News File Photo Judge Ed Black, right, is pictured.

ALPENA — A judge can be fair even if someone doesn’t like him, Judge Ed Black said in court on Monday, ruling that he won’t recuse himself from presiding over the case of David Frey.

Frey, accused of attempted home invasion and destruction of property, said in a motion filed with Alpena’s 26th Circuit Court that Black can’t be fair because of past encounters between him and the judge while Black was Alpena County prosecutor.

In his former position, Black prosecuted seven cases involving Frey, including investigating him for murder, according to defense attorney Alan Curtis.

Frey has a known grudge against Black, his attorney said, and has, on at least one occasion, confronted the now-judge, accusing him of unfairness. The defendant has also made disparaging remarks about Black in public, Curtis said.

If there’s been enough verbal abuse, Curtis said, “It almost sinks into the judge’s psyche, and it’s kind of tainted.”

Curtis said attorneys and other community members he’s talked to have been shocked that Black is continuing to preside over Frey’s case.

“In every case where somebody doesn’t like my decision, if they start stating things in public, I should therefore recuse myself?” the judge asked Curtis.

Black said that, as prosecutor, he stepped away from one case involving Frey after learning of the defendant’s anger toward him. That was done, he said, not because of ill will on his own part, but because he didn’t want the defendant to think any decisions were being made for an improper purpose.

He hasn’t interacted with cases against Frey since 2013, and he didn’t authorize charges against Frey in several other instances for lack of evidence, he said.

“I don’t see that there’s any actual prejudice there,” Black told Curtis, “or that there’s any apparent prejudice, despite what your straw poll says.”

Black denied Curtis’s motion for recusal.

Black lowered Frey’s bond amount from $150,000 cash or surety to $50,000. Curtis said the higher amount was insurmountable for his client and also based on charges that have since been dismissed.

The bond is equal to that set for Frey in another case recently bound over to circuit court involving destruction of police property after a window was cracked at the Alpena County Jail after Frey’s arrest.

Also in court on Monday, Austin Phillips — in court without an attorney and facing a charge of delivery of methamphetamine — demanded a new venue and said Black will be biased if Phillips chooses to go to a bench trial. In a bench trial, a judge rules on a defendant’s guilt, instead of a jury.

Black asked the defendant to put his concerns in writing and file them with the court. If Phillips disagrees with Black’s ruling on the motion, he can appeal to the circuit’s chief judge, Black said.