ELLICOTVILLE TOWN JUSTICE RESIGNS
Judith P. Chapman, a non-lawyer who has served as Ellicotville’s Town Justice since 1994, has resigned, avoiding likely sanctions by The Commission on Judicial Conduct. A complaint against Chapman alleged that, due to her failure to assign counsel in a “timely manner or altogether” in three cases, three defendants were stuck in jail without access to attorneys for a week each. Administrative violations were also alleged, including failure to deposit bail monies in six cases; turn over fine receipts to the state comptroller in 22 cases “despite the Commission’s prior censure for such conduct;” failing to act on a criminal case for so long that the charge was dismissed; and neglecting to order pre-sentence investigations in three cases, causing sentencing to be delayed for months. In exchange for a stipulation that Chapmen would never again seek or accept judicial office, the CJC agreed to close its investigation of her alleged actions.

"THE GRASSO CASE IS OVER" 
Former New York Stock Exchange chairman Dick Grasso is off the hook. As The New York Times reports, the Appellate Division yesterday reversed a lower court decision and ruled that Grasso could keep more than $100 million in compensation. In a 3-1 decision, the appeals court reasoned that since the stock exchange had been converted from a nonprofit to a for-profit corporation in its 2006 merger with Archipelago Holdings, the attorney general had no basis to sue Grasso on behalf of the public. “Thus, for all intents and purposes, the Grasso case is over,” attorney general Andrew Cuomo said in a statement. Cuomo had inherited the case from its vociferous champion, Eliot Spitzer.

"FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT PURPOSES ONLY" 
Acting Albany Supreme Court Justice Robert McDonough has ordered the city of Albany to turn over records of illegal machine gun purchases made by local police officers to The Albany Times Union. The Times Union had filed a Freedom of Information Law request seeking access to the illegal purchases, which were made on Albany Police Department stationary, and under the guise of “law enforcement purposes.” Normally such weapons, called “Title II weapons” under federal law, are subject to tight regulation and can only be bought by police or military units.

GARSON'S GREED GARNISHED
The New York Times also reports on the sentencing of former Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Michael J. Garson, for his role in a forgery scheme that helped him obtain control of his ailing aunt’s finances. Garson avoided jail time, resigned from the bar, and agreed to repay his aunt’s estate $219,000. Nassau County Judge John Kase presided.

PAKISTAN'S JUDGES AND PRESIDENT BUSH 
Finally, The New York Law journal report on a prominent Pakistani lawyer’s appeal to the New York Bar Association over President Bush’s “silence” on the matter of 60 Pakistani Supreme Court and appellate judges ousted by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, who feared they would oppose or disallow his policies. Aitzaz Ahsan, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association of Pakistan, said Bush had “stalled the process” of reinstating the judges, while not speaking “a word, a syllable” to protest the five-month house arrest of Pakistan’s chief justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. Ahsan said the administration “does not want to embarrass” Musharraf, but that its inaction has been “noticed in Pakistan” and is “a tragedy in the larger context and canvas of Pakistan’s place in the world.”