Sheriff Joe faces off with judge over deputy's courtroom document theft

There aren't too many ways to evoke sympathy for a law-enforcement officer who was recorded stealing documents from a defense attorney, but in Arizona, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Gary Donahoe may have stumbled on the trick. In the case of Detention Officer Adam Stoddard, who was caught by a security camera swiping documents in a courtroom from defense attorney Joanne Cuccia while her back was turned, Judge Donahoe found the offending officer guilty of contempt. But rather than slap Stoddard with an adult penalty for an adult crime, he channeled his schoolyard days and ordered the officer to make a public apology -- and probably violated his rights in the process.

The problem is, while it may lie within the power of kindergarten teachers to order their charges to voice insincere sentiments to one another as a means of settling disputes, that's not a widely accepted use of, admittedly far-reaching, judicial power. Judges can fine people and toss them in the can, but ordering them to state predetermined opinions would seem to run afoul of First Amendment protections.

In Stoddard's case, Judge Donahoe had already dismissed as unacceptable the officer's claim that the reason he grabbed Cuccia's documents and photocopied them was because he saw a few suspicious words on the page. The documents clearly were covered by attorney-client privilege, he ruled. Yesterday, he found Stoddard guilty of contempt for his sticky-fingered grab at confidential information. Penalties for contempt usually consist of fines or imprisonment.

But ... as we've come to know, judges often hold police officers to be a somewhat higher breed of human than the rest of us. That's the best guess as to why Judge Donahoe decided to get creative in this case. Rather than deplete Stoddard's bank account or subject the officer to the shoddy prisons run by his own boss, the judge ordered a public, but meaningless, display of faux regret: a press conference to be held by November 30, at which a verbal and written apology is to be expressed by Officer Stoddard. If Ms. Cuccia is satisfied, the matter is then laid to rest.

After which, presumably, milk and cookies are to be served to all.

But the judge made a big error: Adult transgressor aren't toddlers; you can't make them voice opinions they don't hold, even when trying to do so seems to constitute a much lighter penalty than the alternatives. And Stoddard clearly isn't sorry, and neither is his grandstanding boss, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who has already announced that the officer won't comply with the order, saying in a press release, "My officer was doing his job, and I will not stand by and allow him to be thrown to the wolves by the courts because they feel pressure from the media on this situation." He added, "I decide who holds press conferences and when they are held regarding this Sheriff's Office."

Having stepped off on the wrong foot, Judge Donahoe is now back to what he should have done to begin with: handing Officer Adam Stoddard an adult penalty for violating attorney-client privilege and interfering with the rights of criminal defendants in the courtroom.