Charges dismissed against former Kentucky judge accused of forgery, records tampering
A judge has dismissed criminal charges against a former Kentucky circuit judge whose case has put a spotlight on allegations that a prosecutor allegedly solicited nude images from a defendant.
Judge Phil Patton issued an order Thursday dismissing charges against Beth Maze, who served nearly two decades as circuit judge in Bath, Menifee, Montgomery and Rowan counties.
Maze was indicted in 2018 on two charges of forgery and one charge of tampering with public records, all felonies.
The charges related to an incident in 2017 in which Maze was accused of citing the offices of other court officials and a lawyer without their knowledge on orders for her ex-husband to receive drug tests after he was arrested on a drug possession charge.
Maze denied wrongdoing, saying she put the names on the orders during a chaotic evening and believed the form was a different one.
The orders were also an issue in a disciplinary proceeding by the state Judicial Conduct Commission, which accused Maze of violating ethics rules.
Maze retired before the panel issued a decision. The commission said later it would have removed Maze from office if she hadn’t retired.
The Kentucky Supreme Court later upheld the commission’s findings, but said Maze’s conduct would not have justified removing her from office.
Maze’s attorney, Thomas E. Clay, used that finding as the basis for an argument in her criminal case that the state’s highest court had examined the actions at issue in the charges and concluded they didn’t merit removing her from office, meaning it was not criminal conduct.
Clay pointed out the Supreme Court had written that Maze’s conduct “stands in contrast to a more deliberate course of criminal activity . . . .”
The special prosecutor in the case, Brian Wright, argued that the Supreme Court was merely commenting on Maze’s actions, not making a formal finding about her guilt or innocence.
However, Patton ruled that the Supreme Court decision “establishes conclusively that the highest court in the Commonwealth held her conduct was not criminal.”
The Supreme Court said that her conduct would have deserved a suspension if she had stayed in office.
Patton said a judge convicted of a felony can’t hold office, so the fact that the Supreme Court said she could have returned to the bench after a suspension showed the court concluded she didn’t commit the felonies charged in the indictment.
Patton also noted that other judges in the counties Maze served had signed the outdated forms at issue in the case dozens of times.
Allegations against prosecutor
The case against Maze has gotten a good deal of attention not just because of the criminal charges against a longtime judge, but because it pushed up allegations that Ronnie Goldy, the commonwealth’s attorney in the 21st Circuit, asked a woman for explicit photos and videos after helping her in court.
A former boyfriend of the woman, who has a lengthy criminal record, gave screenshots of messages on her phone to Clay as he prepared for Maze’s trial.
The shots indicate that Goldy gave the woman gas money at one point, searched whether she had outstanding arrest warrants, said he would get court dates moved for her and advised her on getting back her car, which had been impounded after an arrest.
The screen shots show Goldy asked the woman, Misty Helton, for photos and videos.
On June 11, 2018, for instance, Helton asked Goldy what she needed to do to get a warrant taken care of. “Besides the obvious lmao (laughing my a** off),” she said.
Goldy responded that he would talk to the judge the next day. Four days later, Goldy sent Helton a message that said “When do I get to see a video?”
“When am I not gonna have a warrant hahaha,” she responded.
“Lol. Good point. Incentives never hurt,” Goldy messaged back.
The screenshots include two of Helton nude or semi-nude. “Wow. Nice,” Goldy texted after receiving some photos in May 2018.
During a June 1 hearing, Goldy testified he had never exchanged messages with Helton about “things she was going to do for him and things he was going to do for her,” and denied asking her for videos.
In a more recent hearing Goldy, said he had no memory of more than 200 Facebook messages they allegedly exchanged, according to The (Louisville) Courier-Journal.
The Kentucky Bar Association has asked the Supreme Court to suspend Goldy, and the state prosecutors’ association kicked him out.
