James N. Citta, Sharp-Tongued Ocean County Superior Court Judge, Reprimanded by Discplinary Committee for Verbal Abuse of Two Defendants

James N. Citta, sharp-tongued Ocean County Superior Court judge, reprimanded by disciplinary committee for verbally berating defendants in court.

 The New Jersey Supreme Court's disciplinary committee has publicly reprimanded Ocean County Superior Court Judge James N. Citta for belittling an immigrant defendant's poor English and for comparing another defendant to O. J. Simpson during two sentences.

According to media reports, he disparaged a Mexican immigrant's inability to speak English after six years in the United States and compared a man being sentenced for attempted murder to Simpson, who as you will remember, was acquitted in 1995 of killing his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman.

The report issued by the disciplinary committee on Tuesday found Citta's remarks inappropriate and excessive despite his reputation as an effective and hardworking judge. He reportedly told the court  that the stress of presiding over emotionally charged criminal trials had sometimes caused him to "say things better left unsaid."

According to the official complaint, Citta responded by engaging “in a gratuitous diatribe about immigration and his opinion of illegal aliens” when he let loose on defendant Alex Ramirez, who appeared before him on April 13, 2006:

CITTA: Now so let me understand this. Not only do we have to let him come into the country illegally and stay here, not only do we have to provide him with public assistance, not only do we have to provide him with free health care, not only do we have to provide him with a free attorney when he gets in trouble, now he wants a bilingual probation officer, because otherwise it’s inconvenient for him.

Well I think it’s a miracle you haven’t been sent back to Mexico as a result of being placed on probation and being charged with these crimes in the first place. If it was up to me, I’d take you just as you’re dressed and bound right now and have you escorted back to Mexico forthwith and forget the prison term, but it’s not.


All I can do is send you to prison and hope that the Department of Immigration and Naturalization will scoop you up when you are released and send you back to Mexico.

In the second instance, Citta compared defendant Earl Peeples, who appeared before him November 22, 2002, for sentencing, to O.J. Simpson and “berate[d] the defendant at length:”

CITTA: You look up domestic violence in the dictionary, your picture should be next to it. The only difference between you and O.J. Simpson is he had more money and he got off for some reason in a land of fruits and nuts.

The complaint filed against Citta accused him of “creating an appearance of racial or ethnic bias.”I am well aware of the enormous stress judges perform their jobs under, but berating a defendant in such a manner is objectionable.


Photo credit:  Judge James Citta, APP.com