Aug. 6 (UPI) — A Black man who was sentenced to more than 10 years in prison on drug trafficking charges had his conviction vacated Friday after it was revealed the White judge who oversaw his case said he “looks like a criminal.”
The U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals vacated the case of Leron Liggins, who was sentenced to more than a decade in prison in March 2022, court records show.
“This guy has got my attention, Mr. Arnone. What do you want me to do? This guy looks like a criminal to me,” U.S. District Court Judge Stephen J. Murphy, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, said during a January 2020 hearing related to the case.
“This is what criminals do. This isn’t what innocent people, who want a fair trial do. He’s indicted in Kentucky. He’s indicted here. He’s alleged to be dealing heroin, which addicts, hurts and kills people, and he’s playing games with the Court. Do you agree?”
The three judges on the appeals panel — Andre B. Mathis, Karen Nelson Moore and Eric L. Clay — agreed that Murphy’s remarks were disparaging and that it was “troubling” that the federal judge had said Liggins “looks like a criminal.”
“The government assures us that this remark referred only to Liggins’ conduct, and not his appearance. But this Court cannot decide what the district judge meant by his remark. Rather, we review only the remark that the district judge made,” the appeals court said in its opinion.
“And regardless of the district judge’s intended meaning, we must consider the interpretation that a reasonable observer of this public hearing could have made, for we must guard against not only actual bias but also the appearance of bias.”
The appeals court has ordered a new trial to be held in the case assigned to a different judge.
