JUSTICE BUILDING BLOG

WELCOME TO THE OFFICIAL RICHARD E GERSTEIN JUSTICE BUILDING BLOG. THIS BLOG IS DEDICATED TO JUSTICE BUILDING RUMOR, HUMOR, AND A DISCUSSION ABOUT AND BETWEEN THE JUDGES, LAWYERS AND THE DEDICATED SUPPORT STAFF, CLERKS, COURT REPORTERS, AND CORRECTIONAL OFFICERS WHO LABOR IN THE WORLD OF MIAMI'S CRIMINAL JUSTICE. POST YOUR COMMENTS, OR SEND RUMPOLE A PRIVATE EMAIL AT HOWARDROARK21@GMAIL.COM. Winner of the prestigious Cushing Left Anterior Descending Artery Award.

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

JACK DANIELS AND JUDGES WHO CURSE

Longtime and careful readers of the blog know our interest in obituaries and a life well lived. And while we note the passing of Eunice Shriver, sister of Ted, Bobby and JFK, it is the life and death of Jimmy Bedford that has caught our attention.

Jimmy Bedford's NY Times Obituary is here.
For twenty years Mr. Bedford was the sixth master of the Jack Daniels distillery.
Mr. Bedford's responsibilities included making sure Jack Daniels Old#7 never changed. That responsibility included sipping the batches of whiskey to ensure that the taste was the same.

There are tougher ways to make a living.

CURSES!

All rise for the honorable Judge Jeffrey Marcuzzo of Omaha, Nebraska.
Now this is a judge we can do business with.

Unfortunately Judge Marcuzzo has been suspended for 120 days by the Nebraska Supreme Court. It seems that two attorneys who were litigating against each other agreed to change the date of a motion scheduled before Judge Marcuzzo. Judge Marcuzzo called the prosecutor and left the following voice mail about the hearing being changed without his consent: (Warning: X rated)

I did not appreciate that one f— bit. And if I find out you ever did that again to me or any other members of the county court bench, I’ll shove the rest of it up your a — so f— far it will make your throat hurt.
278 Neb. 331. WSJ Law Blog here.

Now that's a Judge we could do business with!! No legalese. Straight from the heart. You know where you stand with Judge Marcuzzo. And that's just fine with us.

See you in court. Let's see if we can find a Judge Marcuzzo around these parts.



26 comments:

Anonymous said...

That sounds like what a few Broward judges would say.

Anonymous said...

I can see already that the blog will soon be full of Judge Snyder/Judge Margolius stories that put the Nebraska judge to shame. For instance, I was in Judge Snyder's chambers when he responded to APD Joe Imperato's message that his client wanted to ask the judge for a probation plea with the following (on the record) comment: "I have a message for your client--fuck you!"

Anonymous said...

We had our Marcuzzo. Remember? Sidebar: "State, make a reasonable offer or I'm going to f.... dismiss this case!" or "The state's offer is very reasonable, so tell your client that if he loses at trial I'm going to f... max him out!" Trivia question of the day, who was that judge?

Anonymous said...

Jeri Cohen has a mouth (minus) the profanity. Read some of the transcripts out of Court.

Anonymous said...

Jeri Beth Cohen does have a mouth, but her heart is in the right place, and she is very astute. She usually only belittles the clients, who in most cases, deserve it, since no one has ever told it to them straight.

Anonymous said...

10:45 - That has to be Margolius. The embarrasment of the Miami Dade County bench.

Anonymous said...

While Judge Marcuzzo could have stated his displeasure to the prosecutor in far more diplomatic terms, he was 150% right about being pissed at the attorneys for agreeing to change a hearing without his input. A 120 day suspension over that message? Load of crap.

Anonymous said...

Same thing, without the profanity, happened to me as a young prosecutor in County Court. A case was set for trial on a Wednesday in front of a brand-spankin' new judge eager for trial experience. On Monday, the PD notified us that the in-custody D was now willing to take the non-jail plea (which he'd previously rejected) to get out. Rather than sit him in custody for the extra two days until the trial date, we had the case set in division for a report re: plea. The case pled Monday afternoon, and D was out that evening. The PD left a message for the trial judge (who was not the division judge) about the plea.

The next day, the trial judge calls the PD's division chief and my chief ranting that he or she (I dare not even hint at the identity) is considering filing a bar complaint against us for failing to get his or her approval of the plea (which was approved by the division judge).

Luckily our chiefs, both of whom were solid attorneys and well-respected supervisors, talked the judge out of it. The judge insisted that we apologize to him/ her in writing. Apparently, the "appropriate" thing to do was to plea the case on Wednesday in front of him/ her, despite the fact that D would needlessly have sat in the DCJ for two extra days.

I realize in retrospect that the stat-hungry judge would never have accepted any plea in the case, as s/he wanted a trial. This was an example, hopefully rare, of justice taking a back seat to judicial ego.

Anonymous said...

dont forget levenson, she had a few classics as well

fake steve bustamante said...

Best Margolius story?

It was well known he tolerated no talking in court. He held two individuals- a deaf man and his interpreter in contempt of court for signing to each other.

Classic

Anonymous said...

Rump,

You should put up a poll for the most pleasant judge in county court. I know who would get virtually no votes.

His name rhymes with Schmeraphin.

Anonymous said...

Another Arthur Snyder story:

After the Judge had granted my sworn motion to dismiss a Hurricane Andrew burglary case, since the "dwelling" in question did not have a roof on it at the time that the defendants entered, he says (on the record) to the defendants, as they're walking out of the court, that "I don't have any legal basis to sentence you to anything in this case, but I hope that, as you're walking across the street after you've left the courtroom that you get run over by a truck."

Anonymous said...

2 TRUE ARTHUR SNYDER STORIES

1- after an opening statement in a drug trafficking trial, the Judge sua sponte said "that's all you've got?" JOA. (It just so happened Ed O'Donnell and Richard Gerstein were the defense counsel, surprise surprise).

2- STu Miskink comes to court on rules to show cause. Snyder yells at state and says all witnesses are stricken.
Stu sends an order in the mail and Snyder signs it without looking at it.

a few months later case proceeds to trial. Stu asks no questions in voire dire. Gives no opening statement.

State calls first witness. Stu stands up to object, but sits down. State says to witness- "State your name"
Stu objects.

Snyder asks for grounds. Stu stands up gently holding the order which had been filed by one corner and says "by order of the court."

Snyder sends the jury out of the room and goes crazy, he was so angry he didn't know who to yell at more.

Anonymous said...

Read the comments section of today WSJ Law Blog. Apparently the 120 day suspension also included conduct for imporperly attempting to influence a crminal case where his nephew was the Defendnat.

Anonymous said...

10:45 p.m., that's got to be Snyder too.

Anonymous said...

I once saw a defendant provide Judge Margolius with a form stating that she had performed her community service hours at a church. The judge turned to the prosecutor and asked if the state waa satisfied with the hours. The prosecutor called the church's sacristan as witness. When he testified that the defendant never did any community service hours at his church and that the completion paper was fake, Margolius immediately held her in contemp[t, gave her 180 days and took her into custody.

Anonymous said...

Rump
I saw Margolius put an Attorney in the box for talking .. TO HIS CLIENT in the middle of the client's PVH.He was asking the client a question in order to respond to the State and Rick put the Attorney and Client in the box for talking in court.lol

Anonymous said...

I loved Art Snyder.

If you passed the poly, you walked even on drug trafficking cases.

If you were late for court, you were in the box. (Defendants)

He gave the fairest trials I ever had as both a prosecutor and later as a defense attorney.

He knew when people were bullshitting him and did not take crap from anyone.

After a cop was convicted and he had to give him 15 mm, for coke trafficking, he said, "sorry pal, I think you were screwed and good luck."

Sorry, Art was a bit crazy but, I loved him.

Mike Catalano

Anonymous said...

11:40 am jeri beth is swamp dumb.

dresnick flips his lid like this and says stupid stuff on teh record as well as in chambers

Anonymous said...

4;13 - gerstein was the diriest prosecutor ever - he took so many bribes it was not funny

Rumpole said...

He's tried more cases than you.....sign YOUR name CLOWN.

Scott Saul said...

I had a ridiculous "burglary with a battery" where my drunken client reached through a window and grabbed somebody's hair. The client was a professional with a family. When Snyder inquired to the prosecutor if it was really necessary to keep the guy locked up, the arrogant prosecutor remarked that an "Arthur hearing" was required of which Snyder had no jurisdiction.

Snyder responded "I am Arthur!" and this is the hearing... $5000 bond ...next case.

No matter what you thought of him, he was a great guy off the bench. The old timers were great b/c they sifted through the crap and were not scared to take a stand.

Anonymous said...

Hey 7 15. At what point is the taking of bribes no longer funny. I guess being on the take is worth a good laugh but do it once too often and it becomes serious.

Anonymous said...

Scott, thanks for the memory of the time you beat an "arrogant" b-level prosecutor on a stupid case. What have you done lately except show up for court in jeans and blab on the blog.

Anonymous said...

7:15, I hope you are not a lawyer. Gerstein was investigated several times and they found nothing. Why, you may ask, because he did nothing wrong. You show as much intellect as Sara Palin--very fucking scary.

Anonymous said...

Dick Gerstein was a great man and a greta public official. Why, Rumpole, print such a libelous comment about a guy who served well and has been dead for so long?