Yeah. I think the clerk is trying cover the judge's error. Throwing blame to the State Police. There is nothing to say that both the police and the judge are out of bounds, and I would not be surprised in the least that the bigger liar here is the court.
I know that is a complete reversal of my earlier "don't blame the judge, he's just a rubber stamp." The reversal is based on the judge being responsible to find a basis in law for what the state police are requesting.
Everybody seems to be running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to get in front of where they perceive the public to be heading so they can declare themselves “leaders.”
IOW, par for the course with politicians.
And I understand what you were getting at about the Judge. A Judge has a reasonable expectation that Officers of the Court know what they are doing, and won’t punish the Judge by doing stupid things like making up cites. I think the State Police were hot to trot to demonstrate to the rubes they’re in charge, and this Judge is caught in the middle because he believed them. I notice they’re not being very specific about the mechanics of what exactly just happened, just “mistakes were made.”
I think there is wholesale violation of HIPAA going on here, and this story only scratches the surface.