C&C

The Lying Witness, the Dank Cellar, and the Dingy Coffee Shop

webmaster@harveysilverglate.com (Harvey Silverglate) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 22:32:52 GMT

William Weld famously won 109 out of the 111 cases his office prosecuted when he was US Attorney for Massachusetts. I am quite proud to be one of the two blemishes on his career. All it took was overzealous prosecutors, unscrupulous federal agents, a lying witness (hardly unusual in federal criminal trials), and the basement of a dingy coffee shop.

A Boston neighborhood saved by a dog and a golfing judge

webmaster@harveysilverglate.com (Harvey Silverglate) — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 10:23:29 GMT

If Moritz Otto Bergmeyer—an architect and building renovator living in a refurbished former warehouse at 107 Fulton Street on the boundary between Boston’s Waterfront and North End neighborhoods—did not have to take his English sheep dog Sacha out to relieve herself early one Saturday morning in the spring of 1972, one of the premier historic neighborhoods of the City of Boston would no longer exist.

Avatar: "Four letter words in Chaucer's day"

webmaster@harveysilverglate.com (Harvey Silverglate) — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 21:10:24 GMT

In 1970 the so-called “counter-cultural” movement was at its height, and the law firm of Flym, Zalkind & Silverglate was in the eye of the storm. During the prior year, city and court officials in both Boston (Suffolk County) and Cambridge (Middlesex County) took aim at the Avatar, a new, upstart “alternative” newspaper that had thundered onto the local scene. The Avatarwas published by the fledgling Fort Hill Community, a family of folks living together in several buildings located at the top of the Fort Hill section of Boston, the second highest point in the city. At the time the group was led by Mel Lyman, a charismatic and talented harmonica player who had previously played in the famous Jim Kweskin’s Jug Band.

Avatar was a spirited, audacious, and in-your-face newspaper. It belonged squarely in the avant-garde tradition, and was not terribly respectful of established authority. During the course of several issues, it carried news and opinion columns criticizing the powers-that-be, including the Boston and Cambridge municipal councils and police departments, and even some of the district court judges who, in those days, operated like lords of the manor, unquestioned dictators in their own local fiefdoms, in courts where there were neither stenographers nor tape recorders. None of those in power appreciated the jabs directed at them by the writers of the Avatar.

An Informant in Our Midst

webmaster@harveysilverglate.com (Harvey Silverglate) — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 19:10:34 GMT

It was shocking enough, in the course of representing one Sheldon Seigel, a member of the feared Jewish Defense League (JDL) accused, with other JDL members, of a bombing-murder in 1972, that our client turned out to be a government informant. But it was even more shocking to learn that our informant-client had tape-recorded the law enforcement agents who were making promises to him that they might not have intended to keep.

Are you a real doctor?

webmaster@harveysilverglate.com (Harvey Silverglate) — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 11:04:12 GMT

Or, how I almost got a degree in nuclear physics.