DiFiore, Bodegas and Debt
Hello and happy summer! I hope you, like me, have been enjoying warmer weather and a slower pace of life. I’ve worked on a few story lines in the last two weeks, including the departure of New York’s top judge.
New York State Court of Appeals Judge Janet DiFiore announced her resignation while the state’s judicial commission was considering a complaint that she improperly attempted to influence a disciplinary hearing, I reported last week in The Wall Street Journal with Corinne Ramey.
The state’s Commission on Judicial Conduct had been investigating Judge DiFiore for several months in connection with a complaint filed last year by Dennis Quirk, head of the court officers union, people familiar with the matter said. The commission voted in June to serve Judge DiFiore with a formal written complaint alleging that she improperly used her official position to influence a disciplinary hearing involving Quirk, those people said.
Deborah Scalise, who represented Judge DiFiore in the matter, said Judge DiFiore was planning her resignation for months and that it was “completely unrelated to Mr. Quirk’s complaint or any other external factors.” Judge DiFiore said in her public resignation letter Monday that she was proud to have eliminated a backlog of cases, promoted racial equity and guided the court system through the pandemic. “It is time for me to move on to the next chapter of my professional life,” she wrote.
THE ALBA CASE: I also wrote about how prosecutors in New York City are reconsidering the murder charge they filed against Jose Alba, a bodega worker who fatally stabbed a man for attacking him earlier this month at a store in Harlem.
Alba’s case has attracted attention in New York City, where residents and business owners are coping with a recent rise in violent crime. Bodega owners have complained about the growth of petit larceny in their stores, which often serve as neighborhood gathering places, in addition to selling coffee, snacks and groceries.
Fernando Mateo, a co-founder of United Bodegas of America, said he wanted to see more store employees arm themselves in the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision. Other Republicans questioned why Alba was initially sent to the Rikers Island jail complex with high bail, which they said contradicts DA Alvin Bragg’s policy of reducing pretrial detention when possible.
BROCCOLI: Several states with budget surpluses this year — including New York — have chosen not to fully repay the federal government for money borrowed to fund unemployment benefits, a move that will impose increased charges on businesses to help make up the difference.
If the debts aren’t fully repaid by Nov. 10, as officials in the four states envision, the federal government will start charging $21 per employee annually on all businesses in the states next year. In addition, state taxes on businesses to fund their unemployment programs will go up by varying amounts.
Business groups say the increased charges are unfair, particularly for companies that haven’t laid off employees recently, and unwise as the economy is potentially headed toward a recession. Liberal advocacy groups and Democratic legislators say the public benefits more from money spent on programs like housing and infrastructure, as well as tax rebates, rather than preventing small fee increases on businesses.
THE QUESTION: What was DiFiore’s job before she was appointed to the Court of Appeals?
Know the answer? Drop me a line at jimmy.vielkind@gmail.com. Or just write with thoughts, feedback or to say hi.
THE LAST ANSWER: Kind of a trick question — President Thomas Whitmore gave the speech in 1996 before leading a dog fight against alien invaders. Unfortunately, he lost re-election to James Marshall, who was known for his tough rhetoric on Kazakhstan.