Michigan judge loses docket after she’s recorded insulting gays and Black people

PONTIAC, Michigan — A judge in a Detroit suburb has stopped hearing cases after a court employee turned over recordings of her using insults against gays and calling black people lazy.

Oakland County Probate Judge Kathleen Ryan was pulled from her schedule on August 27 for unspecified misconduct. Now the court administrator has come forward and said he betrayed her and secretly recorded their phone conversations.

“I just want to make it right. … I want to keep my job and do it quietly,” Edward Hutton told WXYZ-TV“And I want the people of Oakland County who come to court to be treated fairly, to have their day in court, and to have an impartial trier of fact.”

The judge did not speak to the television network, but her lawyers, Gerald Gleeson and Thomas Cranmer, said: “We look forward to defending Judge Ryan in the appropriate court.”

Michigan probate judges handle wills and estates, guardianships, and matters involving the state’s mental health laws.

In the phone calls, Ryan used an anti-gay slur against David Coulter, the county’s highest elected official, who is gay. She also called blacks in the U.S. lazy.

“I’m not systemically racist. I’m a new racist,” said Ryan, who was first elected in 2010.

It is legal to record phone conversations in Michigan if one of the parties consents. In this case, it was Hutton, who said Ryan had been calling him at work and after hours for years.

Hutton said he sent the recordings in August to Coulter; Michigan Supreme Court Chief Justice Elizabeth Clement; and other officials. Chief Probate Judge Linda Hallmark subsequently suspended her, with pay, while she is investigated by a judicial watchdog, the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission.

Her father, James Ryan, was a state and federal judge. A brother, Daniel Ryan, was also a judge.