California Sentencing Judge's Reference To Religion OK'd

In People v. Scharf, 2006 Cal. App. Unpub. LEXIS 3372 (Cal. 3rd Dist. Ct. App., April 24, 2006), a California court of appeals rejected a defendant's claim that a trial judge's comments made during sentencing violated the Establishment Clause. Glyn Scharf was convicted of murdering his estranged wife, even though her body had not been found. After sentencing Scharf to prison, the judge appealed to Scharf's religious convictions in urging him to disclose the location of his wife's body. The court of appeals held that this did not constitute judicial misconduct: "The trial court's appeal to defendant's religious beliefs (present or former) did not express the court's favor of one religion over another, or religion over no religion. At most, the trial court suggested that the revelation of the location of Jan's body would inure to defendant's benefit within the belief system of the religion to which defendant himself had once adhered and might still adhere. Thus, even if the court's exhortation to defendant can be construed as a 'comment on religious questions,' defendant has failed to show that it is the sort of comment that contravened the principal of neutrality."