🔗 Michael Cicconetti

🔗 United States 🔗 Biography 🔗 Law 🔗 United States/Ohio

Michael A. Cicconetti (born 1951) is a retired Municipal Court judge who presided in Painesville, Lake County, Ohio, United States, dispensing a unique brand of what he calls creative justice. The judge often left the choice of penalty to the defendant, who was faced with spending time in jail or undergoing one of Cicconetti's unusual punishments. These often involved placing the defendant in a similar position to that of the defendant's victim at the time of the crime.

Cicconetti's first creative sentence, which involved a violation relating to a stopped school bus, occurred in the mid-1990s. Famously he offered 26-year-old Ohio housewife Michelle Murray the option (in return for a reduced prison sentence) of spending a night in the woods for abandoning 35 kittens in a forest in wintertime; he said: "You don't do that. You don't leave these poor little animals out and, yes, I wanted to set an example for her future conduct or anybody else who was contemplating doing such a thing". On other occasions he ordered noisy neighbors to spend a day of silence in the forest or listen to classical music instead of rock. In all cases the judge attempted to place a link between the perpetrated offense and its punishment.

Due in part to the popularity of his actions, he won the presidency of the American Judges Association. He attributes his unusual approach to his background. He is an Eagle Scout, earning the award in 1964, as a member of Scout Troop 64 in Painesville, Ohio. He was the oldest of nine siblings who had to work on ore boats throughout the Great Lakes as a deckhand and deckwatch to fund himself through college. After graduating from St. Leo University, he became Clerk of the Painesville Municipal Court while attending Cleveland State University Law School at night.

Many of the victims, but also defendants, claim that his unusual approach has helped them to cope with their problems and the judge is reportedly inundated with letters from his admirers. Furthermore, where the national recidivism (repeat offender) rate is over 75%, the rate in Judge Cicconetti's court was just 10%.

His philosophy is exemplified by the following two quotations:

When you engage people and praise them for their good behavior, not unlike children, it helps their self-esteem. My judicial philosophy is really not that much different from a parental philosophy. I have five children. You can paddle them or spank them but what do you gain? Most people want to be good but for little obstacles or habits. We have to change the habits and remove the obstacles. That's our job.

Sentences such as Cicconetti's are becoming more popular across the United States, and one judge has cited him specifically as being the influence for one of her own sentences.

In February 2019 Cicconetti announced that he planned to retire later in the year. He retired from being a judge on September 20, 2019.