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Moore Suspended For Ten Days
Judge's Refusal To Move Ten Commandments Monument Led To Ethics Complaint
POSTED: 5:43 p.m. CDT August 22, 2003UPDATED: 5:54 p.m. CDT August 22, 2003
MONTGOMERY, Ala. -- Chief Justice Roy Moore has been suspended for ten days pending outcome of an ethics complaint for defying a federal court order to move Ten Commandments monument.
When Moore opposed moving the Ten Commandments monument earlier this week despite a court order, plaintiffs in the case immediately filed a complaint with the Judicial Inquiry commission.
A complaint was filed at 5:01 p.m. with the court of civil appeals in Montgomery, automatically triggering the suspension. Moore will be paid while on suspension.
Alabama's Chief Justice Roy Moore has been suspended pending the outcome of an ethics complaint over his refusal to obey court orders to remove a Ten Commandments display from a public building. (ABCNEWS.com)
From Wire Reports
Aug. 22 — Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore was suspended today pending the outcome of an ethics complaint for his defiance of a federal court order to move a Ten Commandments monument from the state judicial building in Montgomery.Moore was automatically suspended with pay this afternoon when the nine-member Alabama Judicial Inquiry Commission referred the ethics complaint against Moore to the Court of the Judiciary. The Court of the Judiciary holds trial-like proceedings and can discipline and remove judges.
Moore has 30 days to respond to the suspension order.
On Thursday, his fellow state Supreme Court justices overruled Moore and directed that his Ten Commandments monument be removed from its public site in the Alabama Judicial Building.
The senior associate justice, Gorman Houston, said the eight associate justices instructed the building's manager to "take all steps necessary to comply … as soon as practicable."
Moore, however, remained defiant, telling a news conference Thursday he would continue his fight for what he called the "constitutional right to acknowledge God."
He said he would appeal again to the U.S. Supreme Court, which had previously ruled that the monument should be removed. Some of his supporters have vowed to fight any plan to remove the monument through civil disobedience.
