Columbus Dispatch

Today’s Ohio Elections Commission meeting is expected to be anything but routine as the panel reviews a campaign-finance complaint by judicial watchdog David Palmer against three state Supreme Court justices.

Palmer has scored several legal victories in recent years. But most of his more than 50 complaints against Ohio officials have been dismissed.

Palmer’s newest complaint says Chief Justice Thomas J. Moyer broke state law by soliciting and accepting $12,125 in campaign contributions from 21 retired visiting judges; $4,050 from 11 Appeals Court

judges; and $8,200 from the spouses of nine appointed visiting judges.

State law says no state elected official shall knowingly solicit or accept contributions from state employees whose appointing authority is the state elected officer.

Donald C. Brey, a Columbus attorney representing Moyer, said he will seek sanctions against Palmer including legal fees and costs for filing a "frivolous claim."

"He’s a frequent filer," Brey said yesterday. "We know about the ones he’s (filed) in public forums. You don’t know how many he’s done in private forums."

In the same elections complaint, Palmer said Justice Terrence O’Donnell wrongfully spent $14,137 in campaign money for legal expenses when he successfully defended himself last summer in an earlier Palmer complaint. O’Donnell’s Columbus attorney did not return a call for comment.

Finally, Palmer said Justice Alice Robie Resnick misrepresented expenses by billing her campaign $3,500 for membership dues with the National Association of Women Judges.

"The complaint against Justice Resnick is completely baseless," Columbus attorney Donald J. McTigue said. "If Mr. Palmer had bothered to check the public records at the secretary of state’s office, he would see that his charges are false."

McTigue called Palmer’s complaint irresponsible and extremely sloppy.

Palmer, a 60-year-old Powell resident who also lives in Sacramento, Calif., flew to Ohio yesterday for this morning’s commission meeting.

Palmer said he wouldn’t be surprised if commission members dismiss his complaint and sanction him.

Commission members could find no violation today or dismiss the complaint altogether after reviewing it, said Philip C. Richter, executive director of the elections commission. If the commission finds a violation it will schedule a hearing to take additional testimony, he said.

Richter said that if the commission finds the complaint is frivolous, it can order Palmer to pay legal fees and costs. But the commission has taken such action only a half-dozen times in the past nine years. "It is relatively rare (and) we can’t fine him," he said.

In September 1998, the elections commission dismissed a complaint by Palmer in which he accused Moyer of taking an illegal $2,000 campaign contribution from the wife of retired visiting judge Richard B. McQuade Jr., of Swanton. The contribution occurred about two weeks before the Supreme Court heard a lawsuit filed by the McQuade’s against ToledoExpressAirport, and Palmer cited a conflict of interest.