Judicial Anti-Semitism Under The Color of Law

In the Holocaust, Jewish lawyers and judges were dragged out of courtrooms by Nazis during trials in public displays of anti-Semitism. Decades later, anti-Semitism in America’s courtrooms is displayed alternatively. I have personally witnessed the anti-Semitic decimation of the legacies of multiple Holocaust Survivor families.

Case in point No. 1:

In Sarasota, Florida, in 2018, the will and trust of Esther Lampel, widow of Holocaust Survivor, John Lampel, was overturned entirely by Judge Andrea McHugh, who based her ruling on her idea that Esther was afflicted with an “insane delusion” if she believed that her son, Geoffrey Lampel, 63, did not love her and wanted her money. Although Esther Lampel left hundreds of thousands of dollars to a Jewish charity that serves Holocaust Survivors and other needy elders nationwide, Judge McHugh did not agree with Esther’s choice of the Holocaust Survivor charity as beneficiary but instead awarded Esther’s assets to Geoffrey, who had already received hundreds of thousands of dollars from his mother.

Judge McHugh overlooked entirely that Geoffrey had fraudulently withheld over $100,000 in trust assets from Esther’s trust, had illegally accessed bank statements from Esther’s accounts, and had changed the mailing address of Esther’s accounts from Esther’s residence in Sarasota to Geoffrey’s home in Landing, New Jersey, where Esther had never lived.

Judge McHugh overlooked Geoffrey’s acts of fraud and conspiracy to defraud the Jewish charity and vetoed Esther’s final wishes. Judge McHugh vetoed hundreds of pages of medical records signed by numerous licensed physicians and licensed nurses that were devoid of any diagnosis that Esther, at 91 years of age, had ever had mental problems or was incompetent.

Thus, one judge overlooked and overruled the express wishes of a Jewish widow to honor her husband’s memory by a donation to a Holocaust education and services charity. In one courtroom ruling, a Jewish family’s legacy was decimated.

Case No. 2:

Well over 1,000 miles away from Sarasota, the Indianapolis probate case of Holocaust Survivor, Al Katz, has dragged on for more than eight years, leaving Al’s family bereft of all its inheritance. The court-appointed estate attorney and administrator, one-in-the-same person, Robert W. York, a long-time adversary of Al’s Jewish family, has committed fraud, perjury, and loss of estate assets on innumerable occasions under the court supervision of Judge James Joven without consequence for the crimes. Indeed, Judge Joven has refused for years to hold Robert W. York responsible for his criminal acts of unlicensed practice of law on behalf of Al Katz’s estate and multiple other crimes.

After over eight years of estate litigation, supervised by the court, Al Katz’s adored great-grandchildren have been left with no inheritance from their “Big Papa,” and the debts owed to Al’s family by his estate have never been paid. In court, Al Katz’s legacy as a generous Holocaust Survivor of seven years of slave labor in temperatures of 52 degrees below zero has been decimated and his memory disgraced.

Case No. 3:

Holocaust Survivor, Marie Winkelman, had a revocable trust worth $3,000,000, which was changed against her will to irrevocable by the signature of Sarasota County Judge Deno Economou, who authorized hundreds of thousands of dollars from Marie’s trust to be paid to a host of lawyers and other professionals fighting to have Marie declared incompetent and to have court control over her sizeable assets to benefit those seeking a ruling of incompetence. Although a psychiatrist of high repute found Marie to be competent, Judge Economou ruled otherwise, putting Marie’s reputation into disrepute and decimating her assets.

Perhaps, it is mere chance that the judicial caste has cast Jews and the families of Holocaust Survivors into stormy seas by courtroom rulings that ruin lives and reputations and decimate legacies, or perhaps anti-Semitism runs rampant and unchecked in the halls of American jurisprudence like the numerous middle school students running down hallways during “Kick-a-Jew Day” in Naples, Florida, where a lawsuit on behalf of the Jewish victims was dismissed.

In the eyes of the law, Jews are far too often dismissed and overruled, as anti-Semitism has found a cozy niche in which to inhabit under color of law.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured photo is by rawpixel on Unsplash.

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