Opinion
SC: 159088
01-28-2022
IN RE Byron J. KONSCHUH, Judge 40th Circuit Court Before the Judicial Tenure Commission
Order
On order of the Court, the Judicial Tenure Commission's Bill of Costs is considered, and the respondent, Byron J. Konschuh, is ordered to pay costs of $7,091.04 to the Commission.
Clement, J. (concurring).
I concur in the imposition of costs, and I write only to reiterate the concerns that Justice CAVANAGH raised in her dissenting statement in In re Brennan , 505 Mich. 851, 934 N.W.2d 274 (2019) ( CAVANAGH , J., dissenting), which I joined. I continue to have doubts regarding this Court's constitutional authority to impose costs. Additionally, I believe that if this Court continues to impose costs—a topic that is currently under consideration in ADM 2019-28—we should provide guidance as to how to apportion them. Nevertheless, just as in Brennan , respondent does not raise these issues, so I would not reach them here.
While in Brennan , I joined Justice Cavanagh ’s dissenting statement because I believed that the Court should have awarded the full amount of costs requested by the Judicial Tenure Commission (JTC), I concur in the costs assessed by the Court in this case, which are a fraction of those requested. In Brennan , the JTC persuasively argued that the respondent's deceitful conduct "permeated all aspects of the proceedings," so costs could not be apportioned. Id. at 852, 934 N.W.2d 274 ( Cavanagh , J., dissenting). The JTC has made no such argument in this case.
Cavanagh, J., joins the statement of Clement, J.