James Johnson

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Washington State Supreme Court
Sitting justices
Gerry Alexander Charles Johnson Barbara Madsen Richard Sanders Tom Chambers Susan Owens Mary Fairhurst James Johnson Debra Stephens
Elections
Former justices
Court of Appeals
Washington on Judgepedia

James Johnson is a justice on the Washington Supreme Court. He was elected in 2004 for a six-year term in the state's non-partisan elections. His current term expires in 2010. Justice Johnson is considered conservative.

Legal Background

Johnson graduated from Harvard University with a B.A. in economics and obtained his J.D. from the University of Washington.

Legal Career

Johnson spent two years in the United States Army as chief of Administrative Services for the Ninth Infantry Division, including serving as that Division's Top Secret control officer and Dive Team commander before joining the Washington State Attorney General's Office. Justice Johnson next spent 20 years serving as a Washington State Assistant Attorney General, heading first the Fish and Wildlife Division and later the Special Litigation Division with responsibility for legal services to 25 state agencies and for major litigation involving the state. Of highest priority were elections-related and constitutional cases, many of which went to the Washington or United States Supreme Court. During that time he was national affairs liaison to the National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG) and the Conference of Western Attorneys General (CWAG), as well as a contributing editor for that Association's American Indian Law Deskbook.

Upon leaving the Attorney General's Office in 1993, Justice Johnson enjoyed a successful private practice in Olympia, where he practiced until his election to the Supreme Court. His private practice specialized in major litigation involving constitutional law, notably many of the important Initiative cases. Throughout his legal career, Justice Johnson has argued nearly 100 appellate cases in three different federal Courts of Appeal, the Washington Supreme Court and Washington Court of Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court.^[1]

2004 campaign

In the 2004 election for the open seat on the Washington Supreme Court, James Johnson raised a total of $538,908. Home builders made up the largest industry that gave to Judge Johnson's campaign with $157,405. The second largest industry was lodging and tourism with $102,000, and the third largest industry was general contractors with a total of $84,003 given.^[2]

Public disclosure

A surveillance videotape taken onboard a school bus is not exempt from the state's Public Disclosure Act, the Washington Supreme Court ruled November 15, 2007. In 2003, an altercation between two elementary school students was captured on a school bus surveillance video. On the day of the fight, the Kelso School District allowed Richard and Ginger Lindeman, parents of one of the students involved, to view the tape. But school officials later refused their request for a copy of the tape, saying it is a record of students' personal information and exempt from disclosure under the state's open record laws. In response, the family filed suit in Cowlitz County Superior Court, alleging violation of the state's Public Disclosure Act. Judge Stephen Warning found the video contained "personal information" about the students involved and therefore was exempt under the act.

But last month, the state Supreme Court reversed course and ordered the district to turn over the videotape as well as pay for the Lindeman's court fees. "This tape is not a file maintained for students," Justice Susan Owens wrote for the 7-2 majority. "It's not a student record. It's a surveillance tape . . . . So it never should have been exempt in the first place." Owens was joined in the majority by Chief Justice Gerry Alexander and Justices Charles Johnson, James Johnson and Bobbe Bridge. Justices Richard Sanders concurred, stating that "merely placing the videotape in a location designated as a student's file does not transform the videotape into a record maintained for students."^[3]

Police posing as lawyers

In May 2007, the Washington Supreme Court determined that it is allowable for police to impersonate attorneys in order to obtain evidence. In re-opening a decades-old rape and murder case, Seattle police created a fictitious law firm. On the law firm letterhead, and representing themselves as attorneys, they sent a letter to the person they suspected of the crime, inviting him to join as a plaintiff in a class action lawsuit. The suspect wrote back, believing he was starting an attorney-client relationship with the "attorneys" who were really police pretending to be attorneys. The police used DNA testing on the envelope to match the saliva from licking the envelope with semen left from the crime.

While the Supreme Court recognized that what the police did was a crime, stating "Although the police officers here were not actually attorneys, they held themselves out as attorneys, in violation of RCW 2.48.180(2)(a)," the Court then resolved the case by deciding that a person does not have any reasonable expectation of privacy in their saliva on an envelope that was mailed so the DNA evidence was admissible. The Court made the specific statement that "We find there is no absolute prohibition of police ruses involving detectives posing as attorneys in the state of Washington." The 5-4 opinion was signed by Charles Johnson, James Johnson, Bobbe Bridge, Barbara Madsen, and Susan Owens.^[4]

Same-sex marriage ban

In a 5-4 decision in July 2006, the court overruled two lower courts that had found the state's 1998 Defense of Marriage Act, which limits marriage to opposite-sex couples, violated the state constitution and its Equal Rights Amendment. Three of the justices in the majority, however, invited the state Legislature to take another look at the gay marriage ban's effect on same-sex couples. Given the clear hardship faced by same-sex couples evidenced in this lawsuit, the Legislature may want to re-examine the impact of the marriage laws on all citizens of this state," wrote Justice Barbara Madsen, with Justice Charles Johnson and Chief Justice Gerry Alexander concurring.

Johnson, along with Richard Sanders, was one of two other justices in the majority. Johnson and Sanders agreed with the outcome but more actively opposed gay marriage. Johnson wrote that the Legislature had "a compelling governmental interest in preserving the institution of marriage, as well as the healthy families and children it promotes. This conclusion may not be changed by mere passage of time or currents of public favor and surely not changed by courts."

The four justices in the minority harshly criticized the ruling, with Justice Mary Fairhurst saying those in the majority had bowed to public opinion by upholding the law.^[5]

External links

• Washington Courts: James Johnson
• Tax Foundation: Washington Supreme Court Invalidates Property Tax Limit
• Institute for Justice: Washington Supreme Court rules for Free Speech
• Supreme Court candidate Doesn't want bar rating

References