The Verdict Is In

One relishes her reputation as a black-robed Terminator. Another comes off as a camera-loving blowhard. A third is the judicial equivalent of the Homecoming Queen.

We wanted the inside dirt on Cuyahoga County's Court of Common Pleas judges, so we went to the people who deal with them every day: lawyers. We mailed questionnaires to more than 550 attorneys. Knowing that professional courtesy and common sense might prevent honest appraisals, we granted respondents anonymity. "All of us are terrified," one attorney later confessed. "If they found out who we were, we'd all be ruined."

Predictably, the Ohio State Bar Association got its panties in a knot. "Scene magazine is asking lawyers to characterize judges, officers of the courts we are duty bound to respect . . . in highly prejudicial ways," OSBA President Keith Ashmus blustered in an e-mail to lawyers, advising them not to participate in our catty little story.

Which only prompted more attorneys to ask for the survey. The final tally exposed deep dissatisfaction with the current crop of Common Pleas judges.

"Universal belief [is] that current bench is least talented and deserving of the past 25 years," one attorney wrote.

"The bench is at an all-time low based on their experience, intelligence and maturity," wrote another. "Most of the judges are political slime and lack the necessary practical experience to ever become good judges."

A third wrote: "Thank you for doing this. You have no idea what it's like to practice law in front of these morons."

The Hanging Judge:
Kathleen Sutula
Pity the defendant who lands on the docket of Kathleen Sutula, Cleveland's own Queen of Mean. "She thinks she's got to be Miss Law-And-Order and doesn't really have much compassion in her entire being, even on cases that merit a little consideration," said one defense lawyer. "I think it's just part of her whole persona. She's not a very happy human being."

Since joining the Common Pleas bench in 1991, Sutula has become known for meting out harsh sentences. A November 1993 cover story in Cleveland Magazine dubbed her "a criminal's worst nightmare" -- a designation she was only too happy to accept. "I'm proud to serve in that capacity," she said. "Crime victims have enough nightmares."

Whether ignoring a plea deal worked out by prosecutors, so that she could give a molester the maximum, or promising to lobby the parole board to ensure that a murderer never sees freedom, Sutula lives up to her harsh reputation. In 1996, she sentenced a woman who'd extorted money from her child's sexual abuser to 43 to 85 years -- a sentence many times longer than the abuser's 5 to 25 years.

Sutula has stuck by her lock-'em-up-and-throw-away-the-key approach, even at the risk of personal safety. In April 2001, someone shot up her Seven Hills home. "I've been on the bench for 10 years," Sutula said. "You think some people don't hate me for putting their brothers or their husbands away?"

Some scoffed that she was using a random act of violence to enhance her reputation, but last week sheriff's deputies arrested a man who stands accused of paying a pair of Hell's Angels $35,000 to kill Sutula. Two months before the shooting, Sutula had sentenced the man to 33 months in prison for a drug crime. Now, if he's convicted, he's likely to be in prison for much, much longer.

The Bleeding Heart:
Thomas Pokorny
If the Statue of Liberty ever needs a day off, she might call Thomas Pokorny. Lawyers say he has a soft spot for the tired, the poor, and the huddled masses yearning not to get life sentences.

Take the case of Cynthia Kline. She fought a six-year battle with Parma after a ticket for evading a police roadblock. Other judges might have wearied of her extended legal tantrum. Not Pokorny, who said the system should share the blame. "It's a situation where it's extremely difficult for a lay person to get through the quagmire here," he said.

Attorneys say Pokorny is one of "the real gentleman of the bench." He's "fair to all" and "truly understands human weakness and tries to help."

Pokorny staunchly advocated for drug court, laid into police and prosecutors for bungling a 1984 murder inquiry, and was among two judges who rescinded approval for the County Prosecutor's budget in 2002, when William Mason tried to finagle $2.6 million more than the $18.8 million he had been promised by county commisioners.

"A lot of the judges will sometime side with the county prosecutor office," says one lawyer. "But he'll demand, as [judges] should, that [prosecutors] do prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. Period. And he has the cojones if they don't to call it like it is. He's judicial integrity personified."

Least Efficient:
Jose Villanueva
Lawyers must have the memories of elephants, because Villanueva can't shake his reputation as the judicial equivalent of Zydrunas Ilgauskas on a fast break.