Court website undermines comments about delay in the 3rd District

I write to address comments by three appellate specialists in the Daily Journal's January 29 article, "Complaint against 3rd District justices divides attorneys," on my recent complaint to the Commission on Judicial Performance about extraordinary decisional delay by Court of Appeal Justices Raye, Blease and Murray during the past three years.

James A. Murphy said: "I have had many cases before the 3rd DCA and have not had the same experience" (of delay). Paul J. Killion said: "I did not have a 3rd District argument last year, but had a couple the year before and neither involved any unusual delay." Myron Moskovitz is reported to have said he hasn't noticed problems with the 3rd District, but added his work in recent years has mainly been before different appellate panels.

Suffice it to say, however, that a search of the California courts website for 3rd District appearances by those three practitioners in recent years reveals a different story.

James A. Murphy's most recent adjudication by opinion on the merits in the 3rd District was in 2014. From 2012 through 2015 he's had five cases there that were dismissed without any briefing, and he's had nothing further there since 2015. Paul Killion has had two recent adjudications by opinion on the merits in the 3rd District; for one, there was a delay of four years and two months between case-fully-briefed and submission-for decision; for the other, there was a delay of two years and 10 months between case-fully-briefed and submission-for-decision. Myron Moskovitz has had one recent adjudication by opinion on the merits in the 3rd District, for which there was a delay of two years from case-fully-briefed to submission-for-decision. 

-- Jon B. Eisenberg

Healdsburg