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Former Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Bridget McCafferty had her law license indefinitely suspended by the Ohio Supreme Court on Thursday. The Westlake resident served 14 months in federal prison for lying to FBI agents about phone conversations she had about using her influence on behalf of crooked county officials and a local businessman.

(Chuck Crow, The Plain Dealer)

COLUMBUS, Ohio—The Ohio Supreme Court on Thursday indefinitely suspended the law license of Bridget M. McCafferty, a former Cuyahoga County Common Pleas court judge convicted of lying to the FBI during a county corruption investigation.

McCafferty served 14 months in prison for making false statements about inappropriate phone conversations she had with then-county Auditor Frank Russo, then-Commissioner Jimmy Dimora, and local businessman Steve Pumper about using her influence on their behalf.

McCafferty, a Westlake resident, has been a lawyer since 1991, and served as a Common Pleas judge from 1998 until September 2010, when she was arrested and suspended from the bench. She lost a bid for re-election two months later.

The Supreme Court ruled 4-3 in favor of suspending her law license for violating multiple professional and judicial conduct rules, a punishment that had been recommended by a judicial ethics board.

Unless she gets into further legal problems, McCafferty will be able to apply to reinstate her law license in 2017.

"Certainly McCafferty's conduct warrants a severe sanction," Justice William O'Neill wrote in his majority opinion.

However, he defended suspending her license instead of disbarring her, noting that her false statements were made during a single conversation with FBI agents, “rather than as a pattern of premeditated criminal conduct.”

The minority in the case held that she should have been disbarred, which would prevent her from ever practicing law in Ohio again.

Justice Judith Ann Lanzinger, in dissent, wrote that McCafferty was "swaying judicial outcomes” and “giving special consideration to high-ranking politicians” for months before the FBI approached her.

“If the primary purposes of judicial discipline are to protect the public, guarantee the evenhanded administration of justice, and to bolster public confidence in the institution, then nothing short of disbarment should be imposed in this case,” Lanzinger concluded.