May Magistrates Be Compelled to Testify about Their Decision-Making Processes?

When a defendant move to dismiss DWI charges based on a violation of his pre-trial release rights, the State’s first response is predictable: Subpoena the magistrate who presided over the defendant’s initial appearance. And in case after case, our appellate courts have considered testimony from magistrates in determining whether a defendant’s rights to pretrial release were violated. See, e.g., State v. Labinski, 188 N.C. App. 120 (2008) (finding statutory violation based in part on magistrate’s testimony that he imposed an impaired driving hold because he thought anyone charged with DWI with an alcohol concentration of at least 0.08 would possibly hurt himself or someone else), State v. Bumgarner, 97 N.C. App. 567 (1990) (finding that impaired driving hold was warranted based on magistrate’s consideration of trooper’s testimony, the magistrate’s personal observations, and the results of the sobriety test, which revealed a 0.14 alcohol concentration). Recently, however, the State’s predictable reaction has met with some unexpected resistance: a motion to quash filed by the state attorney general. Judicial Privilege. Though I haven’t seen any of these motions, my understanding is that they rest upon the long-established rule that that a judge may not be compelled to testify about her mental process in reaching a judicial decision. The United States Supreme Court recognized that principle more than a century ago in Fayerweather v. Ritch, 195 U.S. 276 (1904), ruling that it was error to admit testimony from a trial judge regarding his mental processes in reaching a judgment in an earlier case. The [...]