Joe Deters didn't take the usual route to the Ohio Supreme Court.
When Deters took the oath Jan. 7, he was the first Ohio Supreme Court justice in 30 years to join the court without prior experience as a judge. Deters, instead, had served as Hamilton County prosecutor longer than anyone in history, serving in two different stints since 1992, including continuously since 2005.
The Enquirer reached out to Deters and the six other Supreme Court justices to ask them. Deters declined to be interviewed. Chief Justice Sharon Kennedy declined an interview but in a statement sent to The Enquirer praised Deters' lengthy courtroom experience as a prosecutor and called him a"welcome addition to the court."
"This is the point where there's the old line in Casablanca, 'I'm shocked, shocked that gambling is going on," said Jonathan Entin, a constitutional law expert at Case Western Reserve University."Of course, there's politics going on here. That's inevitable. I don't regard this as any worse than most of the other political aspects when we elect judges."
Justice DeWine declined an interview but said in a statement to The Enquirer said he had nothing to do with Deters' appointment. Then, in January 2019, Deters hired Justice DeWine's senior staff attorney, Mary Stier, as an assistant prosecutor in the appellate division.. His wife accused him of adultery, according to court documents
The job wasn't posted, something a spokesperson for the Hamilton County prosecutor's office said wasn't unusual. But based on communications obtained by The Enquirer between Deters and his staff, the hire seemed urgent. Stier wanted to return to Cincinnati,"where I am raising my family," she wrote in a cover letter to Deters on Sept. 27, 2018.
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