A Georgia administrative judge rejected “birther” claims and ruled Friday that President Barack Obama is eligible to appear on the state’s March 6 Democratic primary ballot.

Judge Michael M. Malihi, deputy chief judge for the Georgia Office of State Administrative Hearings, wrote in a 10-page order that he found “little, if any, probative value” of testimony by witnesses who argued that Obama had faked his identity through forged birth certificates or a fraudulently obtained Social Security number.

Malihi also criticized Obama’s attorney, Michael K. Jablonski, for skipping a Jan. 26 hearing on the matter.

“By deciding this matter on the merits, the Court in no way condones the conduct or legal scholarship of Defendant’s attorney, Mr. Jablonski,” Malihi wrote. “This Decision is entirely based on the law, as well as evidence and legal arguments presented at the hearing.”

Jablonski couldn’t be reached immediately to comment after Malihi’s decision was released late Friday afternoon.

Malihi’s findings will be sent to Secretary of State Brian Kemp, a Republican who has final authority to decide Obama’s ballot eligibility.

Malihi said that Obama met the constitutional requirement that presidential candidates be “natural born citizens” because he was born in the United States.

The judge relied on a 2009 Indiana Court of Appeals analysis in Arkeny v. Governor, 916 N.E.2d 678, of many of the same arguments, including that Obama didn’t qualify as “natural born” because only one of his parents was a U.S. citizen. Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, was born in Kansas, and his father, Barack Obama Sr., was born in Kenya, which plaintiffs say made him a British citizen.

“Parents born within the borders of the United States are ‘natural born citizens’ for Article II, Section I purposes, regardless of the citizenship of their parents,” according to Malihi’s citation of Arkeny.

Malihi said witnesses who questioned Obama’s credentials weren’t qualified or tendered as experts on birth records, forged documents or document manipulation.

“For the purposes of this analysis, this Court considered that President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Therefore, as discussed in Arkeny, he became a citizen at birth and is a natural born citizen,” Malihi wrote.

Obama was born in Honolulu on Aug. 4, 1961, according to birth documents released by his campaign and newspaper birth notices published at the time.

Gov. Nathan Deal’s Judicial Nominating Commission has released a list of six lawyers for the governor’s consideration in filling an upcoming vacancy on the state Court of Appeals:

• Michael P. Boggs, a Superior Court judge in the Waycross Judicial Circuit;
• Elizabeth L. “Lisa” Branch, a partner at Smith, Gambrell & Russell in Atlanta;
• Donald P. Geary, chief assistant district attorney in DeKalb County;
• John C. Pridgen, chief judge for the Cordele Judicial Circuit Superior Court;
• Mary E. Staley, Superior Court judge in Cobb County; and
• Benjamin W. Studdard III, chief judge of the Henry County State Court.

One of those six is to succeed Judge J.D. Smith, who in September announced plans to retire from the court at the end of this year.

Six months ago we wrote that Lin Wood–who became famous fighting for Richard Jewell, the Olympic Park security guard falsely suspected of planting the bomb he discovered–was leaving Bryan Cave to work on a whistleblower case with a small firm he was starting.

But Wood, who also has represented the parents of JonBenet Ramsey and the woman who accused Kobe Bryant of rape, hasn’t lost his touch for landing in the middle of a media circus. Today he appeared at a press conference on behalf of embattled presidential candidate Herman Cain, according to this post from USA Today.

“Herman Cain finds himself over the course of the last several days now on trial in the court of public opinion. Falsely accused,” the article quotes Wood as saying.

It’s unclear what recommendations Georgia’s criminal justice reform council will make when it submits its final report on ways to fix the state’s costly corrections and public safety systems. The council said Friday it would submit its by report by the middle of next week.

A special committee of legislators may draft bills based on its recommendations during the upcoming General Assembly.

On Friday, while the council members took turns praising each other’s hard work, they did not show agreement on all of the recommendations.

“There is not a consensus on a lot of these recommendations,” said the council chairman, Fulton County Superior Judge D. Todd Markle. “A number are controversial.”

Exactly what is recommended in the report or what may be controversial is unknown because the council is not making drafts of the report available to the public. The council also will not vote on the recommendations in the report, said Markle, though the final draft will be disseminated to council members Monday, and a teleconference is planned for Tuesday.

Discussion during the council’s last meeting Friday  at the Capitol was vague, though occasionally members gave a glimpse of what’s in the report.

State Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver, D-Decatur, said she’d like to see more revision to a provision dealing with financing of private probation services, which she said the report recommends expanding. State Bar of Georgia President Kenneth L. Shigley said there needs to be work done on parts of the report dealing with mandatory minimum sentences and “safety valves,” because there appears to be a lack of consensus on those recommendations. And Rep. Jay Powell, R-Camilla, said he believes the report needs to require funding on the front end for sentencing alternatives, such as day reporting centers, which would later be funded through savings realized when prison inmate numbers decrease.

Douglas County District Attorney J. David McDade hinted that prosecutors may be the hardest sell for the proposed criminal justice reforms.

McDade, who is a member of the council, said he has “raised the vast majority of the more strident oppositional points.” However, McDade did not say publicly what his specific concerns are.

“I don’t’ expect to prevail on every issue I’ve raised,” he said during the meeting. “On a number of points, I will obviously exercise my right to voice my opposition at the appropriate point in the Legislature.”

Markle, who was Gov. Nathan Deal’s executive counsel before Deal tapped him for the bench, reiterated that the report and future legislative action is important because the current state of Georgia’s criminal justice system is sapping resources.

“Over the next five years—if we do nothing—the cost to the state would be $264 million,” he said. He did not explain how that number was generated.

Deal, who appointed four members of the 13-member board (the remainder were appointed by the lieutenant governor, speaker of the House and chief justice of the state Supreme Court), said he will issue an executive order continuing the work of the council. Deal also said he’d like to keep as many original members on the council as possible.

DeKalb Superior Court Judge Michael E. Hancock will retire Jan. 31, 2012.

Gov. Nathan Deal’s office said he has accepted Hancock’s retirement letter, which the judge sent on Oct. 16. The Judicial Nominating Commission has not advertised for applications for the upcoming vacant seat, and the governor’s office said it is too early to estimate when the governor will make an appointment.

Hancock, who has been on the bench for at least two decades and is DeKalb County’s first African-American judge, cited his desire to move back to his hometown of Gainesville to take care of his mother and mother-in-law as his reason for stepping down in three months.

“Never in my wildest imagination, as I grew up in the shadows of downtown Gainesville, Georgia, did I ever think my future would take me on the arc that it has,” Hancock wrote in his letter to the governor. “I have always felt that a divine hand has guided me to the points of achievement that I have realized for some purpose. I humbly hope that I have fulfilled that purpose. My trailblazing days are now at an end.”

He earned his law degree from Emory University and was admitted to the State Bar of Georgia in 1979.

Hancock could not be reached immediately on Thursday.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Wendell Willard said he will introduce a bill in the upcoming legislative session that would allow non-attorneys to file information for their companies in garnishment actions.

Businesses have had “heartburn,” the Sandy Springs Republican said, following a decision by the Georgia Supreme court on Sept. 12 that said companies must use a lawyer when they answer certain garnishment actions. The ruling approved a State Bar opinion that a non-lawyer who answers for a garnishee other than himself is engaged in the unlicensed practice of law.

Businesses say the ruling will impose the expense of hiring a lawyer to fill in the blanks on a form that simply asks for an employee’s financial information. Proponents of the rule have argued that it provides more protection for consumers whose funds are at stake in garnishment actions because attorneys will be less likely to make mistakes.

Willard said his bill will be limited in scope and will still require the involvement of lawyers in any garnishment matter that involves a court hearing, filing of pleadings or other contested action.

“This will be very narrow,” Willard said. ”We’re not going to open the door wide.” 

He said he’ll work with the State Bar on his bill, and he noted that the Bar already has shown a willingness to consider a measure that would ease the burden on businesses in simple, uncontested garnishments. He said that filling out the garnishment form “doesn’t constitute filing an answer, in the sense of a pleading,” and thus doesn’t constitute the practice of law.

Willard characterized filling out the garnishment form as providing information “at the direction of a court.”

Kevin Levitas, a Georgia attorney, former legislator and vice president of Hill Manufacturing, a chemical maintenance product company, addresses the issue from the standpoint of businesses in today’s At Issue column in the Daily Report. He fears that the State Bar will “cling to their monopolistic hold over legal representation with a fierce tenacity,” and that it may require a constitutional amendment to remedy the situation. Read his column here.

Scholars at the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institution have pondered a sobering offshoot to terrorist scenarios in which large numbers of people at the White House and the Capitol are killed: what happens if the Supreme Court is similarly decimated? The answers are important, the authors say, especially if the remaining members of the government compete for control.

The 16-page report issued today has some interesting suggestions, such as this amendment to a law requiring a quorum of six justices to act on a case: “If the absence of a quorum is due to the death or incapacitation of more than three judges, and not due to judicial recusals, a majority of the surviving and able Justices may remit the appeal to an emergency interim court. Decisions of the Interim Emergency Court shall be eligible for appeal to the Supreme Court once it has achieved a quorum.”

A good idea?  Let us know. 

Georgia’s senior U.S. senator, Saxby Chambliss, is getting an award from The Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan group aimed at solving the federal deficit. The group said it is honoring Chambliss and Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, for their work leading the “Gang of Six” in proposing bipartisan changes to federal spending and tax collection.

“The leadership of the ‘Gang of Six’ this year by Senators Chambliss and Warner,” said former New Hampshire Republican Sen. Warren Rudman, a Concord founder, “stands as a model of bipartisan cooperation and compromise in confronting the difficult choices that we know are necessary to set our nation on a better course.”  

Chambliss, who practiced law before becoming a full-time legislator, will be introduced at the event by former Sen. Sam Nunn, also a Georgia lawyer who is retired from King & Spalding. Read more »

Court blocks Ala. from checking student status
GREG BLUESTEIN,Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) — A federal appeals court on Friday blocked a key part of Alabama’s law that requires schools to check the immigration status of students, temporarily weakening what was considered the toughest immigration law in the nation.

Justice George Carley announced this morning that he will step down from the Supreme Court of Georgia next July, allowing Gov. Nathan Deal to choose his successor and precluding an election for his seat for which some lawyers around the state had been planning to run. 

Just last week, Atlanta attorney Scott Bonder announced that his campaign for the high court had already raised more than $85,000. In August, Bonder and divorce lawyer Tamela L. Adkins told the Daily Report that each planned to run for court seat expected to be vacated by Carley, who had said earlier he would serve out his term that ends in December 2012.

In the same August story, Presiding Judge Anne Elizabeth Barnes of the state Court of Appeals said she was considering joining the race.

Carley said Tuesday in a press release issued by the court, “I am announcing this now to notify potential candidates before the election cycle gets into full swing.”

In unrelated news that could nonetheless interest would-be candidates for the high court, the U.S. District Court is seeking to hire a new magistrate judge to replace Judge C. Christopher Hagy, who is stepping down next June. The deadline for applications is Oct. 21, according to this link.

The Daily Report will have a full report on Carley’s announcement in its next edition, which will be online late this afternoon.

The full text of Carley’s press release is below.

GEORGE CARLEY TO STEP DOWN JULY 2012

Atlanta, October 4, 2011 – Presiding Justice George H. Carley announced today that he will leave the Supreme Court of Georgia on July 17, 2012, after all cases from the January term of court have been decided.

That means that Governor Nathan Deal will have the opportunity next year to appoint a replacement to the state’s highest court. Whoever the governor appoints will then have to run for election in 2014.

 “I am announcing this now to notify potential candidates before the election cycle gets into full swing,” the Presiding Justice said. Carley, 73, announced earlier that he did not plan to run for re-election.

When he steps down, Carley will leave the high court as its Chief Justice. The court voted unanimously last month to have him serve as the leader of Georgia’s judicial system for two months before he leaves the court. He will become the first in Georgia history to have served as Chief Justice and Presiding Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court, as well as Chief Judge and Presiding Judge of the Georgia Court of Appeals.

The Presiding Justice said that although he is stepping down from the state Supreme Court, he intends to continue being involved in the legal field. “I have loved every minute I have served,” said Carley, who has been a judge for 32 years.