New York
Judge resigns after saying he can’t be on a jury since he thinks all defendants guilty
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — An upstate New York judge has resigned after he got out of jury duty by claiming that he couldn’t be impartial — because he thought everyone brought before a court is guilty.
Richard T. Snyder, who had been a justice of the Petersburgh Town Court for about a decade, left his post after being charged with misconduct by a state judicial commission, officials said Tuesday.
According to court transcripts, Snyder tried to avoid serving on a jury in 2023 by first identifying himself as a judge and then saying, “I know everybody come in front of me. I know they are guilty. They would not be in front of me.”
He was eventually dismissed from serving on the jury after he continued to argue that he could not be impartial, saying “No. It would not be fair,” court transcripts from a special grand jury empanelment in Rensselaer County show.
The judge who was overseeing the jury selection reported Snyder to state officials.
At a judicial commission hearing the following year, Snyder said he understood that defendants are supposed to be considered innocent until proven guilty but that he still felt that people wouldn’t be in court if they didn’t commit crimes.
“I meant, that they were guilty because they did something wrong. But they’re not guilty ‘til they come to court. They’re innocent ‘til proven guilty,” he told the commission.
“They did something wrong. That’s why they got a ticket. But they’re not guilty,” he added.
Snyder, who was elected as a justice, is not an attorney and has agreed to never serve as a judge again.
Public records did not list a phone number for Snyder. Voicemails left with the Petersburgh Town Court were not immediately returned.
Petersburgh is a small town outside Albany near New York’s border with Vermont and Massachusetts. It has a population of about 1,400 people, according to census data.
In a statement, Robert H. Tembeckjian, administrator of the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct, said “there is no place on the bench for someone who so deeply misunderstands the role of a judge and the administration of justice.”
Courts in New York do not offer automatic jury duty exemptions to anyone, including judges.
Louisiana
Court upholds suspension of LSU professor who vulgarly criticized Trump, governor
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A Louisiana appeals court on Tuesday upheld the suspension of an LSU law professor who criticized Gov. Jeff Landry and President Donald Trump using vulgar language.
While teaching a constitutional law class last month, tenured Prof. Ken Levy stated “f(asterisk)(asterisk)(asterisk) the Governor” and employed the expletive to talk about Trump and students who supported him.
Within a few days, LSU’s administration informed Levy he had been suspended from his teaching responsibilities “pending an investigation into student complaints of inappropriate statements made in your class,” according to a lawsuit Levy filed last week.
The three-member First Circuit Court of Appeal’s ruling overturned East Baton Rouge district judge Donald Johnson’s order last week that LSU immediately reinstate Levy to his teaching role. This would require a “full evidentiary hearing,” the appeals court ruled.
A hearing is scheduled for Monday, lawyers for both parties say.
The appeals court ruling upheld the rest of the district judge’s temporary restraining order barring LSU from retaliating against Levy “on account of his protected academic freedom and free speech.”
Levy’s attorney Jill Craft said she is pleased with the appeals court’s decision to uphold “the bulk” of the restraining order on behalf of her client.
“What it means is his rights are protected and LSU can’t take any action against him and so that’s a good thing,” Craft told The Associated Press.
Jimmy Faircloth, Jr., an attorney representing LSU, said that the elements of the restraining order upheld by the appeals court are “superfluous” and “doesn’t do anything other than tell LSU ‘you can’t break the law’ which we know and we’re not doing.”
Levy’s suspension is “not a question of academic freedom” but rather about “inappropriate conduct in the classroom,” LSU’s Vice President of Marketing and Communications Todd Woodward said in an emailed statement.
“Our investigation found that Professor Levy created a classroom environment that was demeaning to students who do not hold his political view, threatening in terms of their grades, and profane,” Woodward added.
Levy said in a sworn affidavit that he had made his comments “in a joking manner” in order to highlight his support for the First Amendment and to emphasize the no recording policy in his class.
Levy had issued a no recording rule “because he did not want to be Governor Landry’s next target — although that is ironically what happened,” Levy’s lawsuit said.
Last November, Gov. Landry had publicly called for LSU to discipline another law professor, Nicholas Bryner, who during a lecture criticized Trump and students who voted for him. Bryner remains employed by LSU.
Levy’s lawsuit said that LSU’s actions violated his due process and “chill and restrict...free speech rights.”
Washington
Judge blocks transfers of 3 transgenders to men’s prison
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge agreed Tuesday to temporarily block prison officials from transferring three incarcerated transgender women to men’s facilities and terminating their access to hormone therapy under an executive order signed by President Donald Trump.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth in Washington, D.C., granted the inmates’ request for a temporary restraining order. He issued a written ruling several hours after a hearing where a plaintiffs’ attorney argued that Trump’s order discriminates against transgender people and violates their constitutional rights.
The judge is presiding over a lawsuit filed on behalf of three transgender women who were housed in women’s facilities before Trump signed the order on Jan. 20, his first day back in the White House.
On Jan. 26, a federal judge in Boston issued a restraining order in a separate challenge to the same executive order. That order was limited to one transgender woman in a woman’s prison.
Trump’s order requires the federal Bureau of Prisons to ensure that “males are not detained in women’s prisons.” It also requires the bureau to revise its medical care policies so that federal funds aren’t spent “for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.”
Justice Department attorney John Robinson said prison officials have “broad discretion” to decide where to place inmates.
Moving the women to a men’s prison would jeopardize their safety and expose them to psychological harm, plaintiffs’ attorneys argued.
Trump’s order would disrupt the plaintiffs’ access to hormone therapy for their gender dysphoria, the distress that a person may feel because their assigned gender and gender identity don’t match. The medical condition has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts.
Lamberth noted that there are only about 16 transgender women housed in female penitentiaries, including the three plaintiffs who sued in Washington. The judge concluded that “the public interest in seeing the plaintiffs relocated immediately to male facilities is slight at best.”
“Moreover, the balance of the equities and the public interest favor the plaintiffs,” wrote Lamberth, a senior judge who was nominated by then-President Ronald Reagan in 1987.
The plaintiffs, who are identified by pseudonyms in court filings, are represented by attorneys from the San Francisco-based National Center for Lesbian Rights and Boston-based GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders, also known as GLAD Law.
The plaintiffs were housed in women’s units for months or years until January, when they were removed from the general population of women’s prisons and segregated with other transgender women to await transfers to men’s facilities.
“They were terrified at the prospect of these transfers given the serious risk of violence and sexual assault that they face in these men’s facilities,” GLAD attorney Jennifer Levi told the judge.
Plaintiffs’ lawyers argued that Trump’s order violates their clients’ constitutional rights to equal protection of laws and to be free from cruel and unusual punishment.
“There is no way to keep these women safe outside of a women’s prison.” Levi said. “We are just asking this court to maintain the status quo.”
Robinson said the plaintiffs haven’t been denied any medical care since Trump signed the order. The Bureau of Prisons hasn’t decided where to transfer them yet, he added.
“I don’t want to get out ahead of BOP interpreting this executive order,” Robinson said.
California
Lawsuit accuses university racial discrimination in admissions
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A lawsuit filed this week accuses the University of California of racial discrimination in undergraduate admissions by favoring Black and Latino students over Asian American and white applicants.
A group called Students Against Racial Discrimination sued Monday in federal court, alleging the university system admits students with inferior academic credentials at the expense of better-qualified ones.
The complaint claims UC’s admissions practices violate a state law approved by voters in 1996 that forbids considering race and other factors in public education, public employment and public contracting.
In addition, the filing alleges that the California campuses are violating the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment as well as Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars federal funds recipients from discriminating based on race.
In a statement, UC said Tuesday that it had not yet been served with the filing, but if necessary it will defend its admissions policies in court.
“Since the consideration of race in admissions was banned in California in 1996, the University of California has adjusted its admissions practices to comply with the law,” the statement said. “The UC undergraduate admissions application collects students’ race and ethnicity for statistical purposes only. This information is not shared with application reviewers and is not used for admission.”
The lawsuit asks a judge to block the university system with 10 campuses from asking about race in student applications and to appoint a court monitor to oversee admission decisions.
Asian American and white applicants are discriminated against because of their race, while Latino and Black students are “often placed at a significant academic disadvantage, and thus experience worse outcomes, because of the university’s use of racial preferences,” the complaint alleges.
“Students of all races are harmed by the University of California’s discriminatory behavior,” the lawsuit says.
It accuses UC officials of ordering campuses to use a “holistic” review of undergraduate admissions, “in other words, that they move away from objective criteria towards more subjective assessments of the overall appeal of individual candidates.”
As an example, the filing cites a statistic that in 2010 the University of California, Berkeley admitted 13% of Black, in-state students, compared with an overall 21% admission rate. By 2023, the Black admissions rate at Berkeley was 10%, compared to an overall rate of 12%, the complaint said.
The lawsuit comes more than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in college admissions, declaring race cannot be a factor and forcing institutions of higher education to look for new ways to achieve diverse student bodies.
Judge resigns after saying he can’t be on a jury since he thinks all defendants guilty
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — An upstate New York judge has resigned after he got out of jury duty by claiming that he couldn’t be impartial — because he thought everyone brought before a court is guilty.
Richard T. Snyder, who had been a justice of the Petersburgh Town Court for about a decade, left his post after being charged with misconduct by a state judicial commission, officials said Tuesday.
According to court transcripts, Snyder tried to avoid serving on a jury in 2023 by first identifying himself as a judge and then saying, “I know everybody come in front of me. I know they are guilty. They would not be in front of me.”
He was eventually dismissed from serving on the jury after he continued to argue that he could not be impartial, saying “No. It would not be fair,” court transcripts from a special grand jury empanelment in Rensselaer County show.
The judge who was overseeing the jury selection reported Snyder to state officials.
At a judicial commission hearing the following year, Snyder said he understood that defendants are supposed to be considered innocent until proven guilty but that he still felt that people wouldn’t be in court if they didn’t commit crimes.
“I meant, that they were guilty because they did something wrong. But they’re not guilty ‘til they come to court. They’re innocent ‘til proven guilty,” he told the commission.
“They did something wrong. That’s why they got a ticket. But they’re not guilty,” he added.
Snyder, who was elected as a justice, is not an attorney and has agreed to never serve as a judge again.
Public records did not list a phone number for Snyder. Voicemails left with the Petersburgh Town Court were not immediately returned.
Petersburgh is a small town outside Albany near New York’s border with Vermont and Massachusetts. It has a population of about 1,400 people, according to census data.
In a statement, Robert H. Tembeckjian, administrator of the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct, said “there is no place on the bench for someone who so deeply misunderstands the role of a judge and the administration of justice.”
Courts in New York do not offer automatic jury duty exemptions to anyone, including judges.
Louisiana
Court upholds suspension of LSU professor who vulgarly criticized Trump, governor
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A Louisiana appeals court on Tuesday upheld the suspension of an LSU law professor who criticized Gov. Jeff Landry and President Donald Trump using vulgar language.
While teaching a constitutional law class last month, tenured Prof. Ken Levy stated “f(asterisk)(asterisk)(asterisk) the Governor” and employed the expletive to talk about Trump and students who supported him.
Within a few days, LSU’s administration informed Levy he had been suspended from his teaching responsibilities “pending an investigation into student complaints of inappropriate statements made in your class,” according to a lawsuit Levy filed last week.
The three-member First Circuit Court of Appeal’s ruling overturned East Baton Rouge district judge Donald Johnson’s order last week that LSU immediately reinstate Levy to his teaching role. This would require a “full evidentiary hearing,” the appeals court ruled.
A hearing is scheduled for Monday, lawyers for both parties say.
The appeals court ruling upheld the rest of the district judge’s temporary restraining order barring LSU from retaliating against Levy “on account of his protected academic freedom and free speech.”
Levy’s attorney Jill Craft said she is pleased with the appeals court’s decision to uphold “the bulk” of the restraining order on behalf of her client.
“What it means is his rights are protected and LSU can’t take any action against him and so that’s a good thing,” Craft told The Associated Press.
Jimmy Faircloth, Jr., an attorney representing LSU, said that the elements of the restraining order upheld by the appeals court are “superfluous” and “doesn’t do anything other than tell LSU ‘you can’t break the law’ which we know and we’re not doing.”
Levy’s suspension is “not a question of academic freedom” but rather about “inappropriate conduct in the classroom,” LSU’s Vice President of Marketing and Communications Todd Woodward said in an emailed statement.
“Our investigation found that Professor Levy created a classroom environment that was demeaning to students who do not hold his political view, threatening in terms of their grades, and profane,” Woodward added.
Levy said in a sworn affidavit that he had made his comments “in a joking manner” in order to highlight his support for the First Amendment and to emphasize the no recording policy in his class.
Levy had issued a no recording rule “because he did not want to be Governor Landry’s next target — although that is ironically what happened,” Levy’s lawsuit said.
Last November, Gov. Landry had publicly called for LSU to discipline another law professor, Nicholas Bryner, who during a lecture criticized Trump and students who voted for him. Bryner remains employed by LSU.
Levy’s lawsuit said that LSU’s actions violated his due process and “chill and restrict...free speech rights.”
Washington
Judge blocks transfers of 3 transgenders to men’s prison
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge agreed Tuesday to temporarily block prison officials from transferring three incarcerated transgender women to men’s facilities and terminating their access to hormone therapy under an executive order signed by President Donald Trump.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth in Washington, D.C., granted the inmates’ request for a temporary restraining order. He issued a written ruling several hours after a hearing where a plaintiffs’ attorney argued that Trump’s order discriminates against transgender people and violates their constitutional rights.
The judge is presiding over a lawsuit filed on behalf of three transgender women who were housed in women’s facilities before Trump signed the order on Jan. 20, his first day back in the White House.
On Jan. 26, a federal judge in Boston issued a restraining order in a separate challenge to the same executive order. That order was limited to one transgender woman in a woman’s prison.
Trump’s order requires the federal Bureau of Prisons to ensure that “males are not detained in women’s prisons.” It also requires the bureau to revise its medical care policies so that federal funds aren’t spent “for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.”
Justice Department attorney John Robinson said prison officials have “broad discretion” to decide where to place inmates.
Moving the women to a men’s prison would jeopardize their safety and expose them to psychological harm, plaintiffs’ attorneys argued.
Trump’s order would disrupt the plaintiffs’ access to hormone therapy for their gender dysphoria, the distress that a person may feel because their assigned gender and gender identity don’t match. The medical condition has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts.
Lamberth noted that there are only about 16 transgender women housed in female penitentiaries, including the three plaintiffs who sued in Washington. The judge concluded that “the public interest in seeing the plaintiffs relocated immediately to male facilities is slight at best.”
“Moreover, the balance of the equities and the public interest favor the plaintiffs,” wrote Lamberth, a senior judge who was nominated by then-President Ronald Reagan in 1987.
The plaintiffs, who are identified by pseudonyms in court filings, are represented by attorneys from the San Francisco-based National Center for Lesbian Rights and Boston-based GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders, also known as GLAD Law.
The plaintiffs were housed in women’s units for months or years until January, when they were removed from the general population of women’s prisons and segregated with other transgender women to await transfers to men’s facilities.
“They were terrified at the prospect of these transfers given the serious risk of violence and sexual assault that they face in these men’s facilities,” GLAD attorney Jennifer Levi told the judge.
Plaintiffs’ lawyers argued that Trump’s order violates their clients’ constitutional rights to equal protection of laws and to be free from cruel and unusual punishment.
“There is no way to keep these women safe outside of a women’s prison.” Levi said. “We are just asking this court to maintain the status quo.”
Robinson said the plaintiffs haven’t been denied any medical care since Trump signed the order. The Bureau of Prisons hasn’t decided where to transfer them yet, he added.
“I don’t want to get out ahead of BOP interpreting this executive order,” Robinson said.
California
Lawsuit accuses university racial discrimination in admissions
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A lawsuit filed this week accuses the University of California of racial discrimination in undergraduate admissions by favoring Black and Latino students over Asian American and white applicants.
A group called Students Against Racial Discrimination sued Monday in federal court, alleging the university system admits students with inferior academic credentials at the expense of better-qualified ones.
The complaint claims UC’s admissions practices violate a state law approved by voters in 1996 that forbids considering race and other factors in public education, public employment and public contracting.
In addition, the filing alleges that the California campuses are violating the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment as well as Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars federal funds recipients from discriminating based on race.
In a statement, UC said Tuesday that it had not yet been served with the filing, but if necessary it will defend its admissions policies in court.
“Since the consideration of race in admissions was banned in California in 1996, the University of California has adjusted its admissions practices to comply with the law,” the statement said. “The UC undergraduate admissions application collects students’ race and ethnicity for statistical purposes only. This information is not shared with application reviewers and is not used for admission.”
The lawsuit asks a judge to block the university system with 10 campuses from asking about race in student applications and to appoint a court monitor to oversee admission decisions.
Asian American and white applicants are discriminated against because of their race, while Latino and Black students are “often placed at a significant academic disadvantage, and thus experience worse outcomes, because of the university’s use of racial preferences,” the complaint alleges.
“Students of all races are harmed by the University of California’s discriminatory behavior,” the lawsuit says.
It accuses UC officials of ordering campuses to use a “holistic” review of undergraduate admissions, “in other words, that they move away from objective criteria towards more subjective assessments of the overall appeal of individual candidates.”
As an example, the filing cites a statistic that in 2010 the University of California, Berkeley admitted 13% of Black, in-state students, compared with an overall 21% admission rate. By 2023, the Black admissions rate at Berkeley was 10%, compared to an overall rate of 12%, the complaint said.
The lawsuit comes more than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in college admissions, declaring race cannot be a factor and forcing institutions of higher education to look for new ways to achieve diverse student bodies.
