Pulaski County Circuit Judge Timothy Fox stands accused in a lawsuit of falsely branding attorney Luther Sutter as a misogynist and portraying him as an unethical, discriminatory and abusive lawyer.
Sutter has sued Fox and is seeking damages of more than $3 million, escalating the battle between the two members of the bar.
“I deeply regret that Judge Fox and I find ourselves in this position,” Sutter recently told Arkansas Business. “Judge Fox has been given every opportunity to make this right, and he has refused to do so. I intend to hold him accountable to the fullest extent allowed by the law, and I won’t stop until I do.”
The dispute comes as Sutter is a candidate in the March election for a circuit judge position in the 2nd Judicial Circuit, which includes Jonesboro.
Sutter sued Fox last month in Pulaski County Circuit Court after Fox referred Sutter to prosecuting attorneys in Pulaski and Craighead counties, apparently to investigate possible perjury and election law violations in connection with answers Sutter gave about his residency during a June 2024 deposition.
Fox began probing after he reviewed Sutter’s deposition taken for a lawsuit before Fox’s court where Sutter was a plaintiff, along with his wife, in a case involving a 2022 motor vehicle crash.
Fox said in the Dec. 2 order that he was aware of the deposition only because the defense attorney “felt physically threatened or intimidated by how angry plaintiff Sutter was during the taking of the deposition.” (In a Dec. 8 email to Sutter, the defense attorney, Michael M. Harrison of Friday Eldredge & Clark’s Little Rock office, said that she never claimed she felt threatened during the deposition.)
Sutter denied making any threats or intimidating conduct during his deposition, according to his lawsuit filed by attorney Jason Stuart of Heath, Texas. He also said he was truthful in the deposition.
After Fox’s order was filed and he recused himself from the case, Sutter submitted an Arkansas Freedom of Information Act request to Fox’s trial court administrator, who is a woman, for records in connection with the deposition.
Fox responded to the FOI in a letter and used the opportunity “to further defame and smear Sutter,” the suit said.
“This now makes two (2) instances, of which this court is aware, of your misogynistic behavior toward female professionals in the legal system,” Fox wrote in the letter — which isn’t a court order.
Fox said that he was sending his Dec. 11 letter to the opposing counsel in all of Sutter’s 16 cases pending in his courtroom. Fox also told Sutter that he had to tell his clients about the FOI letter and response and that Fox would quiz them about it in court. In addition, Fox said he would tell the other circuit judges in the 6th Judicial Circuit of Sutter’s “efforts to bully and intimidate” Fox’s staff.
“By branding Sutter a ‘misogynist’ and implying criminal and unethical conduct, Fox intended to and did smear Sutter in the eyes of other judges, court personnel, lawyers, and potential clients,” Sutter’s lawsuit said.
In addition to the damages, Sutter is asking for a judgment that says he didn’t engage in any of the conduct that Fox accused him of doing. Fox had not filed a response in the case as of Jan. 16, and he didn’t return a call for comment.
Robert Steinbuch, a law professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Bowen School of Law, who was familiar with the case but not involved in it, told Arkansas Business that the situation is unusual. He suggested that the dispute could be resolved either by the Judicial Discipline & Disability Commission, which oversees the conduct of judges, or by the Arkansas Supreme Court, which has superintending authority over all lower courts. He said the Supreme Court could undo anything that Fox has done. “And, in addition, they can sanction him for going outside the scope … of his authority,” he said.
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