CHARLESTON — Justice Beth Walker took the stand in her own impeachment trial, acknowledging she had made mistakes, expressing regret and asserting that the problems don’t merit being removed from the Supreme Court.
“I want to apologize for being here. I regret so much the mistakes I made, and I’m sorry,” she told the senators who are serving as the Court of Impeachment.
“I need to apologize to the taxpayers and to you, so I want to apologize for all of this. I believe people can learn from their mistakes. I have learned from my mistakes to be sure. I think we can restore public trust in the judiciary. I appreciate your consideration.”
Walker was the star witness on the first day of four expected impeachment trials for West Virginia’s Supreme Court justices. She took the stand for about an hour Monday morning and then returned for more than an hour in the afternoon.
So far, this trial is progressing quickly. At the end of Monday’s testimony, House Judiciary Chairman John Shott indicated he had one more witness — former Justice Brent Benjamin — who was subpoenaed to appear at 9 a.m. Tuesday, so the trial will resume then.
Once the final witness has taken the stand, each side would present closing arguments. After that, it would be up to senators serving as the jury of impeachment to deliberate and announce a verdict.
The state Constitution says the Senate has the power to remove public officials from office in an impeachment case. That requires a two-thirds majority vote. Another possibility would be censure, which is an expression of formal disapproval.
Walker, who has been on the Supreme Court since 2017, was named in only one of the 11 impeachment articles passed by the House of Delegates. That’s the fewest of any of the justices.
That article accuses all four remaining justices of failing to establish policies about remodeling state offices, travel budgets, computers for home use and framing of personal items.
Essentially, the article claims the justices failed to hold each other accountable. All of the remaining justices were named in that article.
Asked on the witness stand to describe her view of impeachment, Walker said, “I think of stealing, lying and corruption, and I don’t think I’ve done any of those things.”
But she expressed regret over the cost of her office renovations, as well as her participation in taxpayer-paid working lunches from some of Charleston’s nicer restaurants.
Walker wrote a check for $2,019 as reimbursement for one-fifth of the cost of the lunches.
“I should’ve never participated in those lunches in the first place, but I don’t believe they were illegal,” she said.
Taxpayers paid $130,654 to upgrade Justice Walker’s chambers even though they were renovated during the previous term of Justice Brent Benjamin, at a cost of $264,000.
“I regret the office remodeling. I was not a good steward of the taxpayer dollars,” Walker said.
But she said that when she moved into the office, there was hardly anything in it, just two chairs, a table and a couple of lamps.
She also described it as dark and unwelcoming. Walker said she wanted hers to be a place where people would feel free to meet.
“I wanted it to look like it belonged in a Cass Gilbert Capitol,” she said. “I was not impressed by the office that had been decorated by (now-retired) Justice Davis. I even said Cass Gilbert might be rolling in his grave if he saw that. It just doesn’t fit in this Capitol.”
Walker said she wasn’t aware of costs during the renovations, and she had no reason to be concerned at the time.
Her lawyers, Mike Hissam and Zak Ritchie, presented Walker as relatively new to the court and intent on improving its accountability.
“We are eager to present our case to you because we are confident that, at the end of it, you will see that Beth Walker did not engage in any conduct that would justify the extraordinary remedy of removing her from office against the will of the voters,” Hissam said in his opening statement.
But Walker’s lawyers also contended that there is only so much that Walker, as one of five co-equal justices, could do.
“Unlike other officials in our State Constitution, the power of a single Justice of the Supreme Court of Appeals who is not the Chief Justice is tightly constrained.”
House Judiciary Chairman Shott, making the case against Walker, suggested that although she was a newcomer to the court, she joined its culture rather than resisting it.
“Our position is she came into an atmosphere of entitlement, an atmosphere of cavalier indifference — and its also our position she was uniquely qualified to realize the absence of policies, the atmosphere of reckless spending, of lackadaisical approach to the protection of taxpayer assets,” Shott said in his opening statement.
He added, “She didn’t waste any time joining the party. She immediately became infected by the same atmosphere.”
Shott contended Walker’s own behavior continued until the court received a Freedom of Information request by Kennie Bass of WCHS-TV about the working lunches.
“Her behavior continued unabated until the light of the press,” Shott said.
Shott’s opening statement asked one prevailing question: “Did the general public receive a benefit from these expenditures?”
The impeachment trial also included testimony by Justin Robinson, who works for the Legislative Post Audits division. He described investigations into various aspects of the Supreme Court by legislative staff over this past half-year.
Sue Racer Troy, chief financial officer for the court’s financial division, spoke about the court’s policies on issues such as home offices and inventory control.
State Auditor J.B. McCuskey briefly testified about his office’s position that the Supreme Court disregarded the purchasing card policies for the lunches that would govern all other state offices.
“If we were to allow state employees to buy themselves lunch, the cost to the state would be astronomical,” McCuskey said.
