From HeraldNews.com

The Bristol County Sheriff Department’s director of medical services, who previously admitted to violating a code of conduct as a judge, has resigned just before a scheduled disciplinary hearing.

Michael Livingstone, a member of the Sheriff’s Department since 2008, resigned only an hour before a hearing was scheduled on a matter “serious enough that we felt there was reason for a disciplinary hearing,” Sheriff Thomas Hodgson said Wednesday. He was unable to give details of the complaint because it was a personnel matter.

The Sheriff Department’s internal affairs office began looking into a complaint against Livingstone and had scheduled a hearing for Sept. 20. Livingstone gave his resignation effective immediately.

Hodgson said he was disappointed in Livingstone’s resignation, calling the medical services director an efficient worker “who accomplished an awful lot” with the department. “He did an incredible job,” he said.

Livingstone’s lawyer couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Before his time with the Sheriff’s Department, Livingstone retired from his judgeship in 2008 after admitting he violated the code of judicial conduct. He was charged in 2007 with threatening a tenant, making a false statement in an affidavit and having an illegal agreement with a lawyer in which the lawyer would take over his clients once he became judge and give him a share of the legal fees.

In his letter of resignation as associate justice of the probate and family court, Livingstone said he never intended for the “appearance of impropriety” but “sincerely” regretted it.

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