2 Supreme Court Cases In Chief Justice Scandal Unsealed, Then Quickly Resealed

By Nancy West, InDepth NH

CONCORD, NH — Secrecy is still the name of the game at the state Supreme Court as a panel of replacement judges unsealed confidential records Friday in two cases involving Gordon MacDonald and three other justices involved in the Dianne Martin employment scandal only to have them resealed hours later with no explanation.

The panel briefly unsealed the two Supreme Court cases detailing the battle by MacDonald and Justices Melissa Countway, Patrick Donovan and Bryan Gould to keep confidential even the fact that the Judicial Conduct Committee was investigating the Court’s handling of Martin’s $50,000 payout of unused benefits after being fired, then laid off as the director of the Administrative Office of the Courts.

Three days later, Martin was rehired directing the Office for Bar Admissions in a move court records indicate was intended to meet her demands so she wouldn’t file a lawsuit against the Judicial Branch for being fired while on FMLA. The court won’t say if Martin, a close ally of MacDonald’s at the court since they worked together at the Attorney General’s Office, is still working at her new job and attempts to reach her were unsuccessful.

Martin and MacDonald have both denied allegations about their personal relationship.

Court watchdog Dana Albrecht was a party to the matter as he had filed the motion to unseal the two Supreme Court cases, JD-2026-0001 and JD-2026-0003, and was downloading the suddenly unsealed records at home Friday when the court just as suddenly cut off his access to the files before he could finish downloading them all.

“At first I thought there was a computer problem,” Albrecht said. He drove to the Supreme Court in Concord Friday, was still denied access and got the afternoon resealing order from the Supreme Court clerk that stated:

“The order issued earlier today (Friday) is temporarily stayed pending a ruling on the emergency joint motion to redact and the emergency motion to stay. This order is entered by a single justice (retired Superior Court Chief Justice Tina) Nadeau, J., specially assigned under RSA 490:3, II).”

The court won’t say who filed the emergency motions.

Filling in for the Supreme Court to unseal the two cases Friday before they were resealed by Nadeau were Nadeau and Superior Court Justices Mark Attorri, Martin Honigberg, Lawrence MacLeod, and James Kennedy.

With Supreme Court oral arguments set for Tuesday, the first session since MacDonald resigned last week and admitted violating the Code of Judicial Conduct for his handling of the Martin employment matter and signing off with Justices Countway, Gould and Donovan on a misleading press release explaining what happened, some lawyers and clients are concerned about who will be hearing their appeals.

Well-known defense attorney Mark Sisti said his client Tyler Twombly is scheduled for oral arguments Tuesday at 1 p.m. at the Supreme Court in Concord.

Sisti said he plans to file a motion with the Supreme Court on Monday “challenging the composition of the panel/whatever panel is sitting on the appeal State v. Tyler Twombly, a request for complete disclosure of information about any and all individuals” hearing the appeal. Sisti said he spent Sunday afternoon at the state prison with Twombly, who was sentenced to 40 years in prison for relatively minor crimes like burglary and simple assault, explaining to him what’s going on with the court.

“I can tell you without any question we will be filing a motion tomorrow at the New Hampshire Supreme Court with regard to the composition of justices, those assigned as justices to determine his fate,” Sisti said Sunday.

“We are very concerned with the information we have acquired and very concerned about what we don’t know. We’ll be requesting information we believe would be relevant about the qualifications of those sitting on his case, deciding his fate,” Sisti said.

Since part of MacDonald’s discipline involved taking the lead in a public letter from the court including Donovan, Gould and Countway released Oct. 31, 2025, downplaying what happened in the Martin matter, Albrecht believes they may be under investigation by the JCC.

The letter was the court’s response to NHPR’s Todd Bookman’s report exposing the unusual payout to Martin “In Midst of Budget Crisis, an Unusual Move Helped Ally of NH Chief Justice Collect $50K” that was published Oct. 23, 2025.

MacDonald wrote in one of the public JCC documents: “Justices (Patrick) Donovan, (Melissa) Countway, (Bryan) Gould and I decided that a response was warranted. My memory is that Periklis Kiroutas (sic), a consultant retained by the Judicial Branch to assist with communications, prepared an initial draft of a joint statement from the four justices.

“The draft was finalized during a call with Justices Donovan, Countway, Gould, Judge (Chris) Keating, Mr. Kiroutas and Attorney Richard Lehmann, who had been retained by the Supreme Court to assist with the Attorney General’s inquiry into this matter. All those participants reviewed and approved the final version. The statement was then provided to the Union Leader and was posted on the Judicial Branch’s website,” MacDonald wrote.

The JCC initiated an inquiry into the Supreme Court and joint letter at a meeting Nov. 14, 2025 and hired attorney Philip Waystack to conduct the investigation.

When Waystack interviewed Associate Justice Countway, she informed him she would need a protective order to disclose confidential personnel information about Martin.

Waystack drafted a protective order but soon after attorney Richard Lehmann informed the Judicial Conduct Committee he was representing the four justices and sought a halt to the investigation, a different protective order and Waystack’s removal from the investigation in a motion to the JCC dated Feb. 9.

Thus began a series of motions and objections to the investigation from Lehmann centering on preventing the JCC from releasing a statement that it had opened an inquiry into the matter and the inquiry should be confidential.

Lehmann, as late as mid-July on behalf of Donovan, Countway and Gould, continued to push to prevent a press release from being issued, and a different protective order than the one approved by the committee earlier.

Lehmann, who also serves as counsel to the state Senate, didn’t respond to InDepthNH.org’s request for comment.

The JCC summary of the agreement with MacDonald to avoid a public hearing said: “Finally, the press release issued by the Court on October 31, 2025, under MacDonald’s leadership did not accurately portray the process for Martin’s removal and rehire to a new position. It created the misimpression that her removal and rehire was part of a routine administrative reorganization of the AOC.”

Albrecht said he believes Justices Countway, Donovan and Gould are implicated in what he called the “employment scheme.” Before they were resealed Friday, Albrecht shared what he received of the documents before they were resealed with InDepthNH.org.

There appear to be no public documents that state Countway, Donovan and Gould didn’t violate the code of judicial conduct when they signed the public statement along with MacDonald that the JCC said contained “misinformation,” although at times they are referred to as witnesses in the JCC investigation into the court.

“I think they (Countway, Donovan and Gould) are basically accomplices to what (MacDonald) did,” Albrecht said. If the JCC isn’t still investigating them, Albrecht believes they should be.

Albrecht said he became a court watchdog and court critic because of his mistreatment by a judge in 2021 during his own divorce.

“I just like to see the public get a fair deal,” Albrecht said.

InDepthNH.org’s State House bureau chief Garry Rayno contributed to this report.

This story was originally published by InDepth NH.