Adjunct Professor Joel Cohen wrote an op-ed in the New York Law Journal about sexual misconduct allegations against Judge Alex Kozinski.
Judge Alex Kozinski, who sits on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and is its former Chief Judge, has an outsized standing among members of the federal judiciary. A libertarian in terms of his judicial philosophy, he has been a staunch defender of due process for those accused of wrongdoing.
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He has now been accused by seven former, female court staffers of improper sexual comments or behavior (among others, asking a staffer if she thought specific pornographic images were photo-shopped and if they aroused her). And so, it seems, many of his good works (and often to-the-point, perhaps unique decisions) may well come second to how he deals with the accusations now brought against him. Will he resign? Will he insist on due process and let it take its course, as he has so admirably done for so many other litigants over his judicial career?
It is too early to answer, although his early statement in The Washington Post states: “I treat all of my employees as family and work very closely with most of them. I would never intentionally do anything to offend anyone and it is regrettable that a handful have been offended by something I may have said or done.” His later statement to the Los Angeles Times may say more: “If this is all they are able to dredge up after 35 years, I am not too worried.”
We live in a new era of how our society deals with allegations of workplace harassment and wrongdoing (#MeToo).