Friday, January 15, 2010

Ethics Complaints Dismissed

Norwich bankruptcy attorney Zenas Zelotes

Friday, January 15, 2010
Attorney Ethics Complaints Dismissed

Ethics Complaints Dismissed In Total Attorneys Case
The Connecticut Law Journal by Douglas S. Malan - January 15, 2010

Grievance complaints were dismissed Friday afternoon against five Connecticut attorneys who have done business with Total Attorneys Inc. of Chicago. A Norwich bankruptcy attorney has grieved 12 attorneys in Connecticut more than 550 attorneys in 47 total states claiming that attorneys participating in the Total Attorneys network are paying for referrals, which is a felony offense in this state. Connecticut-licensed attorneys Matthew Rousseau, Gregg Wagman, Steven Lesko, Kenneth Lenz and Russell Small all have been cleared by the Statewide Grievance Committee. It’s likely that the other seven complaints, including one against Manchester attorney and State Rep. Ryan Barry, will be dismissed similarly, though a time table isn’t evident. The short summary decision offered no insight into the three-person hearing committee’s logic behind the decision. A full-length decision is due in two weeks. Chief Disciplinary Counsel Mark Dubois declined to comment until the full decision is released.

Connecticut was the only state to hold formal hearings on the matter. Those hearings occurred in November. Several other states had decided to take no action on the complaints. For defendants who have been part of a massive ethics complaint that was launched last spring, Friday afternoon offered a lot of peace of mind. “We’re delighted with the decision and hope it ends this particularly difficult piece of legal history,” said Raymond Garcia of Garcia & Milas, who was local counsel for Total Attorneys. Kimberly A. Knox and Brendon P. Levesque from the high-powered Hartford appellate firm Horton, Shields & Knox represented Wagman and Lenz. Levesque said it’s “been a crazy ride.” Levesque added, “We are thrilled that Connecticut has dismissed the grievance complaints. Our position has always been that this is simply lawyer advertising.” The company operates numerous web sites for different practice areas that all work the same way: Attorneys pay $65 to receive leads on potential clients who enter their zip code and other contact information through the web site. There’s no guarantee that the leads will turn into paying clients. Total Attorneys says its business model allows lawyers, who are mainly solo and small firm practitioners, to pool resources and pay for group advertising online.

Posted by Corrupt Courts Administrator at 10:13 PM



Politician-Lawyer Named In Ethics Complaint
By DOUGLAS S. MALAN
LINK

State Rep. Ryan Barry, (pictured above) the co-chair of the legislature’s Banks Committee, is under fire after a local grievance panel found probable cause Friday that Barry engaged in unethical conduct through his Manchester law practice.

The finding does not mean Barry broke any laws or violated any ethics rules, but that his case is ripe for further review.

Barry is one of 12 attorneys in Connecticut who have been swept up by a massive ethics complaint filed against Total Attorneys, a Chicago-based business, over accusations that the company’s business model results in attorneys paying for referrals, which is a felony offense in Connecticut. Grievance officials have found probable cause for ethics violations against 11 of the attorneys.

Attorney Kimberly A. Knox, of Horton, Shields & Knox in Hartford, represents Barry and other Connecticut-licensed attorneys who have done business with Total Attorneys. She said current ethics rules established before the digital age have been wrongly applied to lawyers attempting to grow their business through the Internet.

“The advertising that forms the basis of the probable cause finding is not a violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct,” Knox said in a written response to the finding. “The public’s need to know about legal services is fulfilled in part through advertising and the interest in expanding public information about legal services ought to prevail over considerations of tradition.”

Barry deferred to Knox for response to the finding.

Norwich bankruptcy attorney Zenas Zelotes filed the original complaint against Total Attorneys and its affiliated lawyers this spring, naming five attorneys. A supplemental complaint named an additional seven attorneys licensed to practice here.

Zelotes has targeted more than 550 lawyers in 47 states for their business dealings with Total Attorneys. The company operates numerous web sites for different practice areas that all work the same way: Attorneys pay $65 to receive leads on potential clients who enter their zip code and other contact information through the web site.

There’s no guarantee that the leads will turn into paying clients. Total Attorneys says its business model allows lawyers, who are mainly solo and small firm practitioners, to pool resources and pay for group advertising online.

Barry is name partner and founder of Barry & Barall where his general litigation practice includes commercial litigation, employee benefits and criminal law matters.

He entered into a relationship with Total Attorneys in July 2008 and was featured on two web sites -- totaldivorce.com and totalcriminaldefense.com. He terminated those contracts earlier this year after “very little business was generated,” according to Knox.

The panel found probable cause that Barry violated Rule 7.2 of the Rules of Professional Conduct that prohibits giving “anything of value to a person for recommending the lawyer’s services.” An exception includes paying the “reasonable cost of advertisements.”

The Statewide Grievance Committee will now set a hearing date.

Knox said Barry had no direct contact with anyone who contacted his firm through the Total Attorneys web sites; Barry’s partner, Maria C. Barall, handled all contacts.

Barry was elected to the state legislature in November 2002 as a Democratic representative for Manchester. In addition to being co-chair of the Banks Committee, he’s also a member of the Finance, Judiciary and Revenue & Bonding committees.

Four states have decided not to pursue Zelotes’ complaints. Connecticut is the only state that has found probable cause for ethics violations.

Last month, a formal hearing was conducted for Matthew Rousseau, a Massachusetts-based bankruptcy attorney who is licensed in Connecticut. His was the only case to be heard by a three-member ethics commission in Hartford. Rousseau’s lawyers moved to dismiss the case.•

Grievance Officials Target Legal Web Site
Connecticut Law Tribune
Monday, November 16, 2009
Copyright 2009, ALM Properties, Inc.

Hearing focuses on whether lawyers pay for referrals
By DOUGLAS S. MALAN

A Connecticut-licensed attorney ensnared by a nationwide ethics complaint moved to dismiss his case last week after a six-and-a-half hour hearing before a three-member ethics commission in Hartford.

The decision on the motion could have an impact on more than 550 lawyers in 47 states who have done or are doing business with Total Attorneys, a Chicago-based company that helps connect consumers to lawyers through web sites such as www.totalbankruptcy.com.

Norwich bankruptcy attorney Zenas Zelotes filed grievances against all of those lawyers, arguing that Total Attorneys’ method of connecting the parties is an example of lawyers paying for referrals, which is a felony in Connecticut and a violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct.

For a $65 fee, attorneys who sign up with Total Attorneys receive leads on potential clients who enter their zip code and other contact information and click for a “free consultation.” The potential client is routed to the fee-paying lawyer who is closest to that zip code, and the lawyer has exclusive rights to all leads in that zip code.

Matthew Rousseau, a Massachusetts-based attorney licensed in Connecticut, is one of 12 lawyers licensed in this state to be named in Zelotes’ complaints. Five of those attorneys have had probable cause found against them.

Rousseau’s case was the only one heard last Thursday because his was the first in which probable cause was found.

Chief Disciplinary Counsel Mark Dubois argued that the Total Attorneys model violates state law and ethics codes because it is recommending a lawyer to people who enter their contact information. “We got in all of the evidence [during the hearing] that we needed to get in,” Dubois said. “The facts are not disputed. It’s just a matter of whether there were rules violations.”

Like Google?

Attorney David Atkins, of Pullman & Comley, represents Rousseau and two other Connecticut lawyers under fire. He moved for dismissal of the case, arguing that the Total Attorneys set-up is not recommending any lawyers but is just pointing people toward attorneys who choose to advertise with the company, similar to Google’s advertisement model.

“The Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel cannot establish what it must establish by clear and convincing evidence,” Atkins said, that Total Attorneys is recommending lawyers to the public.

Zelotes said TotalAttorney is not the same as Google. While the search engine is selling advertising, he said, the net effect of the Chicago-based site is to provide direct referrals to lawyers. However, he acknowledged that at last week’s hearing, that he “got a sense from the questioning that the committee may not have [understood] the distinction” between Google’s model and Total Attorneys’ model.

If the motion to dismiss is granted, all of the Connecticut cases will be dropped. If the motion is denied, testimony in the Rousseau case will resume and the door will open for additional hearings. “Whatever the decision is, it will open a lot of eyes and we’ll see where we stand with all of this,” Zelotes said.

At least one state has already made that determination. Last month, Hawaii’s disciplinary counsel completed a full inquiry and decided that there was no basis to take any action on the ethics complaints filed there, mainly because the complaints raised First Amendment free commercial speech issues. •

Monday, January 4, 2010

Senator John Sampson Joins a Law Firm as "Counsel"



Sampson playing a law-firm Shel game
By BRENDAN SCOTT Post Correspondent, January 4, 2010
LINK

ALBANY -- Move over, Sheldon Silver!

Senate boss John Sampson has borrowed a page from the powerful Assembly speaker and become the second big-time Democrat to join a law firm with ties to the state's powerful trial-lawyers lobby, The Post has learned.

Sampson, the state Senate Democratic leader, quietly accepted a job last month as "counsel" to Belluck & Fox, a politically connected Manhattan law firm that specializes in asbestos litigation and that claims to have won $220 million in judgments.

The new gig, which comes just six months after Senate Democrats elected Sampson to run the legislative chamber, bears striking similarity to the oft-criticized side job held by Silver (D-Manhattan).

Like Silver, Sampson won't say how much his job pays. And, as is the case with Silver's firm, Weitz & Luxenberg, a founding partner of Sampson's firm, Joseph W. Belluck, sits on the board of the state Trial Lawyers Association.

The potent advocacy group spends about $2 million a year on campaign contributions and lobbying expenses. Silver has repeatedly come under fire for aiding its decades-long winning streak in the Assembly.

The group's new ties to the Senate leader are sure to draw similar concern, especially from those who back reforming the state's medical-malpractice laws.

"The trial lawyers are now covered in both houses," one veteran Capitol lobbyist said. "They have Shelly in one prominent firm, and they have the Senate leader in another firm that has a seat on their board of directors."

"You can't do any better than that that."

Sampson controls day-to-day decisions in the Senate in addition to leading its Judiciary and Ethics committees. The "part-time" Brooklyn lawmaker earns $88,500 annually, including a $9,000 leadership stipend.

Sampson spokesman Austin Shafran refused to disclose the senator's outside income, but insisted the job would not compromise his official duties.

"Senator Sampson's outside work has never been and never will be in conflict with his official duties," Shafran said.

The career move comes as Democratic lawmakers negotiate ethics-reform legislation in response to several recent embarrassments, including the corruption conviction of former Republican Senate leader Joseph Bruno.

During Bruno's trial, an Albany businessman testified that he started paying Bruno consulting fees after the senator complained about the money Silver was getting "from the trial lawyers." Bruno denied the remark.

brendan.scott@nypost.com

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Manhattan Surrogate's Court Judge Kristen Booth Glen


Do Not Vote for Judge Kristin Booth Glen !!!
LINK

I am shocked to learn just two days before the election that Judge Kristin Booth Glen is up for election two days from today for New York Surrogate. Nineteen years ago in a moment of illegal and wrongful misconduct, Judge Glen destroyed my family in ways which adversely affect me and my children to this day.

I have just learned that Judge Glen got on the ballot by surviving a close and hard-fought primary contest in which she narrowly defeated her opponent by just a few votes. Several other persons made charges of misconduct against Judge Glen at that time, but they were apparently ignored by the voters.

I will be filing a formal complaint against Judge Glen tomorrow for her misconduct in 1986, in the hope that this matter be heard and that she be disbarred from the practice of law before she can take office in January.

The date was September 3, 1986, a date I remember well because of the events which changed the lives of my family and especially my children on that date.

On that date a final hearing had been scheduled for the custody of my two children, Peter and Mary, in the New York Supreme Court at 60 Centre Street. My ex-wife Anda had been refusing for more than a year to comply with a court order giving me two hours of weekly visitation with my children, ever since she had remarried. I had filed several petitions for habeas corpus with respect to these children. In violation of CPLR 7003, Judge Glen had refused to sign these petitions. She had postponed the matter several times over a period of months. She had ordered me and my ex-wife to submit to examination by a psychologist, Dr. Bennett, who had charged us each $1000. Dr. Bennett was supposed to have his report ready in time for the hearing, which was scheduled for September 3, 1986.

I brought my mother, Dr. Marjorie Sloan, with me to the hearing. When the case was called, the attorney for Anda, Walter Anderocci, stated and indeed insisted that he needed urgently to speak in private to the judge.

Judge Glen refused to agree to this. When Anderocci persisted, Judge Glen told him that she found his conduct objectionable.

At about that time, the clerk informed the judge that she had received a telephone call. Judge Glen went back into chambers to receive the call. When she returned some time later, she stated that she had received a call from "Judge Larry Janow" in Virginia. Judge Janow had stated that he was the judge in the case of the custody of another of my children, Shamema, aged 4. Charles and Shelby Roberts, who were unrelated to the child, had filed a petition for the custody of the child. Judge Janow wanted the child returned to Virginia. Judge Glen had stated that she had seen me with a four year old child when I had come to her courtroom to check on the status of the case the previous day. Judge Glen had concluded that this was the same child that Judge Janow wanted. Therefore, Judge Glen had called the police and ordered my arrest. As a result, she was disqualifying herself from the case.

As Judge Glen was explaining all this, I turned around and found several New York City Police Officers standing behind me. Walter Anderocci stated that he had arranged for my mother to be transported to my brother, Creighton's, house in North Carolina. My mother replied sharply that she wanted nothing to do with Creighton. She preferred to go to jail with me, she said. With that, the New York City Police Officers carted us off to the Police Station on Elizabeth Street in Chinatown and locked us up in jail.

Only about two hours later, however, the police unlocked the doors to the jail cells and let us out. They stated that they had been on the phone with the Commonwealth Attorney in Amherst County, Virginia and had learned that there was no warrant for our arrest and that Charles and Shelby Roberts did not have legal custody of my daughter. They also said that the silly assed judge had no right to order us arrested and her order meant nothing. Therefore, they were letting us go. They specifically referred to Judge Kristin Booth Glen as a "silly assed judge". That was their exact words.

My mother and I immediately went back to the same courtroom where we had been arrested a few hours earlier. It was not yet 4:00 PM and I was still hoping to get the hearing that had been delayed for nearly a year for custody or visitation with my two children, Peter and Mary Sloan. However, Judge Kirstin Booth Glen had left the courthouse. The courtroom was empty.

The following day I went to the clerks office to check the case file. There was an order in the case file signed by Judge Glen stating that she had disqualified herself from the case because I had been arrested in her courtroom. The clerk informed me that the case was over. I would have to file a new petition for habeas corpus and start a new case from square one to get the matter back into court.

The case is Sloan vs. Sloan, Index No. 36654/1980. I have just been to the clerk's office at 60 Center Street and learned that the original case file has been sent to Philadelphia for microfilming. The clerk informed me that it will take about two weeks to get the file back. When the file comes back I intend to obtain a copy of Judge Glen's order stating that I was arrested in her courtroom and present this document to the Appellate Division to have Judge Glen disbarred from the practice of law so that she cannot take office as New York Surrogate in January.

What Judge Glen did was plainly illegal. Because of what Judge Glen did, I realized that the situation was unsafe for me, my mother and my daughter. Judge Janow had not told Judge Glen that Charles and Shelby Roberts had only filed for custody on August 27, 1986, one week earlier. No hearing had been held on the matter. There was no jurisdiction in Virginia because neither the child nor either of the parents of the child had been in Virginia since the time of filing. The mother of the child was in Pakistan and I, the father of the child, was in New York. In any event, the courts of Virginia had no jurisdiction because the custody of the child had already been decided by Judge Anthony Mercorella of the Bronx Supreme Court in Sloan vs. Awadallah, 17815/1981. Virginia had no jurisdiction to modify this award.

Had I been allowed to speak, I could have addressed these issues and demonstrated that what I was saying was factually correct. However, Judge Kristin Booth Glen had given me no opportunity to say anything. Based on nothing more than a telephone call from a person she did not know, she had called the police and ordered my arrest. She had also cancelled the custody hearing which had been pending for nearly a year.

Realizing that both Judge Glen and Judge Janow were acting crazy,. It was clear that my family was in imminent danger. Therefore, my mother decided that she had no choice but to flee the country. I agreed to go with her, as I had already been scheduled to go to Argentina as the trainer and manager for the Polgar Sisters. My mother had never had a passport in her life, because she had been born in a rural area of Iowa in 1910 and no birth certificate had ever been issued for her. Nevertheless, she managed to convince the US Passport Office in Rockefeller Center to issue her a passport and off we went to Rio Gallegos, Argentina.

Soon thereafter, we discovered that my brother Creighton had frozen all the bank accounts of our mother and had cancelled her credit cards, so she had no funds to travel on or to live on. I soon figured out what should have been obvious all along that Creighton was the mastermind of this entire plot. Creighton had known both Anda and Charles and Shelby Roberts and had introduced them to each other. That is how Judge Janow in Virginia had known that a custody hearing had been scheduled with respect to my other children in New York in September 3, 1986.

We soon became aware that Charles and Shelby Roberts were feverously trying to kidnap my daughter Shamema and Creighton was trying to kidnap his own mother. My mother, my daughter and I became vagabonds traveling from place to place without funds. Eventually, we reached Dubai, United Arab Emirates, where I got a job working as a journalist for a newspaper, the Gulf News. We were able to survive until I was able to open a computer business there.

Exactly four years later, on September 3, 1990 Creighton finally succeeded in having his mother kidnapped and brought back to America, where he had her locked up until she died 12 years later, in 2002. Shamema was kidnapped on October 7, 1990 and was held prisoner by the Roberts for ten years until she became of legal age, joined the Marines, and went to fight in Iraq.

My children, Peter and Mary Sloan, who were the subject of the custody proceeding that was supposed to have been heard on September 3, 1986, never got to see their father again. My daughter Mary, who is now 26, refuses to see me because she believes that I abandoned her when she was a child. She thinks that I just stopped coming to see her. She does not realize that her mother cancelled all visitation when she remarried and that I went to court more than 50 times and filed three habeas corpus petitions and two family court proceedings all in a fruitless attempt to see her.

My son Peter recently established contact with me because he has become a chess master and sees me at chess tournaments. At the same time, he had no contact with his father at all from 1982 until he became an adult, except for a few visits that were allowed in 1985.

My children have suffered problems because of having no father. In spite of bring bright and talented, scoring in the 99 percentile on standardized tests, they have a history of failure and near failure in school and being left back. They both have serious problems which they might not have had it not been for the actions of Judge Kristin Booth Glen.

The actions of Judge Glen were illegal. If there were valid grounds for having me arrested, Judge Janow could simply have contacted the police in Virginia where he was a judge and the police could then have contacted the New York City Police who would then have come to the courtroom and arrested me. This is obvious. Accordingly, Judge Glen should have realized that the call was bogus. Judge Glen simply had no right to call the police and have me and my mother arrested.

CPLR 7003 c provides for penalties for this violation.

�� 7003. (c) Penalty for violation. For a violation of this section in refusing to issue the writ, a judge, or, if the petition was made to a court, each member of the court who assents to the violation, forfeits to the person detained one thousand dollars, to be recovered by an action in his name or in the name of the petitioner to his use.

The actions of Judge Kristin Booth Glen on September 3, 1986 have had a devastating impact on my life and the lives of my children and they were illegal. Accordingly, you should not vote for Judge Glen on November 8, 2005. Judge Glen should be disbarred from the practice of law and not be allowed to take office as New York Surrogate in January, 2006.

Sam Sloan
1664 Davidson Avenue, Apt. 1B
Bronx NY 10453

samsloan@samsloan.com
http://www.samsloan.com/notoglen.htm

917-507-7226
347-869-2465

# Complaint against Judge Kristin Booth Glen
# Order of Judge Kristin Booth Glen (PDF Format)
# Motion to the South Carolina Court of Appeals (HTML Format)
# Motion to the South Carolina Court of Appeals (PDF Format)
# Petition for Rehearing from Order Dismissing Appeal
# Transcript of Hearing on February 4, 2004
# Hearing on Sloan Estate Appeal in Aiken set for Tuesday, April 6 at 11:30 AM
# Transcript of Hearing on April 6, 2004
# Grounds for Appeal in Re: Helen Marjorie Sloan
# Complaint to Judge Little, Aiken County Probate Court
# Opposition to motion by Creighton Sloan to dismiss appeal
# Affidavit in Opposition to Appointment of Creighton Sloan as Personal Representative
# Letter to Creighton's Lawyer
# Creighton won the court case !!!!
# Demand that South Carolina Judge Recuse Herself
# Complaint to the Supreme Court of South Carolina
# Who is Sam?
# South Carolina Supreme Court
# Justice Jean Hoefer Toal biography
# Judge Jean H. Toal another biography
# Lynchburg Circuit Court
# Will of Dr. Marjorie Sloan
# My mother, Dr. Marjorie Jacobson Sloan, 92, has died
# Obituary of Dr. Marjorie Jacobson Sloan
# Transcript of Proceedings to Sell My Mothers House at 917 Old Trent's Ferry Road in Lynchburg, Virginia
# Order appointing Frank G. Davidson as Guardian ad litem for Helen Marjorie Sloan
# Is Sam Sloan the "Black Sheep" of his family
# My mother's lawsuit to lift the freeze on her bank account and to recover her stolen funds
# Letter from his mother, Dr. Marjorie Sloan, about this
# At the Acropolis in Athens, Greece
# With Shamema Honzagool Sloan in Abu Dhabi
# With an elephant on the Street in Sri Lanka
# With a Snake Charmer in Colombo, Sri Lanka
# Shamema Sloan and Dr. Helen Marjorie Sloan in Sri Lanka, 1987
# News Clipping of my mother, Dr. Marjorie Sloan, in 1966
# Birthday Party for Dr. Helen Marjorie Sloan at age 80, March 17, 1990
# At the Crocodile Farm in Thailand
# My mother, Dr. Helen Marjorie Sloan, in 1988
# My mother, Dr. Marjorie Jacobson, in 1937

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Manhattan Surrogate's Court

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Election Results ...
General Election Results

Kristen Booth Glen
Primary Results

Kristen Booth Glen

Candidates...

The Incumbent:
There is no Incumbent posted for this race.

General Election Challenger(s):
Kristin Booth Glen

Primary Election Challenger(s):
Kristin Booth Glen
Eve Rachel Markewich

(Candidate Biographies below)

Feature Articles ...

Surrogate's Court And Why It Should Go

July 4, 2005

The removal of Brooklyn Surrogate's Court Judge Michael Feinberg does not end a system that allows judges, lawyers and politicians to loot money from widows and orphans.
Read article

Candidate Bios ...

The Incumbent:

There is no Incumbent posted for this race.

Challenger(s):

Kristin Booth Glen | Dem | WFP |
Kristin Booth Glen served as Dean of CUNY School of Law from 1995 until 2005. She was elected to the Civil Court of the City of New York in 1980, and in 1986 she was elected Justice of the New York Supreme Court. In 1992 she was appointed to the Appellate Term where she heard appeals from the Civil Court and the Criminal Court.

Eve Rachel Markewich | Dem |
Eve Rachel Markewich is a partner at Blank Rome LLP. From 1997 to 2005, she was a Democratic district leader for the 67th Assembly District.

Campaign Trail ...

Below are the latest Campaign Trail items for the Manhattan Surrogate's Court race. For the full Campaign Trail archive, go here

Amsterdam News Endorses Markewich

September 8, 2005
Ms. Markewich has been rated most highly qualified by the New York County Independent Judicial Screening Panel. Herself disabled, Ms. Markewich has written extensively on civil and corporate law as it pertains to minors and the disabled.
She is particularly interested in the legal problems of disabled persons, children, same sex couples and the elderly.
We believe, strongly, that she should be the Manhattan Surrogate. (Amsterdam News)

Two Candidates Fight for Judicial Seat

September 5, 2005
It's a litte-known race that will end up bestowing a great deal of power: Manhattan voters will elect a new Surrogate Court judge this year. The court has jurisdiction over wills and estates - and with 14-year terms, the two judges who oversee it wield significant pull over the fate of many heirs and many millions of dollars. The court also handles adoptions. In the Democratic primary on Sept. 13, lawyer Eve Rachel Markewich is opposed by former state Supreme Court Justice Kristin Booth Glen. (Daily News)

Daily News Endorses Glen For Manhattan Surrogate

September 4, 2005
Democratic primary voters in Brooklyn and Manhattan have a rare opportunity to elect surrogates, the judges who oversee the estates of the dead - a mother lode of patronage spoils. The Daily News endorses Margarita Lopez Torres in Brooklyn and Kristen Booth Glen in Manhattan because they appear most likely to remain above cronyism.
...In Manhattan, the decisive factor is also independence from the party. On that score, Glen, dean of the CUNY law school who has served on both the Civil and Supreme courts, tops Eve Rachel Markewich, a private estates lawyer. Until recently, Markewich was a Democratic district leader, and she is backed by party bosses.

Glen promises to bar from appointment all elected party leaders, district leaders, county committee members and club presidents. She should add judicial nominating convention delegates to the list, and, if victorious on Sept. 13, she and Lopez Torres must follow through on aggressive reforms.

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