Judge in Burlington County says Christie ousted him unfairly

A Burlington County Superior Court judge who was not reappointed by Gov. Christie said Thursday that the decision to end his judicial career was unjustified.

James J. Morley, whose seven years in the job ended Wednesday, said he had been informed last week that he would not be renominated for tenure.

Had the 62-year-old Moorestown resident been renominated and approved by the Senate, which has the power to block judicial appointments, he could have stayed on the bench until he reached the mandatory retirement age of 70.

According to Morley, the governor's chief counsel, Jeffrey Chiesa, told him that Christie had concerns about his "comments and reasoning" in two cases.

Morley referred to controversial comments he made in State v. Robert Melia Jr. and State v. Donna Goebel. He said his words in both cases had been taken out of context in the press.

In Melia, Morley dismissed four counts of animal cruelty against a Moorestown police officer, saying there was insufficient evidence for a grand jury to determine whether the calves Melia was accused of assaulting had been "tormented" or "puzzled" by the actions.

Authorities claimed to have videos of Melia molesting the cows, but the state has no law against bestiality. Instead, prosecutors pursued animal-cruelty charges, which can include tormenting, beating, or even poisoning a creature.

"I'm not saying it's OK," Morley said of the alleged acts when he dismissed the charges in September. "This is a legal question for me."

In Goebel, Morley said he would not describe as a predator a 45-year-old former teacher's aide who was convicted of sexual assault for a consensual relationship with a 16-year-old student under her supervision.

Noting that the age of consent in New Jersey is ordinarily 16, Morley said the Westampton woman would not have been guilty of a crime but for her position. He sentenced her to five years in prison. Prosecutors had sought a seven-year sentence; the defense had hoped for three years.

"No objective, fair-minded, and reasonably well-informed person could read those [court] transcripts, individually or in combination, as providing a reason to deny me tenure," Morley said during a news conference at a friend's law office.

He said the decision had come as a surprise after administration officials interviewed him.

"We thank Judge Morley for his service on the bench. We understand his disappointment, but the governor has made his decision," Christie's spokesman, Michael Drewniak, said Thursday.

Christie made headlines this year for choosing not to reappoint Supreme Court Justice John Wallace Jr. of Gloucester County. It was the first time under the current state constitution that a governor had chosen not to retain a Supreme Court justice who sought reappointment.

Wallace's supporters argued that Christie's decision tainted the independence of the Supreme Court. Christie said he wanted to make over a liberal, activist court that had taken the state in the wrong direction.

Allen A. Etish, former president of the New Jersey State Bar Association, said last month that Morley was an excellent judge.

The association's Judicial and Prosecutorial Appointment Committees had determined Morley to be qualified, said Etish, who characterized him as "credible" and "succinct."

Morley said he had no reason to believe that Christie's decision about him was related to Wallace's situation.

He said administration officials had asked if he learned anything from the fallout over the Melia and Goebel cases.

"I said, 'I don't think that I said anything that was wrong,' " Morley said.

"I said, 'Maybe I should have been more sensitive to the possibility that, given the crazy and sordid facts of the Melia case, a quote could be pulled out' " of context.

"Of course I regret it, [but] not because I think I said something wrong."

Morley said that in sentencing Goebel, he merely had weighed the mitigating and aggravating factors, as required by law.

"I would not have been doing my job if I had not said that. I made it abundantly clear that what she had done was wrong and it's a crime, it should be a crime, and she has to be sentenced to prison to deter other people," Morley said.

He noted that no parties had appealed either case and added that the two cases "provide only a tiny glimpse into a career in which I sat on many thousands of cases."

The former judge will draw a public pension, and said he would be ineligible to serve as an attorney in a state-level court as a result.

Morley said he was alternately saddened and angered by Christie's decision and wanted to speak out to clear his name.