Judge fines himself after cellphone rings in court

LANSING (AP) -- The latest perpetrator to run afoul of a Michigan judge's ban on ringing cellphones in his courtroom is the judge himself. The courtroom of Lansing District Judge High Clarke Jr. has a sign warning visitors to silence their phones, saying they'll be found in contempt if a phone rings. Clarke was in the middle of a hearing last Friday when his own cellphone rang. So he found himself in contempt of court. "I reached in my pocket, pulled out 50 bucks, gave it to my court officer and she took it upstairs," Clarke told the Lansing State Journal. He has a receipt with a 10:29 a.m. time stamp. "Why would I treat myself any different? That would make me a hypocrite," said Clarke, who joined the bench in 2010. Clarke said he has imposed penalties for ringing phones five to 10 times since the policy began in May. In fact, he fined a defendant for a ringing phone minutes before his own phone rang. Clarke said the moral of the story was to leave the phone in his office. Published: Fri, Oct 11, 2013