John Devine continues to be an ethical quagmire

This guy, I swear.

In January 2022, Elvie Kingston’s dementia took a turn for the worse. The 76-year-old millionaire and longtime conservative activist was declared by a doctor to be partially incapacitated, after which she signed legal documents that removed her family’s right to make decisions about her health and finances.

Two years later, those powers remain almost entirely in the hands of a state Supreme Court justice and his wife.

Justice John Devine has said Kingston is essentially family. In public political appearances, he’s described their relationship as loving — like mother and son — and said he and others helped rescue Kingston “from a really dire situation.”

But legal experts say Devine’s control of Kingston’s trust is a clear violation of Texas ethics rules that prohibit judges from overseeing the trust or estates of non-family.

At the same time, his wife, Nubia, serves as Kingston’s legal guardian. The arrangement gives the Devines broad control over Kingston’s personal, financial and medical decisions — despite objections from Kingston’s niece and three of her friends, who say she was once close with the Devines but, in the years before her mental health declined, made it clear that she didn’t like or trust them.

“She didn’t want anything to do with them,” said Dorothea Hosmer, who said she has been Kingston’s close friend for 25 years. “So when I found out John Devine basically has control of her, I was dumbfounded.”

[…]

In August 2022, Kingston’s niece, Michelle Hartman, filed a complaint against John Devine with the State Commission on Judicial Conduct, accusing him of flagrantly violating the judicial ethics code and using her aunt’s trust for his own financial benefit. The commission declined to comment on the complaint or confirm any related investigation.

In court filings, however, Nubia Devine accused Hartman of trying to exploit her aunt’s finances. She said, under Hartman’s watch, Kingston was living in squalid conditions that posed an “imminent danger” to her health and necessitated that Nubia Devine step in.

John Devine said through an attorney that he has fully complied with all disclosure requirements as set out in the trust and under Texas law. Nubia Devine and her attorney did not respond to requests for interviews or a detailed list of questions.

A spokesperson for the Texas Supreme Court said “the court is aware of the claims involving Justice Devine and has no comment on the matter.” The court did not respond to a follow-up question about whether any exemption was granted to Devine that would allow him to continue serving in that role.

The Texas Code of Judicial Conduct states that “a judge shall not serve as executor, administrator or other personal representative, trustee, guardian, attorney in fact or other fiduciary, except for the estate, trust or person of a member of the judge’s family, and then only if such service will not interfere with the proper performance of judicial duties.”

Devine has for years faced questions about his ethics as a judge. He is one of three Republicans on the all-GOP Supreme Court who is up for reelection this year, running against Harris County District Court Judge Christine Weems.

Earlier this year, Devine was confronted by a private media firm working for his GOP primary opponent about his relationship with Kingston. He denied that he was violating ethics rules because they considered each other family. “She’s held me out to be her son for 30 years,” he said, according to a video of the exchange.

Legal and judicial ethics experts disagree. “The rules are pretty clear,” said Heather Zirke, director of the Miller Becker Center for Professional Responsibility at the University of Akron School of Law. “A judge can serve in that capacity for their own family. But serving as a trustee or administrator for a non-family member still creates the potential for a conflict of interest and serving as a trustee or administrator for a non-family member is prohibited by the Code of Judicial Conduct.”

There’s also the Pressler matter, which the story touches on later, his utter lack of objectivity, his focrd birth fanaticism, and so on. There were already plenty of reasons to vote the guy out. But if you needed one more, there you go.

UPDATE: Still want one more reason to vote for Christine Weems in her race against John Devine? OK, here you go.

Christine Weems, a six-year district court judge in Harris County running for Texas Supreme Court Justice John Devine’s seat, has been endorsed by every major Texas newspaper. But the only thing people want to know about her is her cameo in the comedy cult classic “Office Space.”

Aside from her 24-year passion for law, Weems is a self-proclaimed theater lover and even runs her own theater company with other law professionals in Houston. In fact, her penchant for acting is just as long as her law career. Her side acting gig first started when she submitted her picture on a lark to become an extra on a little movie that was filming in Austin the summer between her first and second year of law school.

That movie happened to be “Office Space” a satirical film about the work life of a group of weary individuals working in a software company in the late ’90s, written and directed by Mike Judge, of Beavis and Butt-Head and King of the Hill fame.

“I joke about how when I was at the polls in 2018 and 2022 campaigning [for district judge] and I would tell people, ‘Hey, Christine Weems for the 281st Civil District Court,’ they would keep walking and the second I yelled I was in ‘Office Space,’ half of them would turn around and come back to me,” Weems told Chron.

“I think everybody has this idea of judges, it’s not like we’re not people, but people look at you as a job and not a person,” Weems added. “I mean, I’ve been endorsed by every major newspaper in Texas, the Houston Chronicle, The Dallas Morning News, The San Antonio-Express News, but the thing that resonates with everybody was that I was in “Office Space.'”

Scroll down to see a still from the movie with her in it. That’s awesome.

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One Response to John Devine continues to be an ethical quagmire

  1. Jeff N. says:

    She’s a great judge, too. Smart, fair, hard-working, kind but tough, a community leader, and a good parent. We would be lucky to have a person like her on the Supreme Court of Texas.

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