Louisiana Voice

A rogue judge in Missouri had teenaged siblings ARRESTED, cuffed and STRIP-SEARCHED  by sheriff’s deputies in Farmerville in Union Parish last November even though he didn’t have jurisdiction to order their arrest, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled has since ruled.

Kadan, 15, and sister Brooklyn Rockett, 13, had refused to go with their mother who lives in California. The teens, aspiring stage magicians who have appeared in films and commercials and have performed in more than 40 countries. They finished in the Top 14 of America’s Got Talent in 2016. They claim their mother desires to sabotage their budding careers as entertainers, court records indicate.

Their parents divorced in 2009.

That didn’t seem to matter to Associate Circuit Judge ERIC EIGHMY, who held them against their will in October 2019 when they were 14 and 12 after he first confronted the children outside the Taney County courtroom after they declined to visit with their mother. The incident occurred after hours and without any attorneys or parents in attendance, which is against the law.

Eighmy was not wearing his robe, legal proceedings had concluded and the children had broken no laws, their attorney claimed in the lawsuit filed against the judge, who berated Kadan and Brooklyn and threatened to send them to a juvenile facility and foster car if they did not go with their mother.

Eighmy had represented the children’s mother as an attorney before he was elected to a judgeship. Because of that, he should have recused himself from the custody battle altogether.

Instead, he had them arrested a second time last November while they and their father were visiting relatives in Farmerville.

Judges, prosecutors and law enforcement officers enjoy qualified immunity, which is a shield against legal liability when they act in accordance with their respective job descriptions. There have been sporadic efforts to eliminate qualified immunity because of the protections it affords officials who get carried away with their jobs.

A classic example was the case of John Thompson of New Orleans who spent 17 years on death row at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola for first degree murder he did not commit. The Orleans Parish District Attorney’s office had withheld exculpatory evidence that would have exonerated Thomas and his court-appointed attorney never saw the evidence.

It was only after the Innocence Project discovered the hidden evidence that Thompson was freed. He sued DA Harry Connick and was awarded $17 million – a million dollars for each year he spent on death row. Connick appealed all the way to the US Supreme Court where Clarence Thomas was the swing vote that overturned the award, citing qualified immunity. Bottom line: John Thompson lost 17 years of his life on death row and got nothing for Connick’s deliberate actions.

The case with the teenagers is a little different in that Judge Eighmy is being sued individually and not as a judge. His removal from the case by the Missouri Supreme Court should lend strength to the Rockett children’s case.

Regardless hos this legal battle plays out, it should serve to illustrate how judges – and prosecutors – have a tendency to be power hungry, a hunger fed by huge egos. It should serve as an impetus to pass legislation to rein the growing number of abuses in places where people are supposed to be able to go to obtain justice.