Newman’s Judicial Fitness Lawsuit Enters ‘Uncharted Territory’

Judge Pauline Newman’s new lawsuit against her Federal Circuit colleagues, who are leading an investigation into her fitness to remain on the bench, tests the boundaries of how a judge may be forced into retirement.

The 95-year-old jurist’s case is one of very few in recent memory in which a sitting judge sued over fitness or disciplinary proceedings against them, lawyers and academics told Bloomberg Law.

And even those lawsuits haven’t generated case law that would inform Newman’s quest to be fully restored to her post, said Arthur Hellman, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh.

“We’re really ...