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Boise Lawyer Accuses Judges of Bias

FLickr - Kevin Goebel
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https://www.flickr.com/photos/kevingoebel/

A Boise lawyer for the state of Nevada in its struggle to ban gay marriages has lodged a rare complaint against the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals - judicial bias. Monte Neal Stewart, who argued for Idaho Governor Butch Otter in that state's unsuccessful appeal on the gay marriage issue, filed a protest for Nevada against the panel of three judges chosen to hear the cases.

Over the past four years, he wrote, two judges on the three-judge panel heard nine of the eleven cases brought before the federal appeals court on the constitutional rights of gays.

The odds against those two judges being chosen at random for the gay marriage cases, he said, are 441-to-1.

Stewart knew he was treading on dangerous legal ground by challenging the make-up of the panel. But he said - quoting - the sensitivity of raising uncomfortable questions for this circuit must be balanced against the interests of ordinary Nevadans who deserve a fair hearing.

Stewart is demanding a full review by the full court before the gay marriage issue is decided.

The State of Idaho, using a different set of lawyers, also asked for a full appeals court hearing, but was turned down.

The Ninth Circuit uses random drawings to assign judges to hear cases. A lawyer who won the Nevada appeal on behalf of eight same-sex couples said Stewart's charge is - quoting - unfounded, desperate and sad.

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