Judicial Candidate Indicted For “Judge Impersonation”

A staff attorney for the Chief Judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County has been charged with felony misconduct, with a possible two to five-year sentence, as well as one count of misdemeanor false impersonation, for allegedly impersonating a judge in a lower-level courtroom that was hearing traffic cases. The attorney, Rhonda Crawford, is also on the ballot for a judgeship in a judicial sub-circuit that includes Chicago’s South Side, running unopposed except for a write-in candidate. In a video posted in the first Chicago Tribune article about the case, Crawford admits to wearing the robes, saying it was part of a “shadowing” exercise, that the courtroom was informed of what was happening, and that Judge Valerie Turner was standing behind her. “At the urging of a respected judge I put on her robe and I sat in her chair,” Crawford says. “The judge stood over me the entire time, while she decided the last three cases on her court call.” Judge Turner is a University of Chicago law school graduate, former federal prosecutor and former associate at Kirland & Ellis. Crawford says she took no action during the brief role-playing exercise, but according to the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission, when asked to grant a continuance because a police officer was not present, Crawford asked Judge Turner if she could deny the motion and then did so. Crawford has acknowledged she made a mistake, and her attorney maintains that an “incident that happened over three to four minutes is being blown out of proportion.”