Prosecutors are known for being quick, determined and always on their toes. Some prosecutors are well known for their snappy, vicious courtroom attitudes and almost perfect trial records. Whether they are still practicing or retired, the following prosecutors will make you glad you never faced them in court:

• Vincent Bugliosi
  Probably best known as the prosecuting attorney for Los Angeles County in the Charles Manson case, Vincent Bugliosi successfully prosecuted Manson and several other of his followers for the 1969 murders of Sharon Tate and 6 other people. Also, known for authoring a book in which he criticizes the district attorneys and prosecutors in the OJ Simpson case, in his years as a prosecuting attorney, Bugliosi tried 106 felony cases and only lost one.
• William Kunkle
  William Kunkle is most famously known for his win of a death sentence for John Wayne Gacy, a businessman and clown entertainer at children’s parties and benefits, who killed 33 men and boys. Kunkle is known for his approval and support of the death penalty, and is known to suggest it widely when he believes it the the proper punishment.
• Marcia Clark
  Marcia Clark is probably most famously known for being the prosecuting attorney against OJ Simpson in the murder trial of his ex-wife and her friend. Although Clark didn’t win a guilty verdict against Simpson, she has a very successful legal reputation and has successfully prevailed in at least 19, some well-known, homicide prosecutions.
• Joseph Richard “Rick” Distaso
  Most famously known for being the lead prosecutor in the murder trial against Scott Peterson, accused of the murder of his wife, Laci Peterson and their unborn son, Distaso was successful in gaining a guilty verdict, despite the hard-hitting high profile of defense attorney Mark Geragos. Distaso is also known for a few other big cases in which he also won based on circumstantial evidence.
• Jeffrey Hayworth Knox
  Jeffrey Hayworth Knox is a federal prosecutor in Brooklyn. Knox, overseeing and with the help of the attorney’s office in Brooklyn, is responsible for the successful prosecution of 1/3 of the international terrorism convictions around the nation in the last two years.
• John Healey
  John Healey, a Fort Bend County, Texas prosecutor is well known for leading a small town of prosecutors and maintaining a successful record. Healey’s team is responsible for a number of succesful prosecutions including child abuse cases, capital murders of children, aggravated assaults, and several high profile murders, rapes and robberies.
• Stephen Lawrence Cooley
  Stephen Lawrence Cooley has served as a prosecutor for 27 years in Los Angeles. Cooley, who is known to have over-seen thousands of felony cases, continues to win in the courtroom and win landslide elections as the first district attorney in Los Angeles history to be re-elected to a third consecutive term.
• Mark A. Richardson
  Mark Richardson is the Cole County, Missouri prosecuting attorney. Richardson has worked in the prosecutor’s office for over 10 years and has won over 55 criminal jury trials including, murder, felony assualts, robberies, and child molestation and drug cases.
  
  
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  Judges are the leaders of the court and the most distinguished figure within the judicial system. Judges do not make law; they rather interpret existing law made by the legislature. Most judges get their start as attorneys, work at the state level and, if they’re lucky, reach the Federal courts. Their influence on law is substantial and their decisions decide how laws work and how they are enforced. Here are 10 unforgettable judges whose decisions made a difference in our nation’s history:

  • John Marshall
    John Marshall (1755-1835) was the fourth Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court and arguably one of the most influential judges to the American legal system. Marshall is remembered for his establishment of judicial review, which gave courts the right to strike down laws that violate the Constitution. The Marshall Court paved the way for several decisions relating to federalism and supremacy of federal law over state law.

  

  • Benjamin N. Cardozo
    Benjamin N. Cardozo (1870-1938) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from 1932 to 1938 and was nominated by President Hoover. Cardozo was remembered for his contributions to American common law and handing down often liberal opinions that stressed the 10th Amendment. Many of Cardozo’s landmark decisions were made when he was on the New York Court of Appeals, in which he focused on tort and contract rulings. He also made notable contributions to legal academia, such as giving the Storrs Lectures at Yale University, helping found the American Law Institute and writing several books that became standard literature within the legal profession.

  

  • Warren E. Burger
    Warren E. Burger (1907-1995) was a Chief Justice of the United States, who was nominated by President Nixon, and was most notably remembered for his controversial decisions on moral issues like abortion, capital punishment, gay marriage and school desegregation. Burger helped progress the juridical system when he wrote opinions that legally defined obscenity, forced President Nixon to release the Watergate tapes and helped end school segregation by implementing busing of students.

  

  • William Rehnquist
    William Rehnquist (1924-2005) served as Associate Justice and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court from 1986 to 2005 and was nominated by President Reagan. Known for his conservative views, Rehnquist favored the idea of federalism that stressed the Tenth Amendment’s reservation of states’ powers and was a supporter of state-sanctioned prayer in public schools and capital punishment. As Chief Justice, Rehnquist made changes to the justices’ conferences in order to keep hearings on track and give even talking time. In 1988, Rehnquist lobbied Congress to give the Court control of its own docket, which limited mandatory appeals and certiorari grants.

  

  • Richard Posner
    Richard Posner (1939 – ) is currently a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago. Since his 1981 commission to this court, Posner has been an influential figure in the law and economics movement with his progressive and controversial views concerning antitrust policy changes, opposition to the right of privacy and favoring efficient breach of contracts. In addition to his contributions to academia as a Senior Lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School, Posner is also a well accomplished legal writer with nearly 40 published books and articles.

  

  • William J. Brennan, Jr.
    William J. Brennan, Jr., (1906-1997) served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from 1956 to 1990 and was nominated by President Eisenhower. Brennan was an influential member of the Court and a leader for the liberal wing, specifically for his progressive views against the death penalty, support for abortion rights and expansion of individual and free speech rights. Brennan played a major role in America’s most groundbreaking and controversial cases, such as New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, Roe v. Wade, Roth v. United States and many others. Brennan’s undying support for individual rights and compelling arguments had the power to sway even the most conservative decisions and bargain for votes.

  

  • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
    Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., (1841-1935) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from 1902 to 1932 and was nominated by President Theodore Roosevelt. Holmes was remembered as one of the most influential common law judges, who supported economic regulation, expansion of freedom of speech under the First Amendment and the legal realism movement. As the oldest justice in the history of the Supreme Court, Holmes played a leading role in many landmark cases, such as Schenck v. United States, in which the Court decided that the First Amendment did not protect the right to free speech against the draft during World War I, and Holmes’ ever-quotable “clear and present danger” majority opinion was born.

  

  • Roger J. Traynor
    Roger J. Traynor (1900-1983) was the 23rd Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of California from 1964 to 1970, after serving 24 years as the Associate Justice of the Court. During his 30-year career on the California Supreme Court, Traynor influenced demographic, social and governmental growth within his state and throughout the nation. Traynor made history during the Perez v. Sharp case for being the first state supreme court to strike down a stature prohibiting miscegenation, in addition to his 1952 opinion that abolished the defense of recrimination for divorce, and his creation of strict liability in product liability cases. Traynor pushed the boundaries of judicial power, while resolving many social and public policy issues.

  

  • Sandra Day O’Connor
    Sandra Day O’Connor (1930 – ) made history when she became the first female Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1981 to 2006 and was appointed by President Reagan. O’Connor was known as the Court’s leading moderate and was often the swing vote for many cases. With this powerful role, O’Connor became the deciding vote for many landmark cases, such as Lawrence v. Texas, Webster v. Reproductive Health Services and United States v. Lopez, in which she shared both majority and dissenting opinions. O’Connor retired from the Court in 2006, but will be remembered for her contributions to the judicial system and paving the way for future women Supreme Court justices.

  

  • Louis Brandeis
    Louis Brandeis (1856-1941) was an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States from 1916 to 1939 and was nominated by President Wilson. While working as a lawyer in Boston, Brandeis developed the “right to privacy” concept in a Harvard Law Review and wrote a book called, Other People’s Money that spoke against monopolies, public corruption, mass consumerism and limiting the power or these large corporations. When Brandeis became a member of the Supreme Court, he took these progressive and controversial beliefs to the high court and defended freedom of speech, the right to privacy in Gilbert v. Minnesota, Whitney v. California and Olmstead v. United States, to name a few.

  

  
  ]]> http://www.courtreporterschool.org/blog/2010/10-unforgettable-judges/feed/ 78466 http://www.courtreporterschool.org/blog/2010/10-most-famous-court-cases/ http://www.courtreporterschool.org/blog/2010/10-most-famous-court-cases/#comments Wed, 18 Aug 2010 22:09:30 +0000 admin http://www.courtreporterschool.org/?p=83

  

  Over the last 200 years, the Supreme Court has made decisions that ended segregation, secured women’s rights and protected civil liberties that we cherish still today. Out of the hundreds of landmark cases heard every year, there are few cases that inspire, teach and define our nation’s history more than these 10:

  • Marbury v. Madison
    (1803)
    Marbury v. Madison is one of the most well-known and studied Supreme Court cases in American history. This Court decision established judicial review, which allows the judicial branch to review and nullify the actions of the legislative and executive branches, therefore, exercising the separation of powers among the three branches of government. Marbury v. Madison challenged this idea, when President John Adams federally appointed William Marbury as the Justice of Peace at the end of his presidential term, but his Secretary of State failed to deliver the documents. When Thomas Jefferson became president, he told his Secretary of State, James Madison, not to deliver Marbury’s commission because he didn’t want members of the opposing political party to take office. Marbury sued Madison and the case went to the Supreme Court, in which Chief Justice John Marshall made the Judiciary Act of 1789 unconstitutional, because it gave the Supreme Court authority that was denied within the Constitution. This was the first time the Supreme Court struck down a law because it was deemed unconstitutional.
  • McCulloch v. Maryland
    (1819)
    McCulloch v. Maryland established that sovereignty remains in the United States and not within the individual states. This historic Supreme Court decision ruled that Congress had the right, as implied in the Necessary and Proper Clause of the Constitution, to create the Second Bank of the United States, but the state of Maryland did not have the power to tax the bank in an effort to stop operation. Chief Justice John Marshall presided over the case, which also granted Congress the ability to pass laws that would execute its enumerated powers, such as regulate interstate commerce, collect taxes and borrow money.
  • Roe v. Wade
    (1973)
    Roe v. Wade was the landmark Supreme Court case that discussed the issue of abortion. Jane Roe, a single pregnant woman, filed a class action lawsuit against Dallas County District Attorney Henry Wade, in order to challenge the constitutionality of the Texas criminal abortion laws which made aborting a fetus a felony, unless the woman’s health was at risk. The Court upheld the constitutional right to privacy and a woman’s decision to have an abortion. The case also stated that it is the right of states to regulate abortions, based on protecting prenatal life and the mother’s health. State regulation is determined by the mother’s current trimester of pregnancy. Roe v. Wade is arguably the most controversial Supreme Court decision in history and is constantly fought to be overturned.
  • Brown v. Board of Education
    (1954)
    Brown v. Board of Education was a monumental case for the civil rights movement and attaining racial equality. During the 1950s, a large amount of schools were segregated by race. This was the case in Topeka, Kansas, where Linda Brown, her sister and other black students were denied access to nearby segregated white schools. The Topeka NAACP filed a case on the behalf of a group of 13 parents and 20 children who believed their Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated by the segregated school system. This class action suit was named after one of the plaintiffs, Oliver Brown. The case was taken to the Federal district court, but segregation was upheld because the court claimed all white and non-white students had similar buildings, transportation, curricula and accessibility. The case reached the Supreme Court and the Browns insisted that segregated school will never be equal. The Court decided that school segregation was unconstitutional because it violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
  • Gideon v. Wainwright
    (1961)
    The right to have an attorney appointed to you, in the event that you cannot afford one, was not always a constitutional right. In the Supreme Court case, Gideon v. Wainwright, a Florida man, Clarence Earl Gideon, was arrested after being spotted near a burglary scene and was unable to afford a lawyer to represent him in court. When he asked a Florida Circuit Court judge to appoint a lawyer for him, he was denied and forced to represent himself. Gideon did not defend himself in court, was found guilty and sentenced to a Florida state prison. Gideon pleaded for the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his case, which it agreed to and unanimously agreed that Gideon’s rights were violated because the Sixth Amendment required state courts to appoint lawyers for defendants who cannot afford counsel.
  • Miranda v. Arizona
    (1966)
    You may know or have heard the following sentences: “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you. Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you?” These are the Miranda rights that every police office must give suspects during their arrest. Miranda v. Arizona was the Supreme Court case that made these rights a customary practice among U.S. police force. The case came about because of Ernesto Miranda, who was arrested for rape and kidnapping in Phoenix, but was not informed by police of his Fifth or Sixth Amendment rights against self-incrimination or the assistance of a lawyer. The Supreme Court decided that the Arizona police did not follow the designated steps to inform Miranda that he has the right to remain silent and be appointed a lawyer if he cannot afford one.
  • Gibbons v. Ogden
    (1824)
    The Supreme Court case, Gibbons v. Ogden, determined that the federal government has sole power over interstate commerce. The case originated because of a state law that gave a New York steamship company a monopoly by allowing them to use the state’s waterways for business. Aaron Ogden was one of the business investors, who held a license under the monopoly, allowing him to access these waters. Another steamship trader, Thomas Gibbons, planned to use the same waterways to do his business, but was denied access despite having a federal coasting license that had been issued by Congress. Gibbons sued Ogden and the case went to the Supreme Court, which decided the federal commerce clause took precedence over the state law.
  • Dred Scott v. Sandford
    (1857)
    Dred Scott v. Sandford, was an important case in the fight for equality and abolishment of slavery. The Supreme Court case involved Dred Scott, a slave who was purchased in Missouri and brought to Illinois, which was a free, non-slave state. Scott moved with his owners to Minnesota, where slavery had been prohibited, and back to Missouri. After his owner died, Scott sued the widow and claimed he was no longer a slave because he was freed while living in a non-slave state. The Supreme Court decided that Scott was not a citizen of the state and blacks cannot become citizens, nor do slaves become free when taken into free states.
  • Plessy v. Ferguson
    (1896)
    The Supreme Court case, Plessy v. Ferguson, originated because of a Louisiana statute, called the Separate Car Act that forced all rail companies in Louisiana to provide separate but equal accommodations for white and non-white passengers. Violation of the car act would result in a fine of $25 or 20 days in jail. In 1892, passenger Homer Plessy boarded a car that was designated for white passengers only. Although Plessy was only one-eighth black, he was told to move to the colored car, and when he refused in an act of planned disobedience, he was arrested and jailed. Plessy argued in state court that the East Louisiana Railroad denied him of his Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Judge John Howard Ferguson presided over the case and ruled that Louisiana was right to regulate railroad companies within the state boundaries. Plessy took his case to the Supreme Court, which decided that racial segregation is constitutional under the separate but equal doctrine.
  • Texas v. Johnson
    (1989)
    The Supreme Court case Texas v. Johnson extended the First Amendment rights to protect symbolic speech. During a political demonstration for the Republican National Convention in Texas, Gregory Lee Johnson set the American flag on fire. No one was injured or in immediate danger by his demonstration, but many witnesses were offended and Johnson was charged and convicted for desecration of a venerated object. The Supreme Court overruled the Texas Penal Code violation, and decided Johnson’s demonstration was a form of symbolic speech protected by the First Amendment.
  
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