MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Seven retired judges, including a former governor, were selected randomly in a lottery Monday to hear Roy Moore's appeal of his ouster as chief justice, the latest unprecedented twist in his Ten Commandments case.
The drawing came just hours after all eight Supreme Court justices disqualified themselves from hearing the appeal because of their earlier involvement in the monument case.
Moore was ousted on Nov. 13 by a judicial ethics panel for refusing to obey a federal judge's order to remove his 5,300-pound Ten Commandments monument from the rotunda of the state judicial building. The eight justices had the monument moved to a storage room in August after Moore refused to do so.