O'Reilly dinged for $5,000

Sharon Coolidge reports:

A three-member panel of the Ohio Supreme Court’s Board of Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline recommended Friday that 1st District Court of Appeals judicial candidate Jim O’Reilly be ordered to stop running misleading television advertisements about his opponent and be fined $5,000.

In a 12-page written report, the panel said, “It is unseemly for a judicial candidate to simply quote or feature cleverly selected news reports, while ignoring actual court records that belie the accuracy of the news reports as the basis for conclusions about judicial ‘errors’ and ‘mistakes.’

“(O’Reilly’s) explanation that ‘reasonable voters’ would rely on newspaper articles is no excuse for his failure to look beyond the few news clippings he selected that contained sensational sound bites. As a candidate for judicial office, he has the obligation not to mislead or misinform the public about the actual facts of court proceedings.”

Chief Justice Thomas Moyer will choose a five-judge panel, possibly as early as Monday, which will review the recommendations and decide whether they should be imposed.
Recommendations that ads be pulled and a candidate be fined are rare, in fact this is the only case this year in which the board has made such recommendations, according to Ohio Supreme Court spokesman Chris Davey.

There have been about 15 to 20 cease and desist orders in races across the state since the rules were created in 1995, he said.

"I’ve worked my whole life to do the right thing, it’s been upsetting to me and my family to see my record distorted in this way," Dinkelacker said. "I hope this helps the voters to do the right thing."

O’Reilly expressed disappointment in the decision. “We continue to believe mistakes were made, we had enough information on which an ordinary advertisement would be substantiated. The standard being set here in addition to that research one should read the trial transcript.”

O’Reilly said he will no longer run the offending ad, which has been on the air almost three weeks and attacks his opponent Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Patrick Dinkelacker.
The recommendations come from a complaint, filed by Cincinnati attorney Steve Goodin on behalf of Dinkelacker, which alleged misconduct by O’Reilly. The complaint says O’Reilly’s television advertisement is false.

O’Reilly’s ad says Dinkelacker jailed an alleged rape victim, made an error that allowed Larry Flynt to go free and continue to sell pornography in Hamilton County and prosecuted the only death penalty case commuted by Gov. Bob Taft.

Goodin argued that all three claims are false and misleading, a violation of judicial canons that forbid a judicial candidate from running a television ad that is false, or if true, that would be deceiving or misleading.

“We have said all along this ad was false and the court agreed,” he said. “They flat out say these ads would mislead a reasonable person.

“We expect this sort of thing in other races but a judicial race should be held to a higher standard,” Goodin said.

Read the complaint here