Courtroom Yawner Jailed for Six Months

Clifton Williams arrived at the Will County Courthouse in Joliet and sat in the fourth-floor courtroom where his cousin was pleading guilty to a felony drug charge.

As Circuit Judge Daniel Rozak handed down the cousin's sentence -- 2 years' probation -- Williams, 33, stretched and let out a very ill-timed yawn....

Williams' sentence? Six months in jail -- the maximum penalty for criminal contempt without a jury trial. The Richton Park man was locked up July 23 and will serve at least 21 days...

The prosecutor in the courtroom [said] "it was not a simple yawn -- it was a loud and boisterous attempt to disrupt the proceedings."...

Rozak's order sentencing Williams to 6 months in jail found that he "raised his hands while at the same time making a loud yawning sound" that caused the judge to "break from the proceedings."


Even though six months seems way too harsh -- 24 hours would have been more than enough --- I don't believe for a second that this yawn was involuntary or so difficult to control that it didn't rise to the level of some sort of inchoate statement of disrespect for the judge.

Who hasn't heard a child say, "I wasn't sighing, I was just breathing!" "I wasn't talking to you I was just talking to myself" "I just shut the door, I didn't slam it" or any of a number of other patently false excuses for exhibitions of what they hoped was subtle insolence?
Jason Mayfield, the cousin of Williams who was pleading guilty at the time, said it was "not an outrageous yawn."


Perhaps not. But neither is the idea that it amounted to contempt of court.