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Sunday, May 04, 2008
Ind. Courts - "Courtenay Scott case could decide Democrat nominee" in Vigo court race
Deb Kelly reports today in the Terre Haute Tribune-Star in a lengthy story which includes these quotes:
The two Democrat candidates for judge of Vigo Superior Court Division 5 agree on almost everything except how the incumbent handled a single, contentious case in 2004.See also this ILB entry from Feb. 15, 2008.Judge Barbara Brugnaux, who has been in the office for 14 years, is running against Dr. Michael Rader, a medical doctor and practicing attorney who hopes to unseat her in the primary.
Brugnaux was elected to Division 5 in 1996 and again in 2002 (after serving as temporary judge of the court from 1994 to 1996).
Rader, who practiced medicine for 30 years before earning his law degree, most recently has been serving as a public defender in Vigo County.
He has been practicing law for a little more than 10 years. * * *
Brugnaux, the first female judge in Vigo County, has faced harsh criticism for her decision to accept a plea agreement in a case involving the death of a toddler.
The case was against ex-daycare provider Courtenay Scott, whose actions resulted in the death of 2-year-old Alexis Williams on May 22, 2002. A special prosecutor from Vanderburgh County recommended Scott spend no time in prison. Brugnaux accepted the agreement, and Scott was sentenced to two years probation for reckless homicide, a class-C felony.
Rader, in recent advertisements, has criticized what he calls Brugnaux’s “misunderstanding of the law.”
Rader pointed to one sentence in a letter Brugnaux sent in February to 7,000 Democrats in Vigo County, in which she stated, “It is a judge’s duty to review the terms of [the plea] agreement and accept that agreement if it complies with the law.”
He said that is the statement that concerns him. “That is an incorrect statement of the law,” he said. He added that the statement implies that Brugnaux thought she had no choice but to accept the plea agreement that was offered.
“That’s why I said [in an advertisement] I thought her decision was ill-considered,” Rader said. “If it’s based on this misunderstanding of the law, then it was ill-considered.” * * *
In a more recent interview, Brugnaux said she objected to Rader’s ad, specifically to the part that stated that “I implied that I had no choice. Because that’s just flat-out not true,” she said. “I never said that I did not have a choice, I clearly had a choice; I had the opportunity to see the evidence, which Dr. Rader did not, and I made my decision based on that.”
Posted by Marcia Oddi on May 4, 2008 10:47 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts