Bloods on Their Hands

Like many other areas of the country and the world, Long Island has its share of gang problems. If rival gangs only killed one another, then that would be one thing. But violence between rival gangs is seldom confined to members of the rival gangs.

One such rivalry up here involves two separate factions of the Bloods gang. There is a certain geographic territory which is contested turf between the Braveheart Bloods and the Wyandanch Bloods. Richard Dormer, the Suffolk County Police Commissioner, is now attempting to obtain a civil injunction which would prohibit 37 particular members of the Bloods gangs from congregating in that defined geographic territory.

The New York Civil Liberties Union (which, as the name implies, is the ACLU's New York franchise), now seeks to intervene with an amicus brief in the case. But because each of the 37 gangsters is, at this time, going pro se (i.e., without an attorney), the NYCLU is effectively their attorney.

I understand where the NYCLU/ACLU is coming from on this one. I really do. It is, after all, a significant imposition on one's freedom if one is restricted from associating with one's associates.

But I also understand that the gang members such as the Bloods have zero respect for the law and for the Constitution which the NYCLU/ACLU invokes to protect the so-called "rights" of the Bloods. It was that very disconnect which, many moons ago, caused me sufficient agita and disgust to allow my ACLU membership to lapse, never to be re-upped again, when the ACLU evinced a greater concern for the Nazis in Skokie than for the integrity of American values.

The NYCLU doesn't seem to get it that the Bloods and similar gangs are, in fact, actually dangerous, not only to one another, but to the public at large. Law-abiding citizens cannot safely walk down the street when the Bloods congregate together. The drugs the Bloods purvey corrupt the neighborhoods, and induce formerly law-abiding youngsters to enter into a pattern of crime, violence, and, in too many cases, death. That great abstract notion of individual rights is all well and good, but when the Bloods congregate in Wyandanch, then nobody, least of all the law-abiding citizenry, has any individual rights.

It is ironic that the NYCLU officials are so quick to carry signs reading "Safe Schools," but are doing everything in their power to prevent Commissioner Dormer from making the streets of Wyandanch safe (if such is possible anymore).

And it is certainly not lost on this observer that the lead defendant (because he leads in the alphabetical order if not the pecking order) in the case, Dormer v. Alexander, is a Blood named Jihad Alexander. That given name tells me about 85% of what I need to know about the type of thugs the Suffolk County Police are dealing with.

And so, I'm with Commissioner Dormer 100% on this one. My only misgiving is that the relief sought from the court is to enjoin Jihad Alexander and his fellow Blood thugs from congregating in a particular area of the Town of Babylon. In my own mind, they should be excluded from the entire State of New York (with the possible exceptions of Dannemora, Attica, Rikers Island or Sing-Sing).

First Amendment, Second Class Education

When I was in senior high school (let alone junior high), it was well understood that students were expected to attend classes for the duration of the class session, until dismissed by the teacher. We were not allowed to cut classes, and we were not allowed to leave the classes before dismissal.

And if, by whatever circumstance, we deigned to walk out of class (or, more commonly, were ordered out by the teacher on account of our suboptimal decorum), we were required to report directly to the Vice Principal's office for such action as he deemed appropriate. All else being equal, the consequences would be a one day after-school detention for the first offense, a two day after-school detention for the second offense, and a one-day suspension for the third offense (a level I was skillful enough to personally achieve).

But now, the New York Civil Liberties Union takes the position that students should be allowed to walk out of classes with impunity if the action is for political purposes! Some students at the Ralph J. Reed Middle School in Central Islip, NY, walked out of classes in protest against some proposed budget cuts by the school district.

Hey, aren't the students allowed to exercise their First Amendment free speech rights by talking about whatever the wish during travel time between classes, during lunch, before and after school, et cetera? Shouldn't the teachers have the right to demand the undivided attention of the students during classes? Apparently, the NYCLU (and by extension, its parent organization, the ACLU, from whose policies the NYCLU would never deviate) thinks that freely walking out of classes in the name of free expression and the First Amendment is more important than a first-rate education.

I can see reasons for prioritizing free expression over education. But if students seek to walk in and out of classes, willy-nilly, and thereby subvert the educational process and the teachers' lesson plans, then they should exercise their First Amendment rights on their parents' dimes, and not the taxpayers'. Because if the teachers are not allowed to teach, then they are relegated to being babysitters, and should be paid babysitter wages with our tax money and not teacher wages.

Better still -- Get the students who do not want to learn out of the classrooms, so that those dedicated professionals in the classrooms can get their smaller class sizes, and those students who do wish to learn can do so without the distraction of the other pantywaist.

There is a time and place for political protest. But there also is a time and place for the education of our children.

To Central Islip School District Superintendent Craig Carr, I say stand by the suspensions and tell the NYCLU to go take a hike!

Judgment without being Judgmental

We're coming off of Yom Kippur, and heading into Sukkoth. I have completed the Yom Kippur fast, and have done about 90% of the work on my Sukkah. My main malady now is fatigue.

Justice Carol Edmead of the New York State Supreme Court, New York County, has come down with a number of notable decisions of late. Before Carol played the politics and got herself a black judge's robe to wear, she assisted me in obtaining a particular elusive credential as an attorney, so it pleases me all the more that she is proving to be a credit to the bench. She has called her cases as she sees them, let the chips fall where they may, and kept her personal and political biases in the irrelevant column.

One such case is Matter of Urban Justice Center v. New York Police Department, decided about 3 weeks ago. It is a relatively lengthy read of legal mumbo jumbo, necessitated by the very technical nature of the issues involved. To spare the reader's time, I shall distill its essence as follows:

The Urban Justice Center, a non-profit legal and social services corporation, has a "Sex Workers Project" division whose reason for being is to protect the rights of the so-called "Sex Workers." SWP is now studying the legal ramifications of certain types of sexual behavior which do not involve penetrative contact, including the so-called "BDSM" (bondage, dominance, sadism and masochism). To such end, SWP has requested, under New York's Freedom of Information Law, certain documents from the New York Police Department. The documents consist of the NYPD's training manuals as to arrests for prostitution (Category 1) and memos and manuals of policies and investigation records of bondage and domination establishments (Category 2). The NYPD denied the request, and UJC/SWP's appeal fortuitously hit Justice Edmead's chambers.

Justice Edmead upheld NYPD's denial of the Category 1 documents, in light of the risks to the integrity of the NYPD's operations and the safety of its officers. Category 2 documents were required to be produced, however.

Okay, I know, I know -- The profession, and all of its specializations, have been around from time immemorial. But the UJC's employees and directors, as reflected on its Form 990, seem to be heavy on the left side, and many are connected with the ACLU. And if there is one thing this recovering liberal Democrat has learned over the years, it is that the ACLU has an agenda which is influenced more by political orientation than by the grand principles of liberty [for all you ACLU watchers, I deliberately allowed my membership to lapse after Skokie]. Accordingly, I cannot help but wonder whether SWP will (if it has not already) cross that line which demarcates the separation between protecting the victims on one hand, and encouraging and enabling the abominators on the other.

The case, then, carries lots and lots of baggage and "guts appeal." Justice Carol Edmead fulfilled her noble purpose by keeping the police honest, while not allowing UJC to obtain one more Post-It note of paper from NYPD than any other group would be allowed to obtain.

Going Ape over Travis the Chimpanzee

The Travis the Chimpanzee story is making the rounds around the world and on the Internet.

Whether Sandra Herold, the late chimp's owner, will be criminally charged, is a question I will leave to the local Connecticut State Attorney's office to answer. Whether or not Ms. Herold's relationship with her pet ape did or did not get a fair report in the media, and/or whether it included sexual penetration, has yet to be proven one way or the other, and I book no bets either way. There almost certainly will be a lawsuit; where it will settle depends upon diverse factors, including but not limited to the extent of Herold's liability insurance coverage, and her equity in her own home and business.

I leave it to the psychiatrists (or, perhaps, the mechanics) to confirm my suspicions that Herold, and/or the victim, Charla Nash, were working with a few sockets missing from their wrench sets.

While the news media busies itself with such questions, this Blog will pose the following three:


A. Where does the ACLU stand on the apparent disregard of Travis the Chimp's civil rights by the Stamford, Connecticut Police Department?

B. Where does PETA stand on the treatment of Travis the Chimp?

C. Where do the staunch opponents of capital punishment stand on execution of Travis the Chimp?

Off the Derekh

.

"Derekh" is Hebrew for road or path. Speaking of someone going "off the derekh" usually does not mean that the person is taking a detour for lunch or shopping, but rather, that he or she has strayed from the values of the Torah and Jewish law.

Judah Touro (1775 - 1854) was an American Jewish merchant and philanthropist who supported diverse charitable causes. In about 1971, Bernard Lander founded an educational institution called Touro College, which was named in honor of Judah Touro. According to its mission statement, Touro College was "established to perpetuate and enrich the Jewish heritage, to support Jewish continuity, as well as to serve the general community in keeping with the Judaic commitment to intellectual inquiry and social justice."

And indeed, Touro College's undergraduate units include Lander College for Men, whose students are all religious Jewish young men who learn Talmud and secular academic courses, and there is a Lander College for Women, which does ditto for religious Jewish young women.

So far, so good! A number of Lander men and women have been enrolled in some of the summer session courses I have taught over the years, and if they are any indication, then the respective Lander Colleges are fulfilling their missions rather well.

But all of those wonderful Jewish values seem to be circling the bottom of the toilet bowl when it comes to Touro's law school, more formally known as the Touro College Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center. I have had numerous occasions over the years to use the law library there, and now that Touro Law has relocated to a site across the parking lot from the Court Complex in Central Islip, New York, it is a good place to get a kosher meal.

As a lawyer practicing on Long Island, I can depend upon Touro Law's fundraising friends to send out those familiar solicitation letters from time to time. I am not particularly ashamed that once upon a time I did pull out my checkbook to respond to those solicitations, but neither am I particularly ashamed that, of late, I no longer do so. Okay, any law school anywhere will have programs and aspects which do not suit me; this is understood. But Touro Law has gone a bit too far off the derekh for my tastes and sensibilities.

For example, Touro Law now sponsors the William Randolph Hearst Public Advocacy Center. I cannot help but get an ever so slightly sour taste in my mouth from anyone in the Hearst family (except for WRH's granddaughter, Patty Hearst, who makes me feel like vomiting). But that wouldn't be so bad, except that the organizations hosted by the WRHPAC include ACORN and the Long Island franchise of the ACLU, and some other organizations having questionable compatibility with Touro College's state mission.

What would Judah Touro say?