By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC - Guardian UK - Honduras - ESPN
SDNY COURTHOUSE, Jan 26 – On a day when most U.S. judge-picking talk focused on the Supreme Court vacancy being opened by the retirement of Justice Stephen Breyer, he Board of Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York did their own judge picking.
To replace retiring SDNY Magistrate Judge Kevin N. Fox, they chose Federal Defender Jennifer Willis.
Inner City Press has covered her work, for example in the Balde case involving review of the fairness of SDNY jury pools, and in the sentencing of a Rwandan defendant who quit their job at the UN, here. Inner City Press is looking forward to covering incoming Judge Willis' criminal cases in the 5th floor Magistrates' court, and her civil case - and hopes for maximum transparency and public access in both kinds of cases.
Back in December 2021 the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on December 15 on a number of nominees for District Court seats, and on Alison J. Nathan who while presiding over the U.S. v. Ghislaine Maxwell sex trafficking trial was nominated for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
The Maxwell trial took a three day hiatus.
The reason was not publicly explained, in keeping with the redaction in the case of the flight logs of Jeffrey Epstein's planes, the withholding of Maxwell's witness list, and the curtailing of the public call-in line that other Districts and even some SDNY judges maintain. Since then, Juror 50's questionnaire and motion, and Maxwell's motion for a new trial, have all been withheld in full.
(In full disclosure, Inner City Press has written more than four times to Judge Nathan on these topics. The first two letters were docketed and denied, here. The third, citing the Omicron variant of COVID and the ban on travel from African countries that Epstein's plane flew to, with former President Clinton and Kevin Spacey, has yet to be docketed; its January 19 filing was obliquely referred to in the Court's order of January 26.)
At the December 15 Senate Judiciary hearing, none of these topics came up. Most Democratic Senators offered only praise. (Senator Mazie Hirono, to her credit, asking her standard question about unwanted sexual advances.)
Two Republican Senators asked about Judge Nathan shaving a year off the sentence of William Tucker in 13-cr-378 and questioned it, since he already had COVID and was vaccinated.
One of Judge Nathan's boldest decisions, to at least initially grill the prosecutors for Brady violations in US v. Nejad, did not come up in the Committee, nor in some recent profiles. Judge Nathan for her part shouted by, by name, her SDNY courtroom deputy Khalilah Williams.
In DC on December 15 there were questions about the Second Amendment and the place of international law, citing Nathan having noted the presence in the Supreme Court gallery of a delegation from China when the application of the death penalty was limited.
But nothing about the Maxwell case and its implications; nothing about court transparency either. Video of hearing here, from 1:00 to 1:48.
To some it seemed strange (some might note that since big wigs of both parties are implicated in l'affaire Epstein and Maxwell, neither side wants to touch it).
To others, it was a missed opportunity. We'll see - and closer to home, we'll see Judge Willis' cases in the SDNY Mag Court - watch this site.
***
Your support means a lot. As little as $5 a month helps keep us going and grants you access to exclusive bonus material on our Patreon page. Click here to become a patron.
