A Jefferson County judge is stepping away from a case involving the Birmingham Water Works Board after lawyers questioned his impartiality and cited a terse email as evidence.

Judge Fred Bolling Tuesday issued an order recusing himself at the request of the utility to avoid “the media circus.”

The civil case before Bolling involved a lawsuit brought by small business owner Sherry McCostlin, who is challenging thousands of dollars in water bills charged by the water works.

The situation began with an email that Bolling – before he was a judge – sent to chief water works attorney Mark Parnell after Bolling’s legal services were discontinued in late 2021.

Bolling, in the email, told Parnell to never contact him again and accused him of inappropriate “underhanded maneuverings.”

He described Parnell as a greedy lawyer.

“You are not representing anyone but your own greed and I pray that karma and justice finds it(s) way to your doorstep,” Bolling wrote in 2021.

He ended the message with an ironic salutation:

“Be blessed.”

Bolling became a judge in 2025.

Water works attorneys included the entire email conversation in the court filing, citing the bitter exchange as a reason why Bolling should step aside in the current case against the utility.

When stepping aside from the case, Bolling noted that the disdain in the 2021 email was not directed at the water works itself.

“To be clear, the comments previously made were directed in a singular direction. They did not include any animosity toward the Birmingham Water Works Board and utility, which Judge Bolling proudly served as an attorney,” Bolling wrote, referring to himself in the third person. “The comments made by attorney Bolling used the terms ‘you’ and ‘your,’ and the aim of those comments should have been reasonably and abundantly clear.”

Bolling said he had a right to stay on the case but would leave to avoid creating a distraction.

Although he had no beef with the water works in 2021, Bolling has since gone up against the board in court.

In 2024, Bolling sued the water works board on behalf of then-board member Lucien Blankenship in a dispute over a board “loyalty pledge” that Blankenship refused to sign. Then-board member George Munchus was also a plaintiff.

That dispute was created when board leadership refused to pay the two members their $1 monthly stipend after they declined to sign a code of conduct. Both men said they had philosophical objections to the wording of the document.

Bolling in his recusal referred to that legal case as well, and placed the blame on Parnell, the water works attorney. He said Parnell had created “what was nothing more than a loyalty pledge aimed at quieting criticism of the board’s resources.”

He wrote that “Attorney Bolling simply wanted to have the board members who had done the work receive the approved allowance.”

Parnell, who is not directly involved in the current case but leads the water works legal team, told AL.com earlier that the utility had asked that the motion be sealed and not made public, but Bolling did otherwise.

“We asked to file it under seal out of respect for Judge Bolling and to protect his reputation,” Parnell said earlier. “It’s unfortunate that this email is now part of the public record. While it may not be in my personal interests to have this in the public record, I have a duty to protect my client’s interests and point out this potential conflict.”