North America

The Supreme Court stated that a woman could not be admitted to the bar because she was under a common law disability: she did not have the right to enter into contracts with third persons without the permission of her husband.

This case addressed the claims of Etta Haynie Maddox that she should be allowed to sit for the bar examination and receive admission to the bar despite a Maryland state statute limiting bar admission to “male citizens of Maryland.” The Maryland Court of Appeals denied her application, stating that the court did not have the power to enact legislation. Thus until the legislative branch declared that women could be admitted to the bar, the court did not have any power to admit Maddox.

In May of 1990, Piatt represented clients A and B in their respective domestic relations actions.  During his representation of client A, Piatt repeatedly asked her questions such as whether she had masturbated at the age of fourteen, and whether she had ever had sexual relationship without emotional involvement.  He also made comments about the length of client A’s skirt and how “delicious” she looked.  Piatt later told client A during a meeting that if she did not respond to his sexual advances, he would be forced to charge her a large sum of money for continued representat

In re Return of Weapons to J.W.D., 149 N.J. 108 (1997) is a case where the New Jersey Supreme Court considered whether firearms seized following a domestic violence complaint must be returned once the complaint is withdrawn or dismissed. The Court held that the dismissal of a complaint does not mandate return of weapons under N.J.

The Court of Appeals, New York’s highest court, removed Romano, a town and village justice, from office, in part, because of his insensitivity to victims of domestic violence.  The justice engaged in egregious misconduct in his courtroom, at an arraignment, where a defendant was charged with violating a protection order and assaulting his wife.  After reviewing the charges, Romano stated, from the bench, “What’s wrong with that?  You’ve got to keep them in line once in a while.”  The Court of Appeals concluded that the evidence in the record supported the Commission’s fi

Here, the parties were married for two years when the plaintiff filed a domestic violence petition against the defendant. She stated that defendant punched her in the stomach and leg, choked her, threw her to the floor, fisted her in the face, and threated to drown her in the bathtub. The plaintiff did not specify the dates of the abuse. The trial court issued an ex parte domestic violence temporary order of protection. The defendant argued that the plaintiff’s petition was legally insufficient as it did not specify when the abuse occurred.

This is a proceeding for the disciplining of Schwartz, a trial court judge. Judge Robert Schwartz initiated a romantic relationship with an assistant public defender with cases before him. The assistant public defender informed her supervisor of Judge Schwartz’s planned recusal via a voice message. In the following days, Judge Schwartz provided dishonest reasons for his recusal from some cases involving the assistant public defender, and entered rulings in some other cases involving the assistant public defender.

A pregnant minor applied for judicial bypass to have an abortion without notifying her parents. The trial court denied her application, finding that she was neither mature nor well-informed enough to consent to an abortion without parental notification. The Supreme Court reversed, finding that Doe showed that she was sufficiently well-informed. The trial court specifically denied Doe’s application because she was allegedly unaware of the intrinsic benefits of alternatives to abortion such as parenting and adoption.

A pregnant minor applied for judicial bypass to have an abortion without notifying her parents. The trial court denied the application on a form, but made no ruling and no findings of fact on one of the bases for judicial bypass—whether notifying her parents would lead to physical, sexual, or emotional abuse of the minor. Under the Texas Family Code, the court was required to issue a ruling and written findings of fact and conclusions of law within two business days after the application was filed.

The court upheld an elected clerk’s three-year suspension from the practice of law for various acts, including sexual advances toward female employees in the clerk’s office.  Six female employees made allegations that he sexually harassed them.  Respondent attempted to argue that his actions toward the employees did not meet the standard for “13” as defined by the EEOC.  The Court found that it did not need to rely on a federal agency’s definition to “find that the respondent’s creation and perpetuation of a work environment infected with inappropriate and unwelcome sexual ad