Posted on 08/19/2008 10:41:09 PM PDT by Stoat
Tuesday, August 19th 2008, 4:21 PM
Anti-war activists who claim they were wrongly locked up by the NYPD during a 2003 protest won a $2 million settlement from the city Tuesday.
Led by plaintiff Sarah Kunstler - the daughter of famed civil rights lawyer Bill Kunstler - the 52 protestors claimed victory.
"We hope our victory helps convince the city to stop violating people's rights as a matter of policy and stop wasting taxpayers' money doing so," Kunstler said.
City lawyers said the deal was not an admission of any wrong doing, but simply the most cost effective solution to what would have been a lengthy and expensive legal battle.
The settlement comes after criminal charges were dropped against all 94 people who protested outside the Carlyle Group in April 2003.
Kunstler, a filmmaker and attorney, was acquitted of additional criminal charges stemming from protest against Carlyle's contracts in Iraq.
The lawsuit against the city claimed the protestors were not blocking the sidewalk and were not asked to disperse before cops penned them in and arrested them.
That tactic, panned by legal observers and civil rights activists and praised by law enforcement, became the model for arrests during the Republican National Convention in 2004.
"The NYPD violated core constitutional rights when it arrested a group of peaceful demonstrators who were lawfully protesting against the commencement of the Iraq war and those who stood to profit from it," said Sarah Netburn, an attorney on the case.
Lawyers for the city claimed a jury trial would have likely resulted in victory for the NYPD, but would have come with a hefty price tag.
"This settlement was reached without any admission of liability on behalf of the city and the individual defendants," said Susan Halatyn, senior counsel with the city Law Department. "Although defendants believe that they would ultimately have prevailed at a trial, the costs of going forward weighed in favor of a settlement at this time."
It would have been worth it, though.
It reminds me of the movie (a classic from the sci-fi genre, whose name escapes me now but I will undoubtedly remember 30 seconds after I post this) where a government has computers which keep continual track of the cost of apprehending fugitives, and the robot policemen instantly stop a pursuit when the cost becomes too high.
Sadly, this will give tremendous comfort and instill new enthusiasm in the Left.
"sigh"
This is how leftists can do “greenmail” - here they force local govt. either to squander huge sums of taxpayer money fighting these cases or else pay a large settlement that is less than would be spent as the case dragged through years of court battles.
Still, it was important for the scumbags to be prosecuted - probably some libs in NYC govt. wanted to hand an easy victory to these traitors.
"Anti-war [pro-communist, anti-American] activists who claim they were wrongly locked up by the NYPD during a 2003 protest won a $2 million settlement [gift] from the city Tuesday.
Led by plaintiff Sarah Kunstler - the daughter of famed civil rights [Communist] lawyer Bill Kunstler - the 52 protestors [misguided morons] claimed victory."
From David Horowitz:
"...another Stewart colleague, William Kuntsler, whose Center for Constitutional Rights is a front for leftwing extremists intent on carrying on their own war with America. As an editor for the New Left magazine Ramparts, I remember being visited in 1969 by Arthur Kinoy, who with Kunstler was the co-founder of the Center for Constitutional Rights. Kinoy was carrying with him a draft manifesto for a new "Communist Party" (those were the words in the document) which he intended to organize with Kunstler. The agendas of the hard left never really change. Support for America's enemies then; support for America's terrorist enemies now.
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/horowitz1.asp
Anyone got a picture of Sarah Kuntsler? Gotta see this collectivist bag.
DIRT LIST...7000+ Self-Hating Israel-Threatening Jews
Kunstler, Emily Photographer for the Palestinian cause
Kunstler, Sarah Evil-doing sister of Emily
Also:
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EMILY KUNSTLER (CO-DIRECTOR)
|
 Emily Kunstler graduated from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in Film and Video in 2000. Emily worked as a video producer for Democracy Now!, an independent national television and radio news program that broadcasts on the Pacifica Radio Network, and on public access and satellite television. She was a studio art fellow with the Independent Study Program of the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2004. Along with Sarah Kunstler she is a co-founder of Off Center Media. With Off Center Media, Emily has co-produced, directed and edited a number of short documentaries, including “Tulia, Texas: Scenes from the Drug War” (2003), which won Best Documentary Short at the Woodstock Film Festival, and was instrumental in winning exoneration for 35 wrongfully-convicted people, and “Getting Through to the President” (2004), which won the audience award at the Portland International Short Film Festival. |
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SARAH KUNSTLER (CO-DIRECTOR)
|
 Sarah Kunstler graduated from Yale University with a BA in photography in 1998 and from Columbia Law School with a JD in 2004. She has worked as a photographer for the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, freelance photojournalist, and media director for the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice. She is currently a criminal defense attorney practicing in the Southern District of New York. Along with Emily Kunstler she is a co-founder of Off Center Media, and has co-produced and directed a number of short documentaries. |
Considering the Kunstler 'family's' long history of anti-Americanism and anti-Israel sympathies, that seems quite likely.
This is just wrong — as are most of these types of cases. The left always gets paid off. Sickening.
Thanks. I am disappointed. I expected older and uglier. I guess I’ll just have to wait a few years.
Agreed....and the taxpayers of New York just paid two million dollars to help fund their next "protest".
NYC Paramedic: "Sorry sir, traffic's all backed up and it looks like it will be for quite some time. We're doing our best to get you to the hospital."
Critically-injured trauma patient: "What's the problem?"
NYC Paramedic: "A bunch of Leftist protesters won a 2 million dollar judgment from the city, so they bussed in thousands of their protester buddies from out of state. I hear on the radio that they're setting police cars on fire in the street."
Critically-injured trauma patient: "If I survive this, I'm changing my political party affiliation."
You're welcome. Sadly, some of the nicest-looking women can be breathtakingly ugly on the inside....most Hollywood actresses, as an example.
The Kuntster sisters. What an appropriate name.
someone breed with that bastard. I home no one breeds with his daughters, but they are probably gay. I hope.
All of the commie left hate Israel. And to think that dope Curtis Sliwa used to cohost a popular radio program (Curtis and Kuby) with Ron Kuby. Kuby was a partner with William Kuntsler at a commie law firm.
"He was a director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) from 1964 to 1972, when he became a member of the ACLU National Council. In 1969 he cofounded the Center for Constitutional Rights. Kunstler also worked with the National Lawyers Guild. He was a socialist who publicly declared his refusal to critisize any socialist country, such as the People's Republic of China, which fellow lawyer Alan Dershowitz critisized him for doing.
Kunstler's image was that of a flamboyant radical who defended controversial clients, including Salvador Agron, Lenny Bruce, William Worthy, H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael, American Indian Movement (AIM) leaders, Filiberto Ojeda Rios, Jack Ruby, Abbie Hoffman, Assata Shakur, Angela Davis, Jerry Rubin, Martin Luther King, Lemuel Smith, Siddig Ibrahim Siddig Ali, Ibrahim A. ElGabrowny, Gregory Lee Johnson, Wayne Williams, Larry Davis, Michael X and Gary McGivern. In the Brown case, Kunstler worked with Baton Rouge civil rights attorney Murphy Bell.
He gained national renown for defending the 'Chicago Seven' (originally 'Chicago Eight') against charges of conspiring to incite riots in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. During the trial, he and co-defense attorney Leonard Weinglass were cited for contempt (the convictions were later overturned).
From 1983 until Kunstler's death in 1995, he employed future radio personality Ron Kuby as a junior partner. The two took on controversial civil rights and criminal cases, including cases where they represented Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, head of the Egyptian-based terrorist group Gama'a al-Islamiyah..."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Kunstler
Jumping ahead to 2008 and the Democratic National Convention...
RECREATE 68
http://www.recreate68.us/
Great, essential information...thank you so very much. I remember Kunstler as being hard-Left trash back when he was alive, and it’s sad to see that he’s destroyed his daughters’ minds with that garbage as well.
Your other points and links are all interesting and worthwhile as well, thank you.
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