While she was on a ten-day vacation in China, the staff of a St. Louis-based judge handled hundreds of cases for her, including denying bail and issuing arrest warrants.

 

Associate Circuit Judge Barbara T. Peebles is now in trouble with her judicial peers for allowing her clerks to do everything short of banging the gavel and passing judgment in the courtroom.

 

In her absence, Peebles’ clerks, who are not lawyers, handled at least 350 cases. Using Peebles’ signature stamp, they dismissed five cases, including one for kidnapping. They also recommended at least 18 arrest warrants and continued more than 300 other cases to later dates. For the most part, the actions were taken—at Peebles’ request—by deputy clerk Whitney Tyler. According to Robert Patrick of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Tyler was already “jokingly called ‘Judge Whitney’ by some insiders.”

 

Defense lawyer David Stokely called the moves while Peebles was gone “illegal as hell.”

 

St. Louis Circuit Court Presiding Judge Steven Ohmer said the conduct of both Peebles and her clerks was “wrong” and criticized her “overall lack of management and supervision.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff