Commission recommends reprimand for Nome Superior Court judge on paid leave for nearly a year

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The Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct has recommended a Nome judge be reprimanded for behavior including using offensive accents to impersonate people from other ethnic groups, and keeping a courtroom of attorneys waiting for an hour while he watched a sports game.

The recommendation came after a brief hearing Friday in which members of the commission, which is charged with investigating allegations of misconduct in Alaska’s judiciary, agreed with a special prosecutor that Nome Superior Court Judge Romano DiBenedetto had broken judicial ethics canon and undermined public trust in his position.

DiBenedetto was placed on paid administrative leave on March 23, 2025, according to the Alaska Court System. Since then, the Nome area has been without a regular judge for nearly a year.

The Alaska Supreme Court will determine what happens next for DiBenedetto. Sanctions can range from reprimand or censure to retirement, suspension or removal from office.

In a statement, DiBenedetto’s attorney John Cashion wrote that the judge “cooperated with the Commission on Judicial Conduct throughout the entirety of the proceedings, worked cooperatively with the Commission’s Special Counsel, and stipulated to the findings of fact advanced to the Alaska Supreme Court.”

“At this point, the matter is in the hands of the Alaska Supreme Court, and we will not have any further comment until they have evaluated the agreed upon recommendation for discipline,” Cashion wrote.

The state is paying DiBenedetto his full salary of $259,729.08 while he is on administrative leave, according to a spokesperson for the Alaska Court System. He is not working while on leave.

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