Free Republic

The American system of justice is predicated on some basic, easily understandable principles: an individual has the presumption of innocence; an individual has a right to face his/her accuser; an individual has the right to trial in front of a jury of his/her peers, and guilt is only established in a criminal trial when there is no reasonable doubt. And under tort law, a person or company is supposed to be subject to liability only for wrongfully causing harm. Pretty simple. If you wrongfully cause harm, you become liable for damages to those who you have been proven to harm....

Last week, the U.S. Court of Appeals issued a ruling in the only cases to reach appellate court arising from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s 2006 civil lawsuits against out-of-state firearms retailers that interfered with as many as 18 ongoing criminal investigations. Not surprisingly, Mayor Bloomberg filed those cases in federal district court in Brooklyn, N.Y., before his handpicked judge, Jack B. Weinstein. While the appellate court ruled the defendants’ strategy of avoiding the charade of a “trial” before Judge Weinstein where the outcome would be a forgone conclusion resulted in their waiver and forfeiture of jurisdictional defenses, Judge...

In his 43-year career as a federal judge, Jack B. Weinstein has come to be identified by his efforts to combat what he calls “the unnecessary cruelty of the law.” His most recent crusade is particularly striking because of the beneficiary: a man who has amassed a vast collection of child pornography. Judge Weinstein, who sits in the United States District Court in Brooklyn, has twice thrown out convictions that would have ensured that the man spend at least five years behind bars. He has pledged to break protocol and inform the next cast of jurors about the mandatory prison...

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced Wednesday that Khalid Al-Jawary, a dangerous Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) terrorist convicted of a 1973 New York City bomb plot and implicated in multiple terrorist attacks spanning two decades, was deported to Sudan. He had served only half of his thirty year sentence. Recently declassified information additionally reveals that Al-Jawary got help from New York's Iraqi diplomatic mission in communicating with his PLO masters. In March of 1973, Al-Jawary and possible accomplices planted three powerful car bombs: two along 5th Avenue near Israeli-owned banks, and one at Kennedy Airport. Timed to explode upon...

BELLEVUE, Wash. — Georgia gun dealer Jay Wallace's decision Monday to default on a lawsuit by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and carry his case to an appeals court, was the right move because of genuine concerns he could not get a fair trial before federal judge Jack B. Weinstein, the Second Amendment Foundation said today. SAF has been the largest single contributor to Wallace's defense against the rogue lawsuit filed by Bloomberg, following the anti-gun mayor's infamous vigilante sting operation in 2006. SAF founder Alan Gottlieb concurred with Wallace's attorney, John Renzulli, that "There was no chance for a...

In a surprise turn of events on the eve of opening arguments, New York City prevailed Monday in its public nuisance lawsuit against Georgia gun dealer Adventure Outdoors when Eastern District of New York Judge Jack B. Weinstein granted the city's motion for a default judgment. The ruling gave the city a victory in the most high-profile case in Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's fight against the dealers of guns used in crimes within the city. Of the 27 original defendants, three have now defaulted, 20 settled, three won dismissal and one is scheduled to go to trial in September. The...

A federal judge is forbidding the city from calling Mayor Bloomberg as a witness in its landmark suit against a gun salesman from Georgia. At a hearing yesterday, the judge, Jack Weinstein of U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, explained his decision to keep the mayor off the witness stand by saying, "I'm not going to turn the case into a media circus for either side," according to a partial transcript. A jury will be picked next week to hear the city's claim that a store owned by the gun dealer, Jay Wallace, sold a disproportionate number of the guns that...

Lawyers for Mayor Bloomberg are asking a judge to ban any reference to the Second Amendment during the upcoming trial of a gun shop owner who was sued by the city. While trials are often tightly choreographed, with lawyers routinely instructed to not tell certain facts to a jury, a gag order on a section of the Constitution would be an oddity. “Apparently Mayor Bloomberg has a problem with both the First and the Second amendments,” Lawrence Keane, the general counsel of a firearms industry association, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, said. The trial, set to begin May 27, involves...

Now 86, Judge Weinstein is in his 40th year on the United States District Court in Brooklyn, where his ability to turn out decisions that only a plaintiff could love seems to increase with each passing year. He once gave the green light for a once-and-for-all lawsuit that would include every American man and woman who ever smoked a cigarette. And he has also done his best to allow victims of shooting crimes to sue gun makers for negligent marketing. It turns out that there is quite a story, which we played on yesterday's front page, about why this judge...

The docket of Judge Jack Weinstein in Brooklyn has long been a magnet for big lawsuits with billions of dollars at stake. In case after case involving guns, cigarettes, Agent Orange, breast implants, typing keyboards, asbestos, and pharmaceuticals, manufacturers have defended their products before the now 86-year-old federal judge. Around the courthouse, Judge Weinstein is best known for his unpretentious courtroom manner — he rarely wears a robe and addresses convicted murderers with the same courtesy he extends toward partners at major law firms. Across the country, the judge is known for having "a big strike zone" for plaintiffs, according...

A federal judge on Wednesday kept alive a lawsuit accusing Georgia gun dealers of illegally selling firearms that end up being used in crimes in New York City. In a 99-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein in Brooklyn said he found ample evidence the gun dealers "have been responsible for the funneling into New York of large quantities of handguns used by local criminals to terrorize significant portions of the city's population." The judge rejected motions filed by a number of gun shops, including Adventure Outdoors in Smyrna, that sought to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the city of...

A federal judge on Wednesday kept alive a lawsuit accusing Georgia gun dealers of illegally selling firearms that end up being used in crimes in New York City. In a 99-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein in Brooklyn said he found ample evidence the gun dealers "have been responsible for the funneling into New York of large quantities of handguns used by local criminals to terrorize significant portions of the city's population." The judge rejected motions filed by a number of gun shops, including Adventure Outdoors in Smyrna, that sought to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the city of...

A federal judge in New York today gave class-action status to a lawsuit that poses a major new threat to the tobacco industry by asserting that tobacco companies purposely misled consumers by marketing “light” cigarettes as a safer alternative to regular cigarettes. The ruling opens the door for millions, if not tens of millions, of Americans to join the lawsuit as plaintiffs. In his ruling, Judge Jack Weinstein of the Eastern District of New York, essentially said that any United States resident who has ever purchased a cigarette labeled “light” is part of the class represented in the suit. In...

Sharp shootin' Jack Weinstein, judge of the Eastern District, has used a silver bullet to single-handedly keep alive Mayor Bloomberg's battle to get illegal guns off the street. The judge rightly ruled that the city can use federal data it already has against gunmakers and distributors who carelessly deliver their wares to unscrupulous dealers who, in turn, sell to criminals. Weinstein is the man in the white hat against the firearms black market. It was the second time the judge rode to the rescue against gun-industry puppets in Congress. Which only shows how afraid the National Rifle Association and its...

A federal judge has ruled that New York City's lawsuit against gun manufacturers may go forward. U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein said a new law shielding gun companies from lawsuits by cities and crime victims did not apply to New York's case against several major gun manufacturers. The legislation was championed by the National Rifle Association and signed into law by President Bush in October. It included a narrow exception for some lawsuits alleging specific violations of state law. Weinstein also ruled, however, that if the law did apply to New York's case, it would be constitutional. The judge immediately...

(New York - AP, December 1, 2005) - After losing a fight to get his racketeering case thrown out, Louis Eppolito, a retired police officer accused of moonlighting as a hit man for the mob, insisted today that he was a "good cop." Lawyers for Eppolito and another ex-officer, Stephen Caracappa, argued at a pretrial hearing in Brooklyn federal court that the indictment was legally defective. A judge disagreed and set a trial date for February 21st. Prosecutors claim Eppolito and Caracappa accepted thousands of dollars a month to settle scores for the Luchese organized crime family while still on...

New York City won a significant victory this week in its civil suit against the firearms industry, winning the right to information that could help prove its claim that the industry closes its eyes to the way guns get into the hands of criminals. On Wednesday, a federal magistrate ruled that the city was entitled to federal data that traces the path of guns used in crimes, overruling objections by the Justice Department. Lawyers say that without the data the city would have difficulty proving its claim that the gun industry's marketing and distribution practices amount to a public nuisance....

<p>While the tabloids were having a field day recently with the signals a juror in the Tyco trial was allegedly flashing, elsewhere in Manhattan lawyers for the firearms industry were asking the Second Circuit Court of Appeals to recuse a judge they say is sending his own "OK" signal to plaintiffs in a highly contentious gun case.</p>