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Wilson J. Campbell, who is now the chief prosecutor in the Virgin Islands, said he didn’t have to report his fling with Ann Kirolos because he wasn‘t her direct supervisor and called an ethics complaint against him a “rush to judgment.” The Advisory Committee on Judicial Conduct rejected all of his points.
Committee members said Campbell was obligated to report the three-month affair and then abused his position by threatening to have Kirolos fired if she said anything. The ACJC also maintains that Campbell actually was her supervisor.
On Tuesday, New Jersey Supreme Court Justices Barry Albin, Virginia Long and Roberto Rivera-Soto heard from Campbell and representatives of the advisory committee about the ethics complaint. They, in turn, will rule whether Campbell should be publicly reprimanded.
Authorities learned of the affair exactly a year ago, after a depressed Kirolos took a drug overdose and later blamed the breakup, state court records show.
As if that weren’t enough, Campbell is also fighting a complaint in the Virgin Islands for practicing law without being a member in good standing with the bar association there.
The incident only intensified the spotlight on the city court, whose chief judge recently pleaded guilty to fixing parking tickets — the result of a sting that caught a half-dozen city jurists in all.
Still unresolved are official misconduct charges against 55-year-old Court Administrator Virginia Pagan, who, prosecutors said, tapped into the court’s computerized record system to wipe out a whopping 215 parking tickets issued to her and her daughter.
For audio excerpts from the hearing, go to: Campbell refutes allegations
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