New York Divorce Judge Garson Sentenced to Prison
Disgraced former New York state matrimonial judge Gerald Garson was sentenced yesterday to 3-10 years in state prison, following his conviction for accepting favors, cash, and other goods from a lawyer practicing in his Court. The sentence was stayed pending appeal.
The Garson case was reported upon extensively in the New York press, and he was made out to be the poster child for everything the public sees as wrong about the way matrimonial cases are handled in the Court system: callous and insensitive judges, special access for favored attorneys, decisions made without any regard for the facts of the case and the available evidence, and buying influence with a judge.
In my practice, I spend a good deal of time explaining to my current and potential clients over and over again that the judges I appear before are for the most part decent men and women trying to do what they think is the right thing and that they are not corrupt or being inappropriately influenced by their spouse’s evil and manipulative attorney.
I try very hard to defend the system that I work in and the people I work with because I really believe that most of the time most of the people in it are trying to do the right thing, whatever that might mean for them. Now, when a client points to the Garson case as proof positive that the Court or my adversary is corrupt or dishonest, my argument becomes a little harder to make.
