Judge Christopher announces resignation

In a letter dated March 15, District Court Judge Kim Christopher informed Supreme Court Chief Justice Mike McGrath that she is officially stepping down from her duties April 5. She calls the decision to resign “especially bittersweet,” given her family’s long history in Lake and Sanders counties.

Rumors about the judge’s impending retirement had been swirling since March 8, when Christopher closed her campaign fundraising account with the Commissioner of Political Practices. However, even as of Tuesday her name remained on the Secretary of State’s website.

Her letter to McCrath makes her intentions clear.

Christopher leaves office after nearly 24 years on the bench and winning four elections. In her letter to McGrath, she tallies several milestones: she was the ranking female officer and one of 25 women out of 750 troops at Airborne School in Fort Benning, Ga., and served as an Airborne Captain in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps. She returned to Montana to work as deputy Cascade County Attorney before joining what’s now the Turnage, Mercer and Wall Law Firm in her hometown of Polson.

She became the first female Lake County Attorney and was the first female judge elected to the 20th Judicial District “and there were not many of us at that time.”

“I do not share that as a feminist,” she writes to McGrath. “But because it was so critical to me to do it right, so I did not wreck it for the next girl coming along my path.”

She recounts some of her more memorable cases, including prosecution of State vs. Rodney Sattler in 1996 – the last capital case tried and successfully prosecuted by a county attorney in Montana.

She also mentioned a lawsuit against Hyundai Motor Company, which resulted in a $240 million punitive award (later reduced to $73 million) against the car manufacturer in 2014 for a steering defect that killed two teenagers. The jury also provided $8.1 million in compensatory damages to the boys’ families.

The case yielded the fifth largest monetary verdict in the country at that time “and allowed the jury to send the message that Montana lives mattered,” she wrote.

She also reflected on her work, alongside the efforts of her Judicial Assistant Rose Bridenstine, to build a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program to serve children who must navigate the legal system. That program has flourished and now covers Lake and Sanders counties and the Flathead Reservation.

Christopher describes herself as idealistic, compassionate and tough, and said that her tenure on the bench taught her “so much about people’s lives, professions, qualities and flaws.”

She writes that she took time to thoroughly review each case set for hearing. “I learned the intricacies of each with a focus on each party, the facts as they saw them and the law as I applied it.”

Christopher also mentions the important role of the Supreme Court in reviewing lower court decisions. “As you also know I didn’t get it right all the time and I was always thankful to know if I got it wrong, there were seven Supreme Court Justices who would fix it,” she writes.

She concludes the letter thanking the citizens who supported her, the custodians at the courthouse who let her into her locked office after hours, and “all the personnel in the judicial branch,” making special mention of her assistants Shari Puryer and LeeAnn Erickson and her law clerks.

“Having ‘Judge’ as a first name has been an honor and a privilege,” she concludes.

Polson attorney Britt Cotter has filed to run for Christopher’s seat, but the question remains who will fill her shoes in the interim between April 5 and Dec. 31, when her term expires. Typically, when a judge steps down mid-term the governor appoints a selection committee to interview applicants and recommend a temporary replacement – a process that often takes up to three months.