Blog Posts

Friends and colleagues profess confusion: Why would I do it, why cross a line that seems to separate good from evil? Some are angered: How could I do it? One woman wrote publicly to tell me how disappointed she was in me: I did not take her case against members of the East Haven Police Department,...

I am not sure what is going on in the Connecticut Office of Adult Probation lately, but my telephone has been ringing off the hook. Until recently, probationers appear to have been given a fair amount of freedom to travel interstate. All of a sudden, there’s been a crack down. Folks who were...

Here's the foreward to my new book, Taking Back the Courts, written by an idol of mine, F. Lee Bailey. To say I was thrilled to get this review is an understatement.

FOREWORD

Several years ago I was asked by my most important client at the time to find him a fearless, highly...

Journalists and bloggers glory in the role of iconoclast. Nothing falls with quite such a crash as a hero toppled by disclosure of their failings. The writer who wields the toppling axe struts like a hero. But the line between iconoclasm and gratuitous mudslinging is a thin one. The New York Times...

I never got a chance to stop in to ask Judge Peter C. Dorsey what he thought of the new gym in the basement of the New Haven federal court. It’s not that his door was not open. He was generous with his time. On the occasions that I was in the area with time to talk, he always made time. He...

The politics of federal law enforcement are now front and center in the courtroom of United States District Court Judge Alvin W. Thompson. That is where the federal government’s case against four East Haven police officers landed today. The officers are accused of various acts of police...

I don’t know why the death of an old man takes me by surprise. But it always does. They pass into the night and suddenly a landmark is gone. Yes, all men are mortal. Joe Paterno, Peter Dorsey, were men. Therefore they die. I get the logic. It’s my heart that is breaking.
Joe...

Does anyone really care whether Newt Gingrich asked for an open marriage from his second wife? (He wanted permission to cavort with his mistress. His second wife said no, so Newt dumped her to make the mistress wife number three.) Just call Newt the Henry the Eighth of American...

Michael Connelly is as good as it gets when it comes to telling tales about lawyers and policemen engaged in the dark but heroic act of combatting what we like to think of as the evil in our midst. The Drop, Connelly’s latest, does not disappoint. Harry Bosch, the intrepid and now aging...

I was born on the wrong side of the color line, and, to my shame, I would have it no other way. Not a day goes by in which I do not enjoy the benefit of my skin. We white men had a monopoly on privilege for a long, long time. Our right to call the shots was unquestioned. Today that unquestioned...