Nancy Gertner | |
---|---|
Senior Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts | |
In office May 22, 2011 –September 1, 2011 | |
Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts | |
In office February 14,1994 –May 22,2011 | |
Appointed by | Bill Clinton |
Preceded by | A. David Mazzone |
Succeeded by | Timothy S. Hillman |
Personal details | |
Born | New York City,U.S. | May 22,1946
Education | Barnard College (BA) Yale University (MA,JD) |
Nancy Gertner (born May 22,1946) is a former United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. She assumed senior status on May 22,2011,and retired outright from the federal bench on September 1,2011. [1] [2] She is now a professor of practice at Harvard Law School. [1]
Gertner was born in New York City,the granddaughter of Jewish immigrants from Poland and Hungary. Her father,Moishe Gertner,owned a linoleum business;her mother Sadie Gertner was a housewife. Her family lived in a tenement until she was seven years old,when they moved to Flushing,New York. [3] At Flushing High School she was a cheerleader,a member of the staff of her high school's literary magazine,runner-up for homecoming queen,and valedictorian of her class. [4] Gertner received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Barnard College of Columbia University in 1967 and a Master of Arts and a Juris Doctor from Yale University and Yale Law School,respectively,in 1971. While attending Yale,Gertner became friends with Hillary Rodham and met Bill Clinton.
Gertner began her legal career in 1971 as a law clerk for Judge Luther Swygert of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Between 1972 and 1994,she practiced law in and around the Greater Boston area with Harvey Silverglate and Thomas Shapiro at Silverglate,Shapiro &Gertner,during which she also taught at Boston University School of Law and was a visiting professor at Harvard Law School. During this period,Gertner was notable for being a supporter of liberalism and feminist ideals,wearing bright red clothes in court,carrying her legal briefs in shopping bags and keeping files on lawyers and judges she felt to be sexist. [4]
On October 27,1993,on the recommendations of Senators Ted Kennedy and John Kerry,Gertner was nominated to the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts by President Bill Clinton to a seat vacated by A. David Mazzone. Gertner was confirmed by the Senate on February 10,1994,and received her commission on February 14,1994. Gertner assumed senior status on May 22,2011,and retired on September 1,2011.
After retiring from the bench,Gertner was appointed a Professor of Practice at Harvard Law School. [1] She was named a member of the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States by President Joe Biden on April 9,2021. [5]
Gertner ruled in U.S. v. Hines,55 F.Supp. 2d 62 (D.Mass. 1999),a case regarding the admissibility of expert testimony,that (i) a handwriting expert could testify to similarities between handwriting samples but not state an opinion about whether the same person wrote both notes,and (ii) expert witness testimony regarding the reliability of eyewitness testimony,including problems of cross-racial identification,was admissible. The case interpreted new admissibility standards for expert testimony set forth by the Supreme Court in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals,509 U.S. 579 (1993) and Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael,526 U.S. 137 (1999).
On July 26,2007,she ordered the federal government to pay a record $101.7 million for withholding evidence that could have exculpated four men wrongfully convicted of murder. [6] The men had been falsely accused by mob hitman Joseph "The Animal" Barboza,with the help of corrupt FBI agent H. Paul Rico. The government appealed the award,which was upheld in 2009 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. [7]
Judge Gertner presided over Sony BMG v. Tenenbaum ,a civil trial in which the Recording Industry Association of America accused Joel Tenenbaum,a Massachusetts college student,of illegally downloading and sharing files,thus violating U.S. copyright law. In July 2009,a jury awarded $675,000 to the music companies,but Judge Gertner later reduced the award to $67,500, [8] stating that arbitrarily high statutory damages violate due process and are thus unconstitutional. After both parties appealed,the First Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the original damage award of $675,000 and remanded the case to the District Court,ruling that the judge should have avoided the constitutional issue by first considering remittitur. The Supreme Court refused to hear Tenenbaum's appeal arguing against the remand. A new District Court judge then found no cause for remittitur,and held that the statutory damage award was constitutional. Tenenbaum again appealed to the First Circuit,which in June 2013 upheld the award.
As a defense attorney,she defended Brandeis University student and fugitive Susan Saxe,who stole money to finance the student strikes during the Vietnam era. Gertner describes the Saxe trial as her first big case. [9]
Sean Hannity,Rush Limbaugh,Alan Dershowitz and others have asserted that Robert Mueller was responsible for the improper imprisonment of four men when he was a federal prosecutor in Boston during the 1980s. In an opinion piece entitled "Smearing Robert Mueller",Gertner,who presided over the matter,wrote "[t]he record simply doesn't support these assertions". [10]
Gertner is to date the only Massachusetts judge to post to a personal blog. Though this has resulted in some criticism, Gertner maintains that judges are often too silent on issues they should publicly address. [11]
Gertner published her memoirs, In Defense of Women: Memoirs of an Unrepentant Advocate, in 2011. The book focuses on the period during which she worked as a criminal defense and civil rights lawyer before joining the Federal bench in 1994. [12]
Gertner is married to John Reinstein, former Legal Director for the Massachusetts ACLU. [13]
In October 2015, Gertner became the subject of media attention in the Boston area when an escaped cockatoo did considerable damage to her Brookline residence, a historic Victorian home which also happened to be the birthplace of Robert F. Kennedy. After eluding capture for several months, the bird was caught on October 22. [14]
Stephen Roy Reinhardt was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, with chambers in Los Angeles, California. He was the last federal appeals court judge in active service to have been appointed to his position by President Jimmy Carter.
Bruce Marshall Selya is a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and former chief judge of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review who is known for his distinctive writing style.
Sandra Lea Lynch is an American lawyer who serves as a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. She is the first woman to serve on that court. Lynch served as chief judge of the First Circuit from 2008 to 2015.
Sabita Singh is an American lawyer and Judge of the Massachusetts Appeals Court.
Harvey Allen Silverglate is an American attorney, journalist, writer, and the co-founder of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).
Susan Pia Graber is an American attorney and jurist. She is a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. A native of Oklahoma, she was the 90th justice of the Oregon Supreme Court from 1990 to 1998. She served on the Oregon Court of Appeals from 1988 to 1990.
Patti B. Saris is a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. She is also the former chair of the United States Sentencing Commission.
Douglas Preston Woodlock is a United States federal judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Born in Connecticut, Woodlock graduated from Yale College and worked as a journalist before attending Georgetown University Law Center. After graduating, Woodlock was a lawyer in private practice at the law firm of Goodwin, Procter & Hoar, and had stints at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts. Appointed to the federal bench in 1986, Woodlock presided over a number of noteworthy cases and was a key figure in the construction of the John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse on the Boston waterfront. He assumed senior status in 2015.
In the case of Sony BMG Music Entertainment et al. v. Tenenbaum, record label Sony BMG, along with Warner Bros. Records, Atlantic Records, Arista Records, and UMG Recordings, accused Joel Tenenbaum of illegally downloading and sharing files in violation of U.S. copyright law. It was only the second file-sharing case to go to verdict in the Recording Industry Association of America's (RIAA) anti-downloading litigation campaign. After the judge entered a finding of liability, a jury assessed damages of $675,000, which the judge reduced to $67,500 on constitutional grounds, rather than through remittitur.
Susan Laura Carney is an American lawyer who serves as a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Denise Jefferson Casper is an American attorney serving as a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. She used to be the Deputy District Attorney for the Middlesex District Attorney's Office in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Casper is the first black female judge to serve on the federal bench in Massachusetts. Casper is also notable for presiding over the criminal trial of Whitey Bulger.
Fernande R. V. Duffly is an American lawyer and jurist from Massachusetts. She was appointed by Governor Deval Patrick in December 2010 to serve as an associate justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Patrick nominated her following the elevation of Roderick L. Ireland as Chief Justice on the court. Her nomination was confirmed 4-3 by the Governor's Council on January 26, 2011. She was sworn in on February 1, 2011. She is the first Asian American to serve on the court. She retired on July 12, 2016.
Carolyn Baldwin McHugh is an American lawyer and judge who serves as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. and former Presiding Judge of the Utah Court of Appeals.
Sony BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum is the appeals lawsuit which followed the U.S. District Court case Sony BMG v. Tenenbaum, No. 07cv11446-NG.
Timothy Spafard Hillman is a senior United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
Wilhelmina Marie Wright is a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Minnesota. She is the only jurist in Minnesota's history to be state district court judge, appellate court judge and state supreme court justice. She was formerly an associate justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court, a judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals, and a judge of the Minnesota District Court, Second Judicial District.
Carmen Milagros Ortiz is an attorney, college instructor, and former United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts.
Cornelia Thayer Livingston Pillard, known professionally as Nina Pillard, is a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Before becoming a judge, Pillard was a tenured law professor at Georgetown University.
David Jeremiah Barron is an American lawyer who serves as the Chief United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and former S. William Green Professor of Public Law at Harvard Law School. He previously served as the Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Office of Legal Counsel at the United States Department of Justice.
Ada Elene Brown is a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas. She is a former trial judge of the Dallas County courts and a former Justice of the Fifth Court of Appeals of Texas. She is the first African-American woman federal judge nominated by President Donald Trump and confirmed by the Senate. She is also the first African American woman to sit as a federal judge in the 140- year-history of the Northern District of Texas. A citizen of the Choctaw Nation, Brown is also one of six actively serving Native American federal judges of 673 federal district court judges. When appointed to the federal bench, Brown became the only woman judge in the 233-year history of the Choctaw Nation to serve as a federal judge.