Retired Marengo County Judge Claud Neilson has no patience with “technical violations” when it comes to the law. His disdain for some of state Attorney General Troy King’s dangerous philosophy on justice showed this week when he dismissed a multi-count indictment against a Jefferson County circuit judge.

The Alabama Rules of Criminal Procedure and state law say indictments are to be returned in an open court. Judge Neilson said, “The courtroom where the grand jury was meeting was not open to the public ... The entry doors were locked by the bailiff so that the public could not freely enter the courtroom.”

A version, perhaps, of Star Chamber justice.

The other indictments a county grand jury returned at that time were in open court.

The attorney general called the dismissal a technicality and said it didn’t prejudice the rights of the accused judge.

If not, the “technicality” certainly violated some other part of the judicial process. Perhaps it was a part that Attorney General King holds in low esteem, and disregards as a “technical violation.”

State law and the rule of criminal procedure were established for purpose, and you can bet that purpose was to protect individual rights.

Judge Neilson’s dismissal of the tax evasion and ethics violations requires the attorney general to prosecute cases by the book. But this case in its larger sense may have troubled him, too.

The attorney general has been after Judge Dan King for some time, perhaps because the judge failed to rule against video sweepstakes machines.

The investigation went on for more than a year before investigator Anthony Castaldo told the attorney general he could find no wrongdoing. In a sworn affidavit, Mr. Castaldo said the attorney general ordered him to find anything to get Judge King off the bench in Bessemer.

Judge Neilson might have seen a pattern here. Remember Shelby County District Attorney Robby Owens? The attorney general removed him from a capital case because the district attorney favored a life sentence over lethal injection.

And there is the selective prosecution of Don Siegelman that his office aided, and his weak case against former Secretary of State Nancy Worley.

Alabama’s district attorneys have had enough of Mr. King’s politics, too. They turned on the attorney general because he fails to separate his politics from proper judicial procedures.

Mr. King is an ambitious man who appears ruthless and vindictive. Cutting corners is never a good idea; embracing “technical violations” of the judicial system is dangerous to democracy.

That makes Mr. King a dangerous man who unfortunately wields extraordinary power over people’s lives.

Email This Page