-to-Wellness program who had rejected Salmon Running.
Maldonado surprised everyone by sentencing Salmon Running not to jail time, but to probation with stringent conditions.
Then, after a month, Salmon Running failed probation.
But Maldonado again went with her heart and ordered the young woman into the Waabshkii Miigwan program.
Ultimately, Salmon Running turned her life around.
“She’s still doing well,” said Maldonado. “This case was very impactful for me. It was a case that has helped me give other people a chance where maybe I wouldn’t have before.”
All three of the editors have chapters in the book as well.
Weisberg tells of a mother who had apparently murdered all four of her children and then remained in the house with them for a minimum of three months.
The judge’s dilemma was that the defendant declined first an insanity plea and then a jury trial; his ruling that she was competent to make such declinations brings the expected result that she was convicted.
Mize writes about the fate of a child, Jenny, whose mother, undergoing divorce, was diagnosed as having the very rare Munchausen’s Syndrome by Proxy, in which a caregiver continually causes illness in her loved one.
As Jenny recovered from her sickness and thrived after being placed with her father, Mize refused for years to allow the mother visitation rights. He wondered at the time whether his decision was really
in the child’s best interests – especially when the mother died mysteriously, possibly by suicide.
The judge reached out in later years to find that Jenny had blossomed into a fine young woman who was grateful for his intervention.
Additional chapters touch on the Terri Schiavo end-of-life case, the politically-charged L. Lewis “Scooter” Libby case, and the Cuban child custody case of Elian Gonzalez.
The book, published by The New Press, can be purchased through Barnes and Noble and Amazon, among others.
––––––––––––––––––––
Subscribe to the Legal News!
http://legalnews.com/Home/Subscription
Full access to public notices, articles, columns, archives, statistics, calendar and more
Day Pass Only $4.95!
One-County $80/year
Three-County & Full Pass also available
