Judge Rodolfo Delgado of Corpus Christi; charged with bribery

The state of Texas presented Rodolfo “Rudy” Delgado with a law license in 1981after he graduated from the University of Texas School of Law.

The State Commission on Judicial Conduct found Rudy guilty of the following misconduct.

In 2018, a federal grand jury in Houston indicted Rudy, then-93rd state District Court judge, on three counts of bribery and three counts of violating the Travel Act connected to cash bribes he allegedly accepted from an attorney working as a federal informant.

According to the indictment, an attorney paid Rudy $6,020 in exchange for personal recognizance bonds favoring his clients, who were subsequently released from jail as a result of the bribes.

Subsequently, Rudy pled not guilty to six felony accounts that included conspiracy and obstruction of justice charges. Federal prosecutors claimed that Rudy sent a text message to the federal informant after he accepted an envelope containing 75 bills to divert the ongoing investigation. In the text, Rudy claimed he was unaware the envelope contained $5,500 in cash instead of a check made to his appeals court campaign.

While Rudy awaits a trial on his multiple felony counts, he has been suspended from hearing any cases, but can remain on the court without pay. This scenario only further proves just how asinine the judicial discipline system operates in Texas.

All that remains now is to see how long it takes for Rudy to cop a plea in order to reduce the amount of time he’ll have to spend locked up at the United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas.

As we speak (ca. June 2019), Rudy continues to sit as a judge on the 13^th Court of Appeals in Corpus Christi, Texas.