I'm glad you're here with your entourage. You have your walk up music.
The bomb sniffing dogs have cleared the facility. DJ Hodge has the security failings
available. Not seeing you for a year and a half, you don't look
any worse, by the way, Thank you. Hit the music, Dave.
I'll tell you what this is your walk up music as prosecutor? Is
that correct? That's correct? Hitten that sunset. Tell the TV schme I'm
for out. I can get women today. Hit a Dave because I'm dynamite
singing Sharon Kennedy in the background, Justice Joe Leaders State visit. It's been
a year and a half. Sharon Kennedy has given me a list of questions
not to ask. You got your own list there? Sure? What can
I ask? Not much? Before we get into the weather, anything relevant
that someone might be interested in. Can we talk about a couple of things?
First of all, for you to complain that I'm never on the air
here, are you joking? I mean it's I need some time off to
coalesce. It's a crop shoot. Every time I turn on the radio,
it's January the seventeenth that I'm here. I like the promos, though,
listen to Bill today, he's gonna discuss black b Yeah, Ken Bruce on
Ken Live on he's been liberal for me, Yeah, a little bit.
But they did a great job. And what can I talk about? How
about this? Tell me the last year you were as prosecutor? First year
is a high Supreme Court justice? How's the gig? How's the job differently?
What's better about it? And what's worse? The job is fantastic.
I mean, it's it's it was the right time. I was at the
prosecutor's office for twenty six years and they wanted they wanted you out. All
the people used to come up to me all the time and say, you
know, we did these horrible cases, dead kids. Just I've prosecuted five
serial killers. People say, how do you? How do you deal with
that every day? How you and it just kind of you just kind of
get immune to it, I think. And when I left that job,
God blessed Missy Powers. When I left that job, I realized the toll
it was taking on me. I mean, it really does get to you.
After a while. You can you can only deal with so many dead
children. It's tough. And the other is man of people you have one
hundred and two hundred and forty, two hundred forty employees. And when you
have two hundred forty employees, you're the personnel director. And I went from
two hundred and forty employees to four. Is that a positive? It was
a no. Sharon Kennedy, God bless her. She has to mess with
all the budgets, the legislature. She's fantastic. I mean, it's it's
unbelievable the job she does. And you know, Pat Fisher and Pat de
Wine, they both have helped me a lot up there because they're very smart
lawyers, and yours truly isn't as smart as that, but they are very
smart lawyers, and they've helped me adjust to it. And I think it's
a I think the Supreme Court's great right now. And that's dogical. Now,
those guys aren't practical. They're bright and all that stuff, but you're
on You spent most of your life on the sidewalks on the main streets of
Cincinnati, and you have a practicality. Maybe these erudyte justices don't. Yeah,
yeah, I think if I bring anything to the court, it's I
always stress to them. Look, you're reading a very sterile transcript of what
happened in a trial. And I would read cases from the Supreme Court of
Ohio and other courts, appellate courts where they would disparage defense attorneys for proceeding
down some line of defense. Well, they're not in the courtroom watching jurors
roll their eyes at at another defense. You know, if you bring stuff
up, you just don't know the atmosphere of that courtroom. And I think
what I've been able to stress the best I can to the other justices is
that we need to get great deference to these trial judges and to what's going
on in these courtrooms. I've been there, as you know, a lot,
and you know, God bless them, they have the best view.
It's like second guests in a referee and you don't have instant replay. I
mean, it's just doesn't it's not a look at it this way. Also
that many times a person gets onto a bench, especially when it's the last
most powerful bench in Ohio, and they change. Very rarely does a person
go in as a liberal and come out a conservative. It's normally going as
a conservative come out as a liberal. Is there a concern that you have
now the area dot, you got your staff. I was there for the
Andy Douglas unveiling of the portrait, and I thank you and his lovely wife
Sue for inviting me in the hollow chambers. You kind of walk into carpeting.
It goes down to your ankles. You kind of walk in there,
and everyone coaches served to you. Breakfast is served. You can't buy a
meal anywhere in Ohio. And it changes. Is there a fear we have
justice Joe deaters that you're going to change they come a left ring radical liberal?
Is that possible? There's probably no possibility of that. But you know,
when I first went up there, one of my brothers said to me,
who you know, said, how do you like the new job?
I said, I love it. Everybody's nice to me. And he said
and the way he would say, he said, real nice or fake nice?
I said fake. I don't care. I don't care. Be nice.
They're nice to me. No one's mad at me. It's kind of
interesting in your job. I was in your office many times on that corner
and there'd be arrows coming from every direction. The pundits, the critics would
come after you. You had victims, advocates. You of people picketing in
front of the building, calling you everything but a white man when you made
a decision. You're always careful about two hundred and forty employees, who's gotten
pregnant, who pinched somebody in the butt, who didn't show up today?
How come you're still sick and you're looking around the arrows are hitting you from
every direction. It's like it's like taking the perverbial drink out of a fire
hose. It's just every time I believe, oh my god, look what's
going on. Every day is different. You know, somebody, some cop
shoots somebody the night before. It just comes at you constantly. In Columbus,
none of that. You have your own private parking space and a heated
garage every day, every day. As prosecutor was again, it's like guessing
who's subbing for you this week? You know, wait a minute, hang
on a second. This is the only time to hear I'm off, Is
that right? Okay? Well anyway, Christmas January February. Then I'm back
out at hard, back out at hard. But get you to answer my
question. The question is the question is this reporting to work today in a
heated parking garage up your gold embossed elevator puts up inside your chamber, people
sitting there. When you come off the elevator hand some of your listeners come
up and see the Supreme Court, so they're beautiful. It is very beautiful,
I will admit it, but there's no gold plated and you sit down
and put your feet up with your slippers. Well, as I mentioned you
before when I was prosecutor, this thinge comes at you a million different ways.
Every day is different. Last month, God bless her are Justice Sharon
Kennedy gave me our schedule for the year. Do you understand that the year?
Yeah? I don't know right. I know when I have to be
in Columbus. I know what's going on with the court that far in advance.
And now we have emergency stuff. You know, every election season brings
out thousands of lawsuits. You know, everybody's trying to sue. Everybody got
to sue everybody. What do you miss about it about not being the prosecutor?
What do you miss? What I miss is not being able to shoot
my mouth off like I used to. I mean, I used to be
Come on this show, I would challenge you if you really had statistics I
doubt you do. I think I appeared more than all your other guests combined
last ten years. I think Rob Sanders disagrees. He's the one that you
talk, you know, in Rob Sanders. That's a good subject. You
know. I heard him bad mouth of me today. And you know I
thought I trained the boy well, but apparently not. Once put a border
fence? Does that make any sense? Bar bar border fence? I don't
want to get an opinion about that because I have to rule on that.
You have to rule. Take it down right, I was swimming across the
high I want nothing to do with that. Nothing will wait to see if
it so you miss what the what's next? The excitement. I've become this
guy who yells at his TV all the time. I mean I and I
know you've been exaggerating, but I talked to you quite a bit and yell
at you. But we haven't spoken along. I haven't seen you in a
year and a half. I have to be screened, and so what what
don't you as far as the job is prosecutor, is there When I think
about your cases, and they were heartbreaking and they were difficult. I think
about the one in Blue Ash, the killing or that rode to Nathan,
I'm thinking, what the I know you can't comment on that. But every
day it's like a fight, argument, screaming, and the Supreme Court it's
like looking. It's with slippers and uh, a little bit of perier,
smoking jackets and you just sit there and stroke. You missed the excitement?
Do you miss giving interviews? Do you miss meeting the slaps? You know,
after twenty six years, I don't. I don't miss it. I
mean I'm interested in it. I watch what's going on. You know,
I went through my last my last reelection. I went through a George Soros
funded candidate who came at us with over a million dollars out of out of
Switzerland to defeat you. It was they targeted fourteen prosecutors and they won twelve.
You know San Francisco, La Chicago, all these cities Philadelphia that are
destroyed. Those were the candidates that they were supporting. And they did the
same thing to me. I survived and the prosecutor and Phoenix survived. And
that was it. Fifty You got fifty three percent of the vote. It
used to be nobody ran against you. And then with most of the experienced
great success prosecution. Forty percent of all Aimal the county residents said, we
want to make a change. Just someone George Soros wanted. It's like what,
yeah, it. Politics is a tough business and the other side has
so I know you had input in it. What did Melissa Powers bring to
the table that you thought was deserving of your position? What did she bring?
Well? She I mean, she was one of my best assistant prosecutors
I ever had. I mean, she was I can't endorse her, obviously,
but Missy Powers handled one of our toughest cases, which was Joseph Paul
Franklin, who's a serial killer who went through the Midwest. He shot two
little black kids in the neighborhood I grew up in in Bondale. It was
unsolved for decades. Missy handled it just professionally and really well. She then
went off and became a judge, and she was a very respected juvenile court
judge. And when I was leaving, yeah, obviously I talked to Missy
about it and to make sure she knew what she was getting into because it's
I'll tell you, when you're a prosecutor in a major urban area, it's
a different job. It's a great job, first of all, if you
enjoy it, it's a tremendously fun job. But there are a lot of
slings and arrows to it. You get a lot of criticism, and if
you have thin skin, the job ain't for you. And I think I
think Missy has it. I think, you know. I'm glad what she's
doing has been great so far. And we'll see where you know, how
she does not. I think it's forty eight out of fifty of the largest
fifty cities inside the counties, forty eight of the fifty are liberal Democrat prosecutors
and Hamilton County. If we go that route with the whole government in Hamilton
County now being a Democrat, I accept the county engineer. That doesn't really
count. I'm not sure who that guy is. You know who that guy
is. I don't know who he is. Republican, but I don't know
who he is. Other than that, it's all Democrats. One philosophy city
council Liz Keating could not win, and she finished tenth, spent the most
money, the most qualified, didn't get a sniff and if normal people loses
the prosecutor's office. None were in serious trouble. There's no one watching what's
going on at all completing Obviously, I'm not speaking as justice, not at
all. But what I don't understand is, and I talk to groups all
the time about separation of powers and what our jobs are. I also remind
them it's important who's on the Supreme Court. I mean I'll have to do
is look at Colorado fourty three. It's important new's on those courts and their
judicial philosophies and temperament and things like that. I mean, build the bottom
line with getting back to Missy Powers. She is a very difficult job,
and I couldn't have asked for anybody better to She's got the best shot to
hold it pro I don't know, I maybe, I mean, I can't
talk about it, talk about it, so I'm not going to. You
know, your friends on the left talk about threats to democracy. A threat
to democracy is telling the leader of the opposition party you can't run. Let's
eliminate seventy four million people that voted for the Trumpster and say, guess what,
he's a threat to democracy. So let's make sure we don't practice.
That issue is going to be intense very soon, because once one of the
major parties has the candidate. I mean, I don't I don't know what's
going to happen. Oh the hell's going to break loose once if things come
out as expected and he is the candidate. I don't know what you do.
I don't know. I don't think anybody believe we'd ever be, you
know, doing stuff, having this type of election, when someone indicted for
political purposes, Trump indicted for political purposes. I'm sure you had the ability
for a long time to ruin certain Democrats by indicting them, much less convicting
them. Indicting them. They want them indicted and convicted before the election.
It might be very you didn't. You have many circumstances. Without mentioning names,
you had the ability and power to indict democrats that you opposed. As
prosecutor, you can ruin people's lives very quickly because you have such vast discretion.
That's why soros As people target prosecutors because they affect the judicial system.
And if you have a prosecutor that chooses to ignore the law that he swored
uphold, not only do you have chaos, but you have a dangerous person
because if they choose and in my past, I've had people do it to
me. They tried to use the justice system to harm me politically, and
those kinds of people are frightening, and you know they should never re prosecutor.
I remember I'm answer your question, Bill, Yeah, we investigated public
officials all the time. Just the letting the information leak that we were even
investigating someone would be catastrophic to somebody's career. So we were always I'm sure
you've never heard any leaks out of my office saying oh, we're investigating uh,
this counselman for this, this, and this. Why would you ever
do something like that? And they're waiting to the election year itself to have
these charges metastasized in order to hurt him politically, And that's said, well,
Joe, can you hang around for the student's reporters happen each I had
the guts to do that. Yeah, well you told me off there,
don't be entertaining. I don't want to have any fun. You're boring and
fit right in. Yes, so you fit right in with our I'll be
right. And Matt Reese is not here, Matt rees Guddy's not here.
Yeah, said sad. He said, well, I'm sure. If we
can make a quick phone call, we can get Dan Carrol ken Brew on
the line. What do you think? Now, let's continue with more.
We'll see what happens. I'll try not to be entertaining, just as Joe
hang around for the Stooge Report with the Segman Dennison beautiful, can't wait.
Let's continue with more after two o'clock. Today is Sydney Abrams taking Bill Sites
to task on paying kids who don't show up at school, all on news
Radio seven hundred WLW. At First Financial Bank, we have five percent apuy
on money market accounts and high rate. Some sat