Judicial Reports: LexPress: Preside and Conquer

By Lily Henning

Posted 09-27-06

 

A report about internecine warfare in the appellate division, another depressing dispatch on New York's Podunk justice, and the Manhattan DA's office takes a beating. 

 

PRESIDE AND CONQUER
Daniel Wise in The New York Law Journal reports that John Buckley, presiding judge of the First Department Appellate Division, will stick around until the end of the year. Which in itself might not seem like news. But the story is really about Judge James McGuire, who joined the bench a year ago and wants the presiding judge post. Accused by anonymous court colleagues of being “confrontational” and “abrasive”, McGuire is a close favorite of Governor George Pataki, for whom he was counsel. A frequent dissenter, McGuire is blamed by critics for slowing down the court’s disposition rate — but lauded by supporters for improving the court’s “deliberative character.”

KANGAROO COURTS, PART 3
The last in a series of three articles in The New York Times on town and village courts in New York appears today. William Glaberson gives us a historical overview of the courts and attempts at reform, opening with a quote from Franklin Delano Roosevelt — when he was governor — about the sorry state of New York’s courts. The two earlier articles in the series “Broken Bench” are on the paper’s list of top ten most emailed stories today . . . (The Times also devotes a lengthy effort to looking at the “colorful but largely overlooked career” of Vincent “Vinny Gorgeous” Basciano. The one-time acting boss of the Bonanno organized crime family, Basciano is accused of putting a hit on Judge Nicholas Garaufis, who sits on the federal district court in Manhattan.)

 

JUSTICE DELAYED, DA FLAYED
Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Bonnie Wittner dismissed charges yesterday against Thomas Morales, one of the men indicted in the infamous 1990 murder of a bouncer at the Palladium nightclub. Wittner ruled that Morales, who was indicted in April 2005, had not been accorded his right to a speedy trial, reports the New York Sun (and others.) Convictions of two other men in the same case were overturned, and DA Robert M. Morgenthau's office comes in for some throttling along the way. the Sun also reports that institutional investors in Wendy’s are asking a New York Supreme Court judge to stop the chain from spinning off its baked goods and  coffee chain, called Tim Hortons. Wait – Wendy’s and croissants? And for some reason reporter Matthew Chayes keeps the presiding judge’s name a mystery.

 

Posted by Dirk on September 27, 2006 10:39 AM to Judicial Reports