The 96-Year-Old Brooklyn Judge Standing Up to the Supreme Court.
'A 96-year-old federal judge in Brooklyn had a “Hey, kids, get off my lawn” moment this week.
The kids in question: the United States Supreme Court.
The (metaphorical) lawn: the public’s power to hold the police accountable for misconduct and abuse.
In a spirited decision issued Monday, the judge, Jack B. Weinstein, argued that the justices had gone too far in a pair of recent rulings expanding qualified immunity, a legal doctrine that protects law-enforcement officers from being sued for actions they perform on the job. Judge Weinstein complained that the broadened doctrine now protects “all but the plainly incompetent.”
“The Supreme Court’s recent emphasis on shielding public officials and federal and local law enforcement means many individuals who suffer a constitutional deprivation will have no redress,” he wrote.
The unusual rebuke came in a case in which Judge Weinstein denied immunity to four Brooklyn officers accused of having assaulted a man after he had refused to let them into his apartment without a warrant. The officers maintained that they could not be sued for misconduct in the case because they were simply doing their jobs. Judge Weinstein refused to dismiss the suit, saying that the arguments would have to be weighed by a jury at a trial.
Judge Weinstein, who has sat in Federal District Court in Brooklyn since 1967, has long been known for his progressive leanings and iconoclastic temperament. In recent years, he has produced a spate of rulings that has caught the attention of both the local bar and his colleagues on the bench. . .
Acknowledging that a district judge has no power to affect a high court ruling, Professor Capers said Judge Weinstein seemed to be addressing his decision not so much to the justices themselves as to the public.
“It’s written in a way that he seems to have a larger audience in mind,” Professor Capers said. “He seems to be saying, ‘Look at what’s going on.’”'>>>
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/14/nyregion/the-96-year-old-brooklyn-judge-standing-up-to-the-supreme-court.html?
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