Free Republic

Three GW law professors have endorsed Republican candidate Fred Thompson's campaign for the presidency, joining the Lawyers for Fred coalition. Professors John Fitzgerald Duffy, Orin Kerr and Michael Abramowicz are members of the Law Professors Committee within the coalition. "Sen. Thompson is proud of his experience working as a federal prosecutor," said Darrel Ng, a spokesperson for the Friends of Fred Thompson campaign. "That's why he decided to form something like that (coalition), because of his background." Ng said that having endorsement groups for presidential candidates is an important part of the campaign process. "In campaigns you try to find...

Broken Bench DUANE, N.Y. — Gary Betters thought he understood the law as well as any average American. A school psychologist, he wanted $1,588.60 he said the nearby village of Malone owed him for helping run a summer recreation program. When he brought a small claim in Duane Town Court, he expected that the judge would listen to both sides, then rule. Like many others who go to court across New York State, he got a crash course in the strange ways of small-town justice. Although no one showed up to defend the village, Justice William J. Gori started the...

Broken Bench Some of the courtrooms are not even courtrooms: tiny offices or basement rooms without a judge’s bench or jury box. Sometimes the public is not admitted, witnesses are not sworn to tell the truth, and there is no word-for-word record of the proceedings. Nearly three-quarters of the judges are not lawyers, and many — truck drivers, sewer workers or laborers... --snip-- A woman in Malone, N.Y., was not amused. A mother of four, she went to court in that North Country village seeking an order of protection against her husband, who the police said had choked her, kicked...

The case was familiar, if disturbing. A Bronx man had been accused of punching and threatening his girlfriend. But the woman refused to testify. Prosecutors, though, soon got a break. A Bronx Criminal Court judge appeared to stake out some novel legal ground just weeks after a United States Supreme Court decision. He ruled that prosecutors could use 911 recordings of the woman's anguished call for help as evidence, even though she would not testify. Within weeks, prosecutors and judges around the country seized on the March 25 decision, by Judge Ethan Greenberg, citing it as important precedent as they...