EDUARDO MOLINE O'CONNOR

Last week Eduardo Moliné O'Connor was removed from the Argentine Supreme Court by a vote of 46 - 18 in the Senate. A two-third's vote is required for removal. Read MSNBC's short article here, NDTV's article here, an article on Swissinfo here, an article from Ocnus.net here, and this editorial from La Nacion. The article from Ocnus.net helps to flesh out the precise charges against O'Connor:

In its articles of impeachment, the lower house charged him with using his position on the Supreme Court to favor a private company that was demanding the government pay the balance on a multi-million-dollar contract whose validity was being questioned by state auditors.

He was also accused of sabotaging probes into tax evasion and car smuggling by exceeding his authority to impose sanctions on two lower-court judges who were leading those investigations.

O'Connor became a Supreme Court judge on Aug. 6, 1990, and formed part of the so-called "automatic majority" that consistently favored the 1989-1990 government of Carlos Menem.

Take a look also at this e-mail from Jonathan Miller on the Conlawprof list-serv that argues that the politicized nature of O'Connor's judicial opinions might justify the removal. The Argentine Constitution allows for removal for "improper performance." See also this post as Statutory Construction Zone for some pictures of the Argentine Supreme Court and a few additional links.