Holding Court is a series by retired Rye City Court Judge Joe Latwin. Latwin retired from the court in December 2022 after thirteen years of service to the City.
What topics do you want addressed by Judge Latwin? Tell us.
By Joe Latwin
Sometimes as a judge, you can’t hear a case. Other times, you shouldn’t.
Under New York Judiciary Law § 19, a judge shall not, directly or indirectly, be interested in the costs of an action, claim, matter, motion or proceeding, brought before him, or in a court of which he is, or is entitled to act as a member, except an action, claim, matter, motion or proceeding to which he is a party, or in which he is interested. Sounds pretty obvious.
The judge should also not be involved with cases involving relatives. Theoretically, all humans trace from a common ancestor, so we are all related. However, the rules on hearing cases involving relatives only bar hearing cases involving relatives within a certain degree of consanguinity – usually involving descending from a common great grandfather – grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles, close cousins, children and grandchildren.
When is a judge interested? Usually, it means if they would benefit from the outcome of a case. If the judge owns stock in a company that is suing or being sued, they should not hear the case. Judges are required to file financial disclosure forms each year spelling out the property they and their family own and sources of their income. How far does this go? For instance, if a judge owns Verizon stock, he probably shouldn’t hear cases by or against Verizon. If a judge owns a mutual fund that owns, buys and sells many shares of companies all the time, is the judge barred from hearing a case involving every stock the mutual fund owns or may acquire? Does it depend on how many shares the mutual fund owns? That is usually left up to the sound discretion of the judge.
A judge can hear a case where they may be affected by the outcome if the judge is the same as everyone else. For instance, a judge can hear a real estate property tax case if the tax would otherwise be assessed the entire community in which the judge lives. Otherwise, no one could hear the case. Is a judge interested in a case involving properties near where the judge lives or owns property? While you probably shouldn’t hear a case involving your immediate neighbor, the issue becomes less important the further away the property is.
What happens if there is no other court that can hear a case? This just happened!
The U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up a copyright dispute case because it lacked a quorum after five justices had to recuse themselves. The case involved a claim of plagiarism of a book by a different book. Four of the Justices were being paid royalties from the publishers involved in the case. This was only the third time that justices have recused themselves from cases since the court adopted a new—non-binding—code of ethics in November 2023. In the other cases a justice was a childhood friend of a party, and in the other case, a justice stepped aside in a case that stood to benefit, his friend and former client.
Only had one request to recuse myself. The defendant in a case claimed I shouldn’t hear a case since it involved the City and I had been appointed by the City Council. I denied the request since, although I had been appointed by the City Council, I was a New York State employee, not a City employee and I was not under the control nor subject to the City Council.
There were several cases that I thought I could be seen as being biased due to a party being a former client or close friend and I recused myself without any request by anyone.
