Latest / WCHS Network Podcasts / 04/23/2026 Ask the Lawyer with Tom Peyton

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04/23/2026 Ask the Lawyer with Tom Peyton · WCHS Network Podcasts

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Speaker 1: The views and opinions expressed on this program do not
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Speaker 1: necessarily reflect the views and opinions of five ADWCHS, it's
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Speaker 1: employees or WVRC Media. Okay, you're listening to the Boys
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Speaker 1: of Charleston, five ADWCHS. Thanks for tuning in once again
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Speaker 1: this morning, and my apologies if we had a bit
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Speaker 1: of a problem with our beginning of the show. I'm
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Speaker 1: still trying to track down exactly what happened and how much.
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Speaker 1: So my apologies if there was any portion of the
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Speaker 1: beginning of Ask the Lawyer with Tom Payton that you
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Speaker 1: did not hear, so let me just in case reset
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Speaker 1: the scene for you just a little bit. We had
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Speaker 1: some issues technically speaking, and so we're getting through the
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Speaker 1: other side of that. Tom Payton is here in studio
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Speaker 1: with us this morning bringing a special guest this morning.
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Speaker 1: It is the Honorable Justice Thomas Ewing. He is from
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Speaker 1: the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals running for reelection
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Speaker 1: and we'll get into some of the details of that
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Speaker 1: a little bit later on, but we're interested in to
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Speaker 1: meet Justice Youwing this morning via Tom Payton. And Tom,
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Speaker 1: I'll let you take just a second to reintroduce our
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Speaker 1: guests just in case there was something missing, and then
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Speaker 1: we'll let Judge Ewing take over.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, this might be a bit redundant because we're in
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Speaker 2: the technical black hole this point. We don't know what
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Speaker 2: happened for the first few minutes of the share, but
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Speaker 2: that's fine. But anyway, we got Justice Hewing here with
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Speaker 2: us today. Glad to have him. And he's a candidate
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Speaker 2: for election, which is the non parties and judicial elections
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Speaker 2: that come up on May twelfth. And he was appointed
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Speaker 2: to take the spot of retiring Supreme Court Justice Beth
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Speaker 2: Walker last year, so he's actually serving on the bench
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Speaker 2: right now, which gives us a you know, him a
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Speaker 2: perspective that not many people have running for office. But
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Speaker 2: we were talking before the break. Before going to the
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Speaker 2: being appointed to the bench on the Supreme Court, Justice
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Speaker 2: Hewing was the circuit judge in Fayette County, which is
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Speaker 2: a one one county circuit.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, so.
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Speaker 2: Which gives him a I think a different perspective than
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Speaker 2: any of the other maybe the other candidate up for action.
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Speaker 2: But we were talking about actually Justice Hewing brought up,
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Speaker 2: you know, kind of one of the reasons he was
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Speaker 2: interested in going to the Supreme court is just you know,
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Speaker 2: some of the some of the things that you face
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Speaker 2: as a as a circuit judge in a local kind
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Speaker 2: of small community because you're making all I mean, you're
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Speaker 2: making decisions on felonies, abuse, and neglect, all of which
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Speaker 2: can be emotionally charged because it involves people sometimes being
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Speaker 2: incarcerated for long periods of time, and in the abuse
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Speaker 2: neglect process, of course, it can result in parents losing
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Speaker 2: frontal rights, who you know, is right on par there
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Speaker 2: with losing your liberty and going to jail. On So
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Speaker 2: there's there's a lot of interesting kind of every things
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Speaker 2: that you don't think about that a circuit judge has
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Speaker 2: to deal with on the local level. But I'll turn
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Speaker 2: it over to Justice Hewing here for just a minute.
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Speaker 2: I don't know if he needs to reintroduce himself and
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Speaker 2: give us a little background and then we'll we'll go
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Speaker 2: from there.
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Speaker 1: Well, I got a question for you, Justice Henion. We
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Speaker 1: kind of started on this round. But one of the
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Speaker 1: things that I found interesting about it, I was doing
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Speaker 1: a little bit of reading, and you come from Fayette County,
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Speaker 1: you played basketball at Glenville State. You're a basketball player,
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Speaker 1: and you talked about that just a little bit. But
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Speaker 1: how did you find your way to the Supreme Court
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Speaker 1: from from kind of your background?
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Speaker 4: Well, it sort of a winding road, I guess you
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Speaker 4: would say. And the way I approached it was, you know,
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Speaker 4: I went to law school and I did not know
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Speaker 4: a lawyer, so it wasn't like I had a background
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Speaker 4: and knew knew what I was getting myself into.
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Speaker 3: I went to law school.
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Speaker 4: I applied During my student teaching at at at Glenville,
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Speaker 4: I was getting my education degree, planning on going back
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Speaker 4: home and probably teaching social studies, civics, you know, government
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Speaker 4: related classes, so that that's sort of my passion.
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Speaker 3: While I was interested in and in.
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Speaker 4: Coaching, but decided to pursue, you know, a application to
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Speaker 4: law school and basically had a deal with my wife
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Speaker 4: that if I got in, because she was in a
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Speaker 4: student too, so her credits would transfer to View but
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Speaker 4: not other places. So if she got it, if I
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Speaker 4: got in and we could go to WU, then I'd
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Speaker 4: go and give it a shot. So that was sort
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Speaker 4: of it was.
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Speaker 3: It was.
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Speaker 4: It was more I had an interest in finding something
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Speaker 4: I could do with social studies, political science, that you know,
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Speaker 4: the area of study that I could I could do
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Speaker 4: something besides besides teach. So that's what I had in
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Speaker 4: my mind is, you know, having a law degree would
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Speaker 4: open you know, other doors for me. I was a
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Speaker 4: lawyer for fourteen years with k Casto between Morgantown office,
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Speaker 4: Charleston office, and an office in Fedville that they allowed
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Speaker 4: me to open.
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Speaker 3: And the next.
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Speaker 4: Step would have been the Circuit court vacancy in twenty
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Speaker 4: eighteen that I was appointed to. And at that at
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Speaker 4: the time of that vacancy, I had been doing abuse
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Speaker 4: neglect appointments in Feded County with my regular civil work
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Speaker 4: that I was doing all over the state. But I
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Speaker 4: was doing those appointments because there was a large amount
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Speaker 4: of large number of those cases then and they needed help,
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Speaker 4: The judges needed help, and so they asked me to
5:07
Speaker 4: take the cases. And that was the first time I
5:09
Speaker 4: saw really what was going on with the opioid epidemic,
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Speaker 4: the drug epidemic in my community, because before I was
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Speaker 4: just driving down Route sixty every day in my little
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Speaker 4: bubble doing the civil work with the you know, around
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Speaker 4: the lawyers that in my family, so I didn't have
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Speaker 4: an appreciation of how widespread the substance abuse issues were.
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Speaker 4: Affecting the community, but taking his abuse neglect cases, and
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Speaker 4: you're sitting across the table talking to a dad who's
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Speaker 4: going to relinquish or wants to relinquish, you know, one
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Speaker 4: of those hearings NDTs, you start getting a pretty good
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Speaker 4: idea that not everybody lives the same way you live,
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Speaker 4: not everybody has the same life you have, not everybody had.
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Speaker 3: The same opportunities you have.
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Speaker 4: So I saw the opportunity as as a circuit judge
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Speaker 4: in some ways as a way to help problem solve
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Speaker 4: in the community, help not just deal with the legal issues,
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Speaker 4: but how can we know, as a judge being able
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Speaker 4: to be a leader in the court system there, how
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Speaker 4: can we handle these cases in a way to hopefully
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Speaker 4: prove the lives of children in this community and families
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Speaker 4: in the community. So that was a motivating factor once
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Speaker 4: I understood there was going to be a vacancy because
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Speaker 4: judge and Judge Hatcher actually he was the judge I
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Speaker 4: replaced there. He actually came to me and said he
6:35
Speaker 4: was going to retire a few months in advance and
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Speaker 4: asked and said he thought I should think about pursuing
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Speaker 4: the appointment because he would like to see me you
6:44
Speaker 4: know in that position. That's the first time I thought
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Speaker 4: thought about being a judge. But then motivating factor for
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Speaker 4: me was I could see the benefit of being a
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Speaker 4: judge in a small community. That said what we were
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Speaker 4: talking about earlier. The long the longer you're there, the
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Speaker 4: more decisions you make. It's sort of the blessing in
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Speaker 4: the curse. I'll look at it that way. You know,
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Speaker 4: you can impact the community at that local level, individual level,
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Speaker 4: but being a circuit judge is way more personal than
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Speaker 4: what I do now in the Supreme Court. And so
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Speaker 4: that the longer you're you're in that position as a judge,
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Speaker 4: the more decisions you made, the more relationships have changed
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Speaker 4: in the community, the more, as I said, I think
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Speaker 4: I used the word earlier, isolating it becomes. And so
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Speaker 4: that's why I was interested when the vacancy came open
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Speaker 4: for after following Justice Walker's retirement, to seek the appointment
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Speaker 4: to the Supreme Court to continue to be involved in
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Speaker 4: the court system, to continue to be able to problem
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Speaker 4: solve and make legal decisions and research and write things
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Speaker 4: that I love to do, but a little less personal.
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Speaker 1: I was doing just a little research under your background,
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Speaker 1: and you just re recapped it brilliantly there. But I
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Speaker 1: was very impressed with all of the experience that you
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Speaker 1: have in that space that you talked about presiding over
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Speaker 1: the Family Treatment Court, the Team Court, Truancy Division Program,
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Speaker 1: Adult Treatment Court, Just for Kids Incorporated recognized you as
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Speaker 1: a Champion for children last year in twenty twenty five.
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Speaker 1: I mean that that's a fantastic foundation for where you
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Speaker 1: come from, of course, but I mean you've seen a lot.
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Speaker 1: I mean that's some of the most hardest decisions that
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Speaker 1: you have to see, and the people that you have
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Speaker 1: that come in front of you, most diverse that you
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Speaker 1: could possibly see. I mean that really gives you a
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Speaker 1: pretty strong background there.
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Speaker 3: Yeah.
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Speaker 4: I think having the abuse neglect background has been critical
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Speaker 4: to me as a justice because percent of the docket
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Speaker 4: for twenty twenty five was abuse neglect appeals. So that's
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Speaker 4: still a large part of what the Supreme Court is addressing.
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Speaker 4: It's a large part of what the circuit court dockets
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Speaker 4: are across the.
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Speaker 3: You know state.
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Speaker 4: The other thing that get the perspective it gives me
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Speaker 4: is I've been in the courtroom in those cases. I've
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Speaker 4: set in the m d T S as an as
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Speaker 4: an attorney, and I've worked with the other folks in
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Speaker 4: the process, whether it's the department or the you know,
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Speaker 4: the providers, and and I understand intimately the issues that
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Speaker 4: go on these abuse and neglect cases and the the
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Speaker 4: you know, the collision points and the friction points and
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Speaker 4: the different things that lead to these cases being up.
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Speaker 3: Here on a pill.
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Speaker 4: You know, I have a I feel like a pretty
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Speaker 4: good grasp of that as long as well as the
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Speaker 4: abuse of neglect law and juvenile law in general. So
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Speaker 4: I think that's certainly something that that has given me
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Speaker 4: a leg up as a justice and being able to
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Speaker 4: have that experience and bring that to the room when
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Speaker 4: we're discussing those cases.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, just for background, you know, justice units using the
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Speaker 2: term m d T and and well that's all right.
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Speaker 2: I think that that that stands for multidisciplinary team U
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Speaker 2: because abuse neglects, as much as it's you know, kind
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Speaker 2: of an adversarial.
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Speaker 3: Process, it really is.
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Speaker 2: At least initially geared toward except for the most serious
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Speaker 2: offenses of abuse and you know, outright sexual there's certain
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Speaker 2: things where a parent is going to lose their penal
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Speaker 2: rights it's almost inevitable. But most of the cases the
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Speaker 2: court and the rules and the law is geared towards
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Speaker 2: rehabilitating parents so that they can get the family back
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Speaker 2: together and get some permanency. But there's something called the
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Speaker 2: multidisciplinary team process where basically the players it should be
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Speaker 2: the prosecutor, the lawyers for the parents, the parents usually
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Speaker 2: a Department of Health of human resources worker, maybe a
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Speaker 2: they call a costo worker, which is a volunteer who
10:53
Speaker 2: advocates on behalf the children and guard light them. All
10:56
Speaker 2: the players in the case meet and try and come
10:59
Speaker 2: up with a plan for how you know, if X,
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Speaker 2: Y and Z has done this will result in reunification
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Speaker 2: if possible, and it involves you know, maybe some counseling
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Speaker 2: and things like that.
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Speaker 3: But what I like to hear, you know, and.
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Speaker 2: I've said this before, and when you talk about judicial candidates,
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Speaker 2: it's a little bit frustrating sometimes maybe for the candidates,
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Speaker 2: certainly for folks that are interviewing. You know, they of
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Speaker 2: course Justice Hewing and any sitting judge can't say how
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Speaker 2: they're going to rule on a particular matter. They can't
11:27
Speaker 2: comment on a on a pending case. And and I
11:30
Speaker 2: look at it, you know, for the most part, I
11:33
Speaker 2: represent small businesses and then kind of everyday people on
11:38
Speaker 2: the consumer side of things, And that's that's my interest.
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Speaker 2: But you know, as far as circuit judges and judicial candidates,
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Speaker 2: I look at, you know, who am I going to support?
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Speaker 3: Who am I going to vote for?
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Speaker 2: And you know, if I see really bad decisions routinely
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Speaker 2: from a from a candidate, I'm not going to endure
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Speaker 2: some more vote for them. But I don't really look
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Speaker 2: at in the grand scheme of things, is this judge's
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Speaker 2: going to rule in my favor every time? Because that's
12:05
Speaker 2: never going to happen. You know, it's just not gonna
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Speaker 2: happen because I'm sure Justice Hewing will say, you know,
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Speaker 2: he makes rulings both at the circuit court level and
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Speaker 2: now at the appellate level based on the facts and
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Speaker 2: the law, and that if you do any amount of
12:20
Speaker 2: legal work as a lawyer, you're not going to get
12:23
Speaker 2: rulings that go in your client's favor every time. It's
12:26
Speaker 2: not not possible. What I look at from my perspective,
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Speaker 2: somebody that's you know, been the boots on the ground,
12:34
Speaker 2: operates at ground level, is what I call it.
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Speaker 3: I like to see somebody.
12:37
Speaker 2: That's you know that it's probably zero point one percent
12:41
Speaker 2: or something, maybe even less than that of our audience
12:43
Speaker 2: will ever have a case gip to the to the
12:46
Speaker 2: Western Supreme Court. It's kind of viewed as the ivory tower.
12:48
Speaker 2: But I like a candidate who has been at that
12:52
Speaker 2: ground level and seen how it works. I mean, Justice
12:55
Speaker 2: Hewing's been set in an MDT, so he knows what
12:58
Speaker 2: happens there. Because it's one thing to read it on
13:03
Speaker 2: paper in the code or in the rules of procedure.
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Speaker 2: It's a whole other thing to practice at that level.
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Speaker 2: And then the other thing I like is sitting as
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Speaker 2: a circuit judge for what six years or something, you know,
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Speaker 2: six plus years, you see everything at the ground level
13:23
Speaker 2: and how it works and how it plays out. As
13:25
Speaker 2: opposed to you know, being on a pelt court they
13:28
Speaker 2: don't get to hear. I don't think there's any instance
13:31
Speaker 2: really where the where the Supreme Court, our spring court
13:33
Speaker 2: really hears new evidence or takes facts. Mean, it's all
13:36
Speaker 2: on a record that's already been established. And and you
13:40
Speaker 2: don't really have interaction at the Supreme Court with the
13:42
Speaker 2: actual parties. You have interaction with the lawyers and and.
13:46
Speaker 3: And and so.
13:48
Speaker 2: To have you know. That's that's why I've endorsed uh
13:52
Speaker 2: Justice during plus and frankly, I don't think I had
13:54
Speaker 2: a case in front of Just uh Justice going when
13:56
Speaker 2: he sat as circuit judge in Fate County. But I
13:59
Speaker 2: had a couple two or three lawyers who's judgment I
14:02
Speaker 2: trust give him high recommendations. But those are the reasons
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Speaker 2: I'm endorsing Justice Hewing, And you know, I think maybe
14:12
Speaker 2: at least to me, and it's my show, but I'm
14:15
Speaker 2: kind of interested maybe you can expand a little bit.
14:18
Speaker 2: It is kind of an ivory tower situation for everyday people.
14:21
Speaker 2: And so when you go to the US or the
14:23
Speaker 2: Western Supreme Court, which is the law that's the highest court,
14:26
Speaker 2: your case will end there ultimately on that legal issue,
14:30
Speaker 2: unless there's some kind of US constitutional issue which could
14:32
Speaker 2: take it to the federal level. But that's going to
14:34
Speaker 2: be the law of the land. But I'm maybe you
14:37
Speaker 2: could give us a little perspective. You know, petitions filed
14:43
Speaker 2: and then it kind of goes to the court and
14:45
Speaker 2: then we don't necessarily know anything about what happens until
14:48
Speaker 2: ruling comes out. Sometimes you get to go argue your
14:50
Speaker 2: case in person, but a lot of times you don't
14:53
Speaker 2: and there's just and you don't know when the decision
14:55
Speaker 2: is going to come out. It can take some time.
14:57
Speaker 2: But I thought maybe you could extrapolate on that little
14:59
Speaker 2: bit kind of what what happens once we get a
15:01
Speaker 2: petition for appeal filed and what what happens up there.
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Speaker 3: I'd be happy to do that.
15:06
Speaker 4: So once the petition for appials filed at the Clerk's
15:10
Speaker 4: office issues a scheduling order, and the scheduling order has
15:15
Speaker 4: the deadlines for the the other brief syndic case for
15:18
Speaker 4: the other parties to cebmit. And then once the case
15:23
Speaker 4: is mature, then we have a layer of lawyers at
15:26
Speaker 4: the Supreme Court called the Office of Council, and the
15:29
Speaker 4: Office of Council reviews each each case and does a
15:36
Speaker 4: work up of the case for the justices, and then
15:38
Speaker 4: we have a we have conferences. You know, not obviously
15:42
Speaker 4: not every case goes to oral argument, but every case
15:49
Speaker 4: that every properly filed appeal to the Western Supreme Court
15:53
Speaker 4: gets a written decision and each of the judges reviews
15:58
Speaker 4: or justices review that decision, vote on that decision, and
16:04
Speaker 4: a memorandum opinion. So there's two types of opinions that
16:07
Speaker 4: come out memorandum versus signed. The signed opinions are going
16:11
Speaker 4: to come out of most of the time, or arguments,
16:14
Speaker 4: but the backup so that the Office of Council brings
16:18
Speaker 4: the brings the work up of the case to the court,
16:21
Speaker 4: we have a conference and at that conference they present
16:24
Speaker 4: the case and make recommendations. With our staff we have
16:28
Speaker 4: each each justice has four law clerks who help us
16:31
Speaker 4: review and we on that presentation and on that workup,
16:35
Speaker 4: we look at it and decide, can we decide this
16:38
Speaker 4: case on the briefs an issue of memorandum decision or
16:42
Speaker 4: is this case something that needs to be needs to
16:45
Speaker 4: be set for.
16:46
Speaker 3: Or argument for some reason, whether it's.
16:48
Speaker 4: A novel legal issue, it's you know, it's complicated, it
16:52
Speaker 4: just needs more time.
16:53
Speaker 3: There are questions. So we vote as a court on whether.
16:59
Speaker 4: That case can be decided by memorandum. Then we vote
17:02
Speaker 4: on the memorandum, and then we vote also on whether
17:07
Speaker 4: those cases need to be set for or argument or not.
17:10
Speaker 4: So the work a lot of the what lawyers would
17:14
Speaker 4: say is the delay is built into the process of
17:19
Speaker 4: one the initial briefing schedule. And I'll be honest with you,
17:25
Speaker 4: we have a lot of abuse, neglect and criminal cases,
17:28
Speaker 4: especially when there habeas cases or issues with getting transcripts
17:33
Speaker 4: so extensions are being granted, issues with perfecting the appeal.
17:38
Speaker 4: So you know, not every appeal goes on this linear
17:43
Speaker 4: specific time frame, because there may be a variety of
17:47
Speaker 4: procedural issues that come up. If they're early on, before
17:51
Speaker 4: the case is mature, those procedural issues are essentially addressed
17:55
Speaker 4: by the Clerk's Office of Casey Forbes is currently the.
18:00
Speaker 3: Clerk the Supreme Court.
18:01
Speaker 4: If they happen afterwards, then the Office of Council folks
18:05
Speaker 4: bring those issues to us and we address those as
18:09
Speaker 4: a court in conferences. So we'll have those cases that
18:13
Speaker 4: are decided by written the memorandum opinion, those will go
18:18
Speaker 4: out and they're done. The cases that are set for
18:21
Speaker 4: or argument, then that's scheduled. There may be some supplemental briefing.
18:25
Speaker 4: We work those up, then then we hold the or argument,
18:29
Speaker 4: which we had. We had or argument Tuesday and Wednesday
18:35
Speaker 4: of this week.
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Speaker 3: There are six total cases each day we take.
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Speaker 4: So this morning, when I get done with this, I'm
18:42
Speaker 4: going back to the court and we're going to have
18:45
Speaker 4: a decision conference. So I'll be in the in the
18:48
Speaker 4: conference room with just the other five justices and we'll
18:51
Speaker 4: review each of those cases that were presented for or
18:53
Speaker 4: argument yesterday, just us in the room, and we'll decide.
18:57
Speaker 4: We'll take votes on the decision each one of those
19:00
Speaker 4: cases from yesterday. We know at that point, we actually
19:04
Speaker 4: know at the time of oral argument which justice is
19:07
Speaker 4: going to be writing the opinion. So the justice who's
19:14
Speaker 4: writing the opinion will present the case, present uh proposed
19:19
Speaker 4: resolution from their perspective, and then there's a discussion ultimately
19:23
Speaker 4: a vote, and we either you know, we either have
19:26
Speaker 4: a decision where we've got three votes in favor of
19:29
Speaker 4: of an issue being resolved, or we or we or
19:34
Speaker 4: you know, we have dissent. You can have you have,
19:36
Speaker 4: but you have to have three votes. Majority rules. There's
19:38
Speaker 4: five of us, so three votes constitute the majority. And
19:43
Speaker 4: if the majority decides something, then the dissenting judges can
19:47
Speaker 4: obviously write dissenting opinions and explain themselves why they would
19:51
Speaker 4: have handled it differently or if they concur in some
19:54
Speaker 4: in some part but you sort of have a different
19:57
Speaker 4: angle or a different take, and anyone explain that have
20:00
Speaker 4: the opportunity to do that. So each of those processes
20:02
Speaker 4: take the writing and the research and the processing to
20:10
Speaker 4: get to those decision points. So there's there's each case
20:13
Speaker 4: has different decisions, different sort of jumping off points where
20:16
Speaker 4: it could be decided short of or argument. But I
20:20
Speaker 4: think it's just important for everyone to remember that there
20:23
Speaker 4: was a time prior to twenty ten where circuit judges
20:29
Speaker 4: would make a decision, there was a discretionary appeal to
20:32
Speaker 4: the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court controlled the flow of
20:36
Speaker 4: the could control the flow of work to the court,
20:39
Speaker 4: and if the Supreme Court denied the motion for retisurcer ara,
20:45
Speaker 4: then that was it.
20:47
Speaker 3: Now with the changing.
20:50
Speaker 4: Rules back in twenty ten twenty eleven and the way
20:54
Speaker 4: the Intermediate Court works, every case it's a side, it
20:57
Speaker 4: has a right of appeal, and every perfected appeal gets
21:00
Speaker 4: a written decision from the c A and from the
21:03
Speaker 4: Supreme Court.
21:05
Speaker 1: About about four minutes left.
21:07
Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, so that's that's interesting information. The Yeah, the
21:12
Speaker 2: petition for used to be a petition for rid assertiory
21:16
Speaker 2: and then I mean, you get a ruling from that
21:21
Speaker 2: in the old days, but it wouldn't have any real
21:26
Speaker 2: uh meet to it. Basically say that your petition for
21:30
Speaker 2: ridd is denied, and that's it's just kind of a
21:32
Speaker 2: one liner, uh, and you you wouldn't really get any
21:37
Speaker 2: discussion about your issues or anything like that. Now, after that,
21:40
Speaker 2: we went to the system where every case gets a
21:44
Speaker 2: written reasoned ruling and they're called memorandum decisions.
21:48
Speaker 3: If if if there's no kind of.
21:51
Speaker 2: New issue I guess, or it's a clear cut issue,
21:54
Speaker 2: sometimes you get memorandum decisions. But those can be first
21:57
Speaker 2: of all, you can have justices dissent from the so
22:00
Speaker 2: you can have you can have uh, you know, majority,
22:03
Speaker 2: and then descending opinions too. Uh. They can be quite comprehensive. Actually,
22:08
Speaker 2: I think memorandum decisions generally the court doesn't really issue
22:12
Speaker 2: any new syllabus points, which is kind of common law,
22:15
Speaker 2: but you can still rely on them for I mean,
22:18
Speaker 2: I use them in arguments because if you can find
22:20
Speaker 2: a memorandum decision that has underlying facts that are close
22:24
Speaker 2: to your case and of course same legal issue, then
22:28
Speaker 2: you can use that. And it's precedent for lower courts,
22:33
Speaker 2: circuit courts. But then ultimately you get to the written decisions,
22:38
Speaker 2: the full decisions, I guess you would say, which oftentimes
22:42
Speaker 2: happens after or argument. I wonder, maybe it's not something
22:44
Speaker 2: you can say. But so of course I've argued a
22:47
Speaker 2: few times before the before the court, and when I'm
22:52
Speaker 2: arguing as the lawyer, I don't know who, which which
22:55
Speaker 2: justice has been assigned to write the opinion on that case? Right,
23:00
Speaker 2: So although sometimes I think I can there are clues
23:03
Speaker 2: from your oral argument by what questions are being posed,
23:06
Speaker 2: but maybe you could comment on that. I wonder, how
23:09
Speaker 2: how do the justice decide which case is going to
23:14
Speaker 2: be authored by which particular justice?
23:17
Speaker 1: And not to be too to rush you too much,
23:19
Speaker 1: we have about ninety seconds.
23:20
Speaker 3: Or something pretty easy.
23:21
Speaker 4: There's an ongoing list and you just go down the list,
23:24
Speaker 4: and this assignment is rotating through the list the chief Justice.
23:27
Speaker 4: The chief Justice handles that. It's different than US Supreme Court.
23:30
Speaker 4: The US Supreme Court, the Chief Justice will sign somebody
23:34
Speaker 4: to write it in a majority. So here we know
23:39
Speaker 4: where we stand on the list Rule nineteen, Rule twenty,
23:42
Speaker 4: and they're just sort of assigned seriatum.
23:46
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's interesting.
23:47
Speaker 2: So and then people complain, well I don't want this
23:50
Speaker 2: judge of that judge in the Circuit court. Well, that's
23:52
Speaker 2: done through an automated system. You don't know which judge
23:54
Speaker 2: you're going to get when you file a case in
23:55
Speaker 2: circuit court and actually with the Supreme Court, then it
23:59
Speaker 2: gets randomly assigned to the justice as well. So we
24:04
Speaker 2: got about a minute left or so about thirty seconds okay,
24:06
Speaker 2: So anyway we've got Justice Hewing here. I encourage every
24:10
Speaker 2: all our listeners out there to vote for Justice Hewing
24:12
Speaker 2: on May twelfth. Just you want to make any final
24:15
Speaker 2: comments here real quick.
24:16
Speaker 4: If I can, I'll just say that I think it's
24:18
Speaker 4: important that someone with circuit judge experience remain on the bench.
24:21
Speaker 3: Right now, I'm the only one with circuit judge experience.
24:24
Speaker 4: I'll bring that perspective to the every decision conference, every
24:27
Speaker 4: discussion I have with the other justices. And I just
24:30
Speaker 4: think that based on my experience as a circuit judge
24:33
Speaker 4: and my experience as a lawyer, that I'm a right
24:35
Speaker 4: fit for the job.
24:36
Speaker 1: That's great information. And so once again, that is West
24:39
Speaker 1: Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals Justice, the Honorable Thomas Ewing
24:42
Speaker 1: in studio with This Morning with Tom Payton from the
24:44
Speaker 1: Payton Law from Payton Law from dot Com, p E
24:46
Speaker 1: Y T in Nitro, West Virginia, threez are A four
24:49
Speaker 1: seven five five fifty five fifty six threes are A
24:51
Speaker 1: four seven fifty five to fifty six every Thursday right
24:53
Speaker 1: here on five BIGWC. Just thanks for sticking with us
24:56
Speaker 1: today through the technical difficulties. Tom will see you next time.
24:58
Speaker 1: Thanks a lot for here.
24:59
Speaker 2: Tom sounds good next week.
25:00
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