Unlike the federal judiciary, Maryland has a process for selecting judges that greatly depoliticizes the process and ensures that judges are well qualified. Governors must select judges from a short list of applicants vetted and recommended by judicial nominating commissions. This greatly reduces polarization in the judiciary.

Circuit Court judges appear well down on the ballot, and it is easy for this race to get lost among the many officials we elect. But I strongly encourage you to mark your ballot for all four of the sitting judges: Carlos Acosta, Theresa Chernosky, Kathleen Dumais and Rachel McGuckian.

It is especially urgent that you do so because one of the challengers, Marylin Pierre, is a perennial candidate who would be a very poor choice. In 2020, her opponents were granted a temporary restraining order against her and her campaign surrogates.

Earlier that year, Pierre showed a basic misunderstanding of the judicial process when she tweeted “Lock em up’and then the burden of proof is on them to prove that they are not guilty of ‘contributory negligence an involuntary manslaughter “ [sic].

Bizarrely, this self-styled progressive candidate has also donated to Republicans and promised she would be a “’law and order’ judge who would be tough on bail” at the Montgomery County Republican Convention in 2018.

Now, the Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland has filed a petition for disciplinary or remedial action against Marylin Pierre in the Court of Appeals. The petition documents how Pierre:

knowingly and intentionally misrepresented her experience, including how often she appear in court, the number and type of cases she handled, the number of cases she tried to verdict or judgement, and the number of jury trials she handled.

The complaint further shows that Pierre failed to disclose information about her 1996 detention by the Sheriff’s office for failure to attend a show cause hearing in a case against her. She was released several hours later after posting $500.00 bond. While she mentioned the incident in her 2012 questionnaire, she omitted it in responding to a direct question that should have elicited the information in seven questionnaires she filed after 2012.

I have posted the full complaint below but you can also find it by clicking here.