Hanging judge

"Hanging judge" is an unofficial term for a judge who has gained renown for punishment by sentencing convicted criminals to death by hanging.

More broadly, the term is applied to judges who have gained a reputation for imposing unusually harsh sentences, even in jurisdictions where the death penalty has been abolished. While the term is not necessarily negative, it is used to demonstrate a desire for quick, firm justice. The term "hanging judge" was generally applied to officers of the court with mandates, as opposed to extralegal lynch law.

Reputed hanging judges

• Roy Bean, US Justice of the Peace
• Sir Matthew Baillie Begbie, Chief Justice of British Columbia, from 1858 to 1894
• Roland Freisler, infamous Nazi Judge presiding over Hitler's People's Court
• The Guillotine Club, as the Hanging Judges of Manila were known
• George Jeffreys of England and Wales
• Henry Hawkins
• Ayatollah Sadegh Khalkhali
• Joseph Needham
• Lord Norbury, from County Tipperary, Ireland
• Isaac Parker
• Albert F. Sabo, presiding judge in the trial of Mumia Abu-Jamal
• Choor Singh, former judge of the Supreme Court of Singapore
• Vasiliy Ulrikh, judge of Stalinist show trials
• Judge Dodds, Liverpool County Court

Other uses

• A track on the Sodom album 'Til Death Do Us Unite
• A character in the Bob Dylan song "Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts" (album: Blood on the Tracks).
• Justice Wargrave in Agatha Christie's novel Ten Little Niggers (Published as And Then There Were None in the United States)
• The Hanging Judge (film), a 1918 film directed by Henry Edwards