Kick in the Pants

I will be returning to DC soon -- none too soon, for some critics -- so I thought I would shift gears and pick on my hometown judiciary. Well, not so much the judiciary as one particular administrative law judge in our Nation's capital who rains shame on the legal profession and leaves us to ponder, "Why isn't that illegal?"

This is the story of Roy Pearson's $65 million pair of pants. Judge Pearson allegedly suffered some pretty serious harm when the pants he dropped off at the dry cleaner weren't ready on time. You can judge for yourself, but I wholeheartedly agree with these letters to the editor at the Washington Post. Needless to say, I don't think Judge Pearson is going to collect $65 million. I don't even think he'll win his case. If his abuse of judicial process doesn't subject him to serious sanctions, then he'll surely garner sufficient negative publicity to tarnish his reputation and perhaps ruin his career (for which this particular pair of pants supposedly was so important). I'd settle for an old-fashioned kick-in-the-pants for Judge Pearson.