On Friday, October 29, a state judicial ethics court ruled that Talladega County, Alabama, probate judge Randy Jinks would be removed from office after he was accused of making racist and sexist comments at the workplace.
According to NBC News, the choice to reprimand the magistrate comes after a hearing which took the course over several days and included witness testimony and character witnesses which Jinks’ defense lawyer provided, including former Alabama Gov. Bob Riley.
The evidence presented to the court included a recording of Jinks talking about a meme in his office amid national, racial issues, which ensued in 2020. In the recording, Jinks is heard saying, “You sons of b*****s are going to need something to burn down after Trump gets re-elected for a second term, sons of b*****s.”
“Although the complaint alleges ‘racially insensitive demeanor,’ this court is of the opinion that Judge Jinks’ conduct rose above racial insensitivity,” the court said in its final judgment, which also mandated him to pay the proceeding’s cost.
Jinks has been suspended since the spring of this year after reportedly receiving over 100 allegations initially outlined in a 78-page document issued in March by the Judicial Inquiry Commission.
The commission’s complaint details the accusations, which included racist and sexist conversations that coworkers claim Jinks initiated, including talking about pornography and other sexually explicit conversation topics.
Some of the employees claimed that Jinks, who is white, also made inappropriate comments about the death of George Floyd, the Black Lives Matter movement, Black people who came in and out of the office, and the office’s one Black employee, who is a clerk.
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“I am not saying I haven’t made some errors, but the majority of these vicious, vile, and vulgar accusations are nothing to fear,” he told WOTM-TV. “They can say what they want; they can’t hurt me.”
Amanda Hardy, Jinks’ attorney, said in a statement that her client has never been accused of being racist and added that “once he entered politics and became the first Republican to hold that office, that all changed.”
