The Georgia Supreme Court has dismissed appeals that sought to change the ruling against the challenge against the splitting of the Augusta Judicial Circuit.
In an opinion released Tuesday, March 8, the state’s highest court ruled that the lawsuits filed on behalf of Columbia County resident and attorney Willie Saunders and the Black Voters Matter Fund should never have even passed first base.
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The controversy began at the end of 2020 when Columbia County officials began making inquiry into splitting Columbia County out of the Augusta Judicial Circuit, which for 150 years had been composed of Richmond, Columbia and Burke counties. By March 25, Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law Senate Bill 9 which created the separate Columbia County Judicial Circuit.
A month later, a civil lawsuit filed on behalf of Saunders challenged the legality of the law, contending it violated the 1965 Voting Rights Act. In June, the Black Voters Matter Fund lawsuit was also filed. Both lawsuits filed in Richmond County Superior Court noted how the interest of splitting the counties’ court system seemed tied to the election of the first Black District Attorney, Jared Williams.
At a hearing July 12, a senior judge brought in to decide the merits of the cases after the local judges recused themselves ruled that Senate Bill 9 did not violate any constitutional provisions and was otherwise legal. That order became official the next day when the judge put her ruling in writing.
The plaintiffs appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court, and oral arguments were heard in November. In Tuesday’s opinion, the justices found that Saunders’ lawsuit was technically barred because it named the wrong defendants. The court also found that the Black Voters Matter Fund case should have been dismissed at the first challenged because the organization lacked standing.
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To be a plaintiff, one must have an injury in that a law has to have an adverse impact on the person’s rights. An association can bring suit on behalf of its members, but in this case Black Voters Matter Fund failed to show who it represented and what injury was suffered, and it failed to show the judicial split impaired its mission of voting advocacy, the justices wrote.
The judicial split was delayed, but it proceeded last year. Judges Chief James G. Blanchard Jr., Sheryl B. Jolly and J. Wade Padgett, each of whom lives in Columbia County, became the presiding superior court judges for the Columbia County Judicial Circuit. The governor appointed Bobby Christine to serve as the first district attorney for the circuit.
The remainder of the judges of the Augusta Judicial Circuit preside over Superior Courts in Richmond and Burke counties – Chief Daniel J. Craig, Ashley Wright, John Flythe, Jesse Stone and Amanda Heath. Williams remains district attorney in the circuit.
Sandy Hodson is a staff reporter covering courts for The Augusta Press. Reach her at sandy@theaugustapress.com.
