Judge Suspended Without Pay for Nonconsensually Touching Worker

A judge in Massachusetts who reportedly touched a court worker without consent at a court-sponsored event will be suspended without pay while the executive and legislative branches consider further action, the state’s top appellate court ruled on Wednesday.

Probate and Family Court Judge Paul M. Sushchyk was accused by a field coordinator for that court of inappropriately touching her at the Probate and Family Court’s annual spring conference.

The Commission on Judicial Conduct found that Sushchyk had engaged in an intentional and unwelcome touching of the unnamed complainant, and recommended a public censure and a suspension without pay while the other branches consider whether Sushchyk should be removed from office.

Sushchyk challenged the sufficiency of evidence showing he touched the complainant, but the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts found that there was “sufficient circumstantial evidence” to show with a high probability that the judge touched her. The court also noted that Sushchyk had previously created and submitted a “fictional version of events” in which he admitted touching her but said it was unintentional.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court also accepted the commission’s recommendation to suspend Sushchyk for “a reasonable time to permit the executive and legislative branches to consider, if they wish, whether he should retain his judicial office.” The court didn’t choose to publicly censure him because the objective of that sanction has effectively been accomplished by its order.

Sushchyk is represented by Bowditch & Dewey.

Representatives for Sushchyk didn’t immediately return Bloomberg Law’s request for comment on Wednesday.

The case was before Chief Justice Kimberly S. Budd and Justices Frank M. Gaziano, David A. Lowy, Elspeth B. Cypher, Scott L. Kafker, Dalila Argaez Wendlandt, and Serge Georges Jr.

The case is In re Sushchyk, Mass., No. SJC-13077, 3/23/22.