Judge Diane Goodstein of St. George, SC; ethical goblin  

The State of South Carolina presented Diane Schafer Goodstein with a law license in 1981 after she graduated from North Carolina University School of Law.

The South Carolina General Assembly was duped into electing Diane to the position of Resident Circuit Judge for the First Judicial Circuit in May 1998. Diane didn’t win the election because she was the most qualified attorney in the greater Orangeburg area. She received the vote because she had proven to be a reliable lackey for the local political hacks.

In 2008, attorney David Flowers filed an ethics complaint against Judge Goodstein. In his formal complaint, he alleged that Diane colluded to award a family friend, attorney Larry Richter, who represented all victims in the class action exorbitant attorney’s fees of $2.5 million that limited payouts to clients who had been sexually abused by members of the clergy. (Joseph Cranney and Karim Doumar, The Post and Courier)

As a circuit court judge, Diane presided over the sexual abuse case involving the Catholic Diocese of Charleston. Mr. Flowers represented one of the victims in the case. Mr. Richter’s billing records suggested that lawyers in his firm worked more than 24 hours on single days. In fact, one of his attorneys claimed he had worked 92 hours on January 10, 2006. Kind of gives a new meaning to the term “workaholic.”

Subsequently, the enablers for Judicial Misfits sitting on the Commission on Judicial conduct tossed out Mr. Flowers’ complaint and did so without offering him any explanation of any kind. In truth, they simply told him, as they do anyone filing ethics complaints against South Carolina judges, “Up yours, Dave!)

Over the past twenty or so years, no judge in South Carolina has ever been found guilty of engaging in unethical and/or incompetent behavior. This unbelievable statistic makes Ivory Soap’s claim of being 99% is laughable at best. Moreover, it makes one believe that in comparison to the Ethical Purity of South Carolina’s judiciary, Ivory Soap is very unclean.

If the South Carolina Judiciary was really interested in exposing Judicial Misfits, it would not engage in blanket secrecy of their proceedings. Additionally, the makeup of the Judicial Commission guarantees favorable outcomes since of the 26 members, 14 are judges (majority) and 4 are attorneys.

Following the crass and unbelievably biased makeup of the Judicial Commission that results in no findings of misconduct would be the same if the South Carolina Legislature passed a law along the following lines in cases involving child molestation or claims of pedophilia.

• Jury limited to male members only
• All 12 male members of criminal jury required to be convicted child molesters

Now, Boys and Girls, do you think there would ever be a finding of guilty by this type of jury involving child molesters or pedophiles in South Carolina? My bad, stupid question, right?

As we speak (ca. May 2019), Diane continues to sit as a circuit court judge for the First Judicial Circuit in St. George, South Carolina.