Federal Judiciary

BALLOT MANEUVERS
By Mark Thompson
markthomp@yahoo.com
Posted 08-27-08

With election season looming, the Appellate Division resuscitated two campaigns that had been knocked off track by a couple of Queens County Supreme Court judges.

Justice Charles Thomas rejected the petition of a candidate who sought to be listed on the ballot for the Democratic primary, apparently without even bothering to examine any of the evidence presented by either side. Thomas issued his ruling in response to an oral motion brought by a representative of a rival candidate, but didn’t hold much of a hearing, to hear the Appellate Division tell it. The judge erred, a unanimous appellate panel said, “in failing to consider any of the evidence submitted to it or to address any of the issues raised in this proceeding before making [his] determination.” In its ruling released less than three weeks before the Sept. 9 primary, the appellate panel reversed Thomas’s denial of the petition and sent the matter back to him with instructions to hold a proper hearing “forthwith” and this time, to address “all of the issues raised in this proceeding.” Matter of Richards v Board of Elections of the City of New York (August 20)

Full post as published by Judicial Reports on August 27, 2008 (boomark / email).