Feiger loses appeal in case against justices

The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals has dismissed the latest of a long line of lawsuits initiated against a number of justices of the Michigan Supreme Court by Geoffrey Feiger. In a relatively short opinion, the court concluded that the suit, like several others that preceded it, was moot and could not proceed. You can read the full ruling here (PDF).

Feiger has had a long-running feud with the more conservative members of the Michigan Supreme Court. This suit was originally filed against then-Chief Justice Cliff Taylor and Justices Maura Corrigan, Robert Young and Stephen Markman. Since Taylor lost his bid for reelection in 2008, his name was removed from the suit.

Essentially, Feiger has charged that these justices, after making strong public statements against him for various reasons, have proven themselves to be biased against him and that they have overturned financial judgments won by his law firm on behalf of clients as a result of their bias.

Feiger was seeking what the court calls a “forward-looking declaratory judgment” that the justices must recuse themselves from any cases involving his law firm. But this court, like another panel from the same appeals court a week ago, ruled that the Michigan Supreme Court’s new recusal rules adequately address Feiger’s complaints by allowing a procedure by which he could have those justices disqualified from those cases.

The new recusal rules, for the first time, allow an appeal in which the other justices on the court can take a vote and force another justice to recuse themselves from a case. At the time Feiger filed his initial legal challenge over the lack of recusal, it was left entirely up to the challenged justice to decide whether they had a duty to recuse themselves.