Los Angeles Man Who Changed Name To ‘Judge’ Loses Election To Become Judge

Mike Cummins/LinkedIn/Shutterstock

A man who legally changed his name to ‘Judge Mike’ just lost an election to become a judge by a landslide. 

Judge Mike Cummins’ full name appeared to voters on the ballot on Tuesday, March 3, as he hoped to emerge as the winning candidate in the race for judge of Los Angeles County’s Superior Court office No. 76.

Cummins was up against Emily Cole, deputy district attorney for Los Angeles County, but he ended up securing just 16.76% of the vote after locals spread awareness of the fact he’s not actually a judge.

Credit where credit’s due, Cummins was indeed appointed to a judgeship for Stanislaus Municipal Court in 1994, but resigned in 2006. He has also served as a defence attorney and prosecutor, though his law licence became inactive in January 2017.

He changed his name the same year, while contemplating a run for state insurance commissioner, as he wanted his name to reflect his past career when it appeared on the state ballot. Election laws require candidates to use their most recent occupation, the San Luis Obispo Tribune reports.

Judge Mike Cummins/Facebook

Though Cummins has legally gone by Judge Mike for almost three years, voters were still at risk of falling for his rather misleading name in the recent election, so people took to social media to call out Cummins’ sneaky behaviour.

One concerned citizen wrote:

Local LA Voters: Judge Mike Cummins legally changed his name to ‘Judge’ so people would think he was a judge. Don’t vote for him.

Another tweeted:

Californians – please don’t vote for the guy whose name is ‘Judge Mike Cummins’ on your ballot. He changed his name to Judge in 2017. Please support his opponent Emily Cole.

A third commented:

I sh*t you not, there is a dude running for a superior court judge position in CA that *legally changed his name* from Mike Cummins to Judge Mike Cummins in an attempt to dupe voters.

His opponent, Cole, reportedly tried to have Cummins’ name appear on the ballot as ‘J. Mike Cummins’ or ‘J.M. Cummins’, but her efforts proved unsuccessful, and Cummins appeared on the LA County ballot as ‘Judge Mike Cummins, Retired Counselor-at-Law’.

Ahead of the vote, Cummins received a ‘not qualified’ rating from the Los Angeles County Bar Association’s Judicial Elections Evaluation Committee.

The rating is given to prospective judges who the committee believe lack ‘professional ability, experience, competence, integrity and temperament indicative of fitness to perform the judicial function satisfactorily’.

Pixabay

Cole expressed her disapproval at Cummins’ name change, according to The Recorder, saying:

It should have been his response to campaign like I did and educate the electorate.

A judge should always try to follow the law. That is our job. So, I didn’t feel like that was an ethical decision.

Cole said some sitting judges told her Cummins’ loss is the most significant they’ve ever seen. The win comes as a relief to the candidate as she feared other people would ‘try to emulate’ what Cummins had done if he’d proved successful.

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Emily Brown

Emily Brown first began delivering important news stories aged just 13, when she launched her career with a paper round. She graduated with a BA Hons in English Language in the Media from Lancaster University, and went on to become a freelance writer and blogger. Emily contributed to The Sunday Times Travel Magazine and Student Problems before becoming a journalist at UNILAD, where she works on breaking news as well as longer form features.