TENNESSEE: Supreme Court disbars former Roane County judge

A Roane County judge convicted of extortion has been disbarred as an attorney by the state Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court on Dec. 13 entered an order disbarring Thomas Alva Austin, who pleaded guilty last September to charges that he forced some $14,000 in kickbacks from operators of a driving school the judge created and a private probation firm where he ordered offenders to report.

A former General Sessions Court judge, he was sentenced to 42 months in a minimum-security federal prison.

The court suspended Austin's law license last October, and on Oct. 29, Austin consented to disbarment.

To be reinstated, Austin "must show by clear and convincing evidence that his reinstatement will not be detrimental to the integrity and standing of the bar or the administration of justice or subversive to the public's interest," according to a statement released by the Supreme Court this morning.

A probe by FBI Special Agent Bob Gibson revealed allegations that Austin had been using his robe to line his pockets for a decade, collecting as much as $100,000 in kickbacks. Austin 's own words, captured in secretly recorded conversations between the judge and his extortion victims, raised allegations that he solicited sexual favors from women appearing in his court and routinely smoked marijuana.

Ex-judge blames his actions on wife's affair

But prosecutor says kickback scheme has lined Austin's pockets for decade

JAMIE SATTERFIELD, satterfield@knews.com
Saturday, August 26, 2006

A former Roane County judge captured on videotape taking thousands of dollars in kickbacks is blaming his estranged wife's affair with a woman for his foray into public corruption.

Thomas Alva Austin, 58, who pleaded guilty earlier this year to forcing kickbacks from men he handpicked to head up a traffic school and probation office, contends it was his second wife's fling with a woman that drove him over the legal edge.

"In early 2005, while Mr. Austin and his second wife were in marital counseling, she admitted her year-long involvement in an extramarital lesbian relationship," defense attorney Gregory P. Isaacs wrote on behalf of the former Roane County General Sessions Court judge.

"Mr. Austin was quite distraught, sought medical help for depression and was prescribed anti-depressants," Isaacs wrote. "Additionally, he began drinking heavily despite earlier struggles with alcohol. All of the charges that are included in this indictment occurred after this difficult and tumultuous period in Mr. Austin's personal life." . . .

http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/article/0,1406,KNS_347_4944959,00.html

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