Voting Station

Samuel Leibowitz

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Attorney

The Resume

    (August 14, 1893-January 11, 1978)
    Born in Iasi, Romania
    Birth name was Samuel Simon Lebeau
    Attorney in The Scottsboro Boys trial (1931-37)
    Later became a Justice of the New York State Supreme Court

Why he might be annoying:

    He sometimes referred to defendants as 'rats.'
    He successfully defended Al Capone four times.
    He won acquittals for a man accused of 'mercy slaying' his 16-year-old retarded son and a man who had already been convicted three times of murdering a 35-year-old Staten Island mother (fourth time's the charm apparently).
    Although not a communist himself, he was part of the Communist Party's attempt to hijack the Scottsboro Boys case for publicity to 'condemn capitalist justice.'
    He unsuccessfully ran for Mayor of New York twice.
    Within two months of taking the Kings County Court bench, he had already sentenced a convicted person to death.

Why he might not be annoying:

    His family moved to New York from Romania when he was four.
    Of the 140 capital cases he defended, he saved the lives of all but one of his clients.
    He secured acquittals for four of the convicted Scottsboro Boys at a retrial in 1937.
    He took the Scottsboro case to the Supreme Court and argued that the trial had been illegal because qualified blacks systematically were excluded from jury service in Alabama.
    He declined to represent mobster Lucky Luciano against charges of compulsory prostitution.
    He also declined to represent several members of Murder. Inc. against murder charges, although he reportedly was offered a $250,000 fee.
    He was the target of anti-Semitic attacks during the Scottsboro Boys trial, most famously when the prosecutor told the jury, 'Show them that Alabama justice cannot be bought with Jew money from New York.'

Credit: BoyWiththeGreenHair


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 2 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 1 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 35 Votes: 85.71% Annoying