Illinois Judge Who Reversed Man’s Rape Conviction Removed From Bench After Panel Concludes He Circumvented Law

An Illinois judge who made the controversial decision of reversing a man’s rape conviction involving a 16-year-old girl has been removed from the bench after a judicial oversight body found he circumvented the law and engaged in misconduct.

Adams County Judge Robert Adrian was removed from the bench by The Illinois Courts Commission Friday after it held a three-day hearing in Chicago in November on a complaint filed against Adrian, the Associated Press reported.

The commission stated that Adrian “engaged in multiple instances of misconduct” and “abused his position of power to indulge his own sense of justice while circumventing the law.”

The commission could have issued a reprimand, censure, or suspension without pay, but its decision said it had “ample grounds” for its decision to remove Adrian.

In October 2021, Adrian found then-18-year-old Drew Clinton of Taylor, Michigan, guilty of sexually assaulting a 16-year-old girl during a May 2021 graduation party.

The state Judicial Inquiry Board filed a complaint against Adrian after the judge threw out Clinton’s conviction in January 2022, with the judge saying that the 148 days Clinton had spent in jail was punishment enough.

The complaint details that Adrian had acknowledged he was supposed to impose the mandatory four-year sentence against Clinton but that he still would not send him to prison. “That is not just,” Adrian said at the sentencing hearing, according to court transcripts. “I will not do that.”

Cameron Vaughan, the victim, told the AP in November, that Adrian’s reversal of Clinton’s verdict left her “completely shocked.” She attended the November commission proceedings with family, friends, and supporters to oust the former judge.

After Adrian threw out Clinton’s conviction, Vaughan said that the judge told the court, “this is what happens whenever parents allow teenagers to drink alcohol, to swim in pools with their undergarments on,” she said of the transcript from a court hearing.