The director of the state Judicial Qualifications Commission argued during a hearing on Wednesday that Habersham County Chief Magistrate Gerald Johnson should be removed from the bench. Director Charles Boring made the recommendation at the end of a day-long hearing before a three-member commission panel in Cobb County.
The Georgia Supreme Court suspended Johnson with pay in October 2021, for alleged ethics violations stemming from a domestic dispute at his home three days prior. He’s been sidelined ever since, accruing at least $86,000 in salary payments from the county.
Wednesday’s proceeding marked the final hearing in the JQC case against the former career law enforcement officer. Johnson was an investigator with the Habersham and Rabun County sheriff’s offices before he became chief magistrate in July 2014. He’s up for reelection in 2024 and his attorney, Dennis Cathey of Cornelia, asked the panel to reinstate him before then. Cathey proposed an additional six-month suspension without pay.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney presided over Wednesday’s hearing. Also on the panel are former Dekalb County Judge Dax Lopez and Atlanta attorney Richard Hyde. It will be up to them to make a recommendation to the state supreme court for a final decision on Johnson’s judgeship.
“Extremely embarrassed and ashamed”
On Wednesday, a contrite Johnson appeared before the panel inside a courtroom at the Cobb County courthouse. “I’m extremely embarrassed, ashamed, and full of guilt that I’m here in front of you and this honorable panel over these circumstances,” he said.
Johnson testified for several hours about the events of October 18, 2021, that led to his suspension.
He told the panel he was depressed after experiencing a series of personal setbacks. Johnson said he was drinking heavily that night trying to muster the courage to kill himself. His wife was drinking, too, and the two of them got into an argument. When she got into the car to leave, Johnson said he broke the windshield trying to stop her.
Later, standing on their back porch intoxicated, Johnson said the noise from barking dogs and a loud car engine got to him and he fired nine rounds from an AR-15 into the ground. A neighbor heard the shots and called 911. A Habersham County Sheriff’s deputy, who is also a friend, knew the judge lived in the neighborhood and went to Johnsons’s house to ask if he’d seen or heard anything.
Boring told the JQC panel that when Johnson opened the door, he pointed the AR-15 at Lt. Travis Jarrell and said, “I didn’t call no law.”
Cathey characterized the encounter differently, saying the deputy arrived at Johnson’s home with “no lights, no siren, no announcement; he opened the door and Judge Johnson was there with his gun.”
“What he did opening his own private home to somebody he didn’t know with a gun in his hand is not a crime,” Cathey said.
Johnson recounted what happened next.
“What I remember is watching Travis run back down the sidewalk toward the driveway and it occurred to me I had frightened him,” Johnson said. “I did not have any idea I had pointed a gun at anyone until the sheriff came to talk to me several days later and he told me that I did.” He added, “I would never hurt law enforcement.”
Later, in a striking moment of candor, one of many shared from the stand, Johnson said, “My intention was to shoot myself and I used alcohol as the vehicle to get the courage to do that. My goal was to not be here today.”
The damage is done
The sheriff’s office did not arrest Johnson, prompting allegations of favoritism and undue influence. However, at the outset of Wednesday’s hearing, Boring and Cathey announced they had agreed to drop one of four counts against Johnson that alleged he tried to use the prestige of his office to serve his own interests when he asked Lt. Jarrell to turn off his recording device.
While Johnson was never arrested or charged, Habersham County Sheriff Joey Terrell did report the incident to the JQC which, ultimately, led to Wednesday’s hearing. Mountain Judicial Circuit District Attorney George Christian turned the matter over to the Hall County DA for an impartial investigation. No criminal charges have been filed.
Clinical psychologist Robert Obst of Sandy Springs followed Johnson on the stand. He testified that Johnson’s thinking was “compromised” on the night of the incident because of alcohol and depression.
“His thinking was blurry and distorted that night and his judgment was impaired,” Obst told the panel. Asked by Cathey whether he thought Johnson could resume his duties as a judge, Obst referred to the alcohol rehabilitation and counseling Johnson has undergone and said, “He’d be a better judge today than he was a year ago.”
Still, Boring argued, the damage has been done.
In making his recommendation to remove Johnson as chief magistrate, Boring applauded Johnson’s recovery and spoke highly of him while simultaneously arguing that what happened on the night of October 18, 2021, had irrevocably damaged the public’s trust in him as a judge.
“A lot of people do know his character and would be able to parse out what happened that night with his rehabilitation and what he was before,” Boring said, “but there’s going to be a sector of the public that’s going to have that – there’s going to be that appearance of impropriety every time a sheriff’s office person comes into the courtroom where he is. You’re going to have a criminal defendant that may think, ‘I’m not going to get a fair shake because they’re friendly.'”
Judge McBurney said the panel will take the recommendations from both Boring and Cathey under advisement but did not offer a timeline for when a decision might be reached. Judge Johnson, meanwhile, remains suspended with pay, working at an area manufacturing job as he awaits the panel’s decision.
