Justice Erin P. Gall of Oneida County, N.Y., faced removal from office after a judicial commission found that she engaged in a “racially offensive, profane” tirade at a high school graduation party. A New York judge who invoked her position and threatened to shoot Black teenagers at a party has resigned and dropped her monthslong fight to remain on the bench after a state commission recommended that she be forced to leave office. The judge, Justice Erin P. Gall of State Supreme Court in Oneida County, was suspended with pay from her $232,600-a-year position in July after the state Commission on Judicial Conduct determined that she had engaged in a “racially offensive, profane” tirade at a high school graduation party. Justice Gall said at the time that she planned to appeal the panel’s recommendation to the state Court of Appeals. But in a motion filed by her lawyer on Wednesday, she said she was giving up her request that the court review the matter. (…) The episode that led to Justice Gall’s ouster occurred in July 2022 as she spoke to law enforcement officers after a series of arguments and physical fights broke out when a large number of uninvited guests arrived at the graduation party. The disputes, which included Justice Gall’s husband and 18-year-old son, began when the initial party crashers showed up shortly after 11:30 p.m. and escalated after four Black teenagers arrived, the commission found. It was unclear what role the Black teenagers had played in the fighting, the commission found. The teenager who drove them there lost his car key during the skirmish. As police officers arrived and tried to clear the area, the teenager and his companions continued to look for the key, the commission found. At that point, the commission found, Justice Gall, who is white, said, “get off the property — and that’s from Judge Gall.” “I’m a judge,” she added, using a vulgarity for emphasis.
via nytimes: White Judge Who Threatened to Shoot Black Teens at Party Resigns