The big race for District Attorney will be in Manhattan, where the candidates scramble to fill the very large, and very old (but well maintained), shoes of Robert Morgenthau. There are other races as well, but they won’t receive the same level of interest. One such race is in Nassau County, where controversial District Attorney Kathleen Rice is up for re-election.
Rice rode into office on the coattails of Democratic County Supervisor Tom Suozzi, ousting long-time Republican District Attorney Denis Dillon, who spent far too much time concerned about women having control over their bodies to worry about some out-of-town upstart who lacked any apparent qualifications to serve. In Nassau County, having the Republican Party line was all one needed to get elected. That all changed with Suozzi. Well, actually with Republican Party leader Joe Mondello, but that’s another story.
The Republicans are running Joy Watson for District Attorney, a long-time ADA under Dillon who served as Chief of Sex Crimes. She is now the principal law clerk to Nassau Supreme Court Justice Karen Murphy. I don’t know her, but my dear friend, who occasional comments here as The Blind Guy, speaks very well of her. While she’s got one huge mountain to climb, given the current political climate, he tells me that Watson is running for real.
Hoping to learn a little bit more about the race, I did a bit of checking. I was stunned by what I found. No, nothing shocking about Joy Watson, but a tidbit in one of the local throw-away papers, the Floral Park Dispatch.
I wasn’t aware that there was a Libertarian Party in Nassau County. Then again, I wasn’t aware there could be such a thing as a “sole partner” by definition. Go figure. Tony is a major user of social media, occasionally blogging as That Lawyer Dude and twitting up a storm under the same name. He works Avvo Answers, with 504 “answers” as of this writing. On Avvo, he calls himself the “senior partner,” though one would have to have a junior partner for that to make sense. Tony has worked very hard to craft an online persona for the purpose of promoting his practice.Anthony Colleluori Is Libertarian Party’s Candidate
The Nassau County Libertarian Party has named Anthony “Tony” Colleluori as their nominee for Nassau County District Attorney.
Colleluori stated that he will run his campaign highlighting his experience as a defense attorney and civil rights litigator for over 25 years. Issues which he says are his priorities include “ending the excessively punitive prosecutions against DWI suspects, cutting wasteful spending, videotaping all confessions, and de-prioritizing the prosecution of marijuana possession.”
Colleluori is sole partner of his law firm Colleluori & Associates. He is a longtime Nassau County resident presently living in Woodbury with his wife Mary Rose. They have two children Salvatore and Franklin.
And now Tony is running for District Attorney on a minor party line. What is he thinking?
Clearly, he’s got no chance of winning, so he’s running to lose. Why would someone run to lose? There are two possible answers. The first is that he hopes to have a hand in framing the discussion for the campaign. Rather than have Rice and Watson slug it out over who’s going to lock more people away, Tony will inject alternative views into the rhetoric, providing a counterbalance to the fear-mongering that typifies District Attorney races.
The second possible reason is that it’s an opportunity to promote his law practice by using the campaign as a self-promotional marketing opportunity. The benefit here is that if you know you’re guaranteed to lose, there’s no harm to the campaign by using it for personal gain.
Reason number 1 is a very good reason to run for office, even though you know that you have no chance of winning. Reason number 2 is cynical and manipulate. Well-intended supporters of the Libertarian Party will donate their time and money to help promote candidates for the benefit of the party’s agenda. They aren’t doing it so a candidate can get business.
Given how little interest there is in the District Attorney’s race in Nassau County, since Rice and the Democrats are expected to have this election locked up, and even if there is any public discussion on the issues, it will be between the two major party candidates, it’s a huge stretch to imagine that Tony will have much opportunity to contribute to the discussion. Though tilting at windmills perhaps, it would at least be an honorable effort. There is something to be said for people willing to tilt at windmills.
If it’s the second reason, then it would be a subversion of the political process and an unfortunate choice, for him and for the criminal defense bar. It would not be an honorable thing to do. I hope it’s the first reason, Quixotic though it may be, for everyone’s sake.
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I have no idea how people outside the legal system decide to vote in local elections for offices like district attorney or judge, so I really don’t know how Tony’s campaign, whatever its purpose (I suspect a mix of both that you’ve described) might affect the outcome, but I think it would be a shame if somehow, he took away a significant number anti-Rice votes away from Watson.
As an aside, and this is just anecdotal, and forgive me if its off topic, but I don’t know that Rice’s plea bargaining positions on DWI are actually any tougher than those of her predecessor, but just that she makes more of a stink about everything.
I can’t speak to Rice’s DWI plea bargain policies, since I don’t do DWI, but what about Heidgen and DWIU as murder? Dillon never went there.
I could be wrong, I’m only going by vague recollection, but I think there’s a chance the Heidgen prosecution began under Dillon (under extreme pressure from the family, which included a non-criminal lawyer offering his two cents) but it was Rice who then picked it up and ran with it. Generally though, I was referring to more run of the mill DWI’s. I don’t do much in nassau anymore, but I think the number you can blow and still get a basically automatic reduction to an impaired is the same as it was under Dillon. I suspect Rice’s tough talk has empowered line assistants to be unreasonable in their handling of routine cases.
Heidgen was indicted by Dillon and tried by the Rice regime. Point is Rice did not move to dismiss murder count in indictment and did her impression of a braying ass throughout the trial. The 2d Dept in deciding Valencia repudiated Rice. Valencia is now before the Court of Appeals.
Interesting commentary. All I know is Joy Watson has earned the right to run for DA and win. Rice doesn’t really want the job for the long haul. She’s already applied for other jobs (US attorney) and rumor has it that she has her eye on NYS Attorney General ASAP. Why elect someone who’s not committed to the county, hires out of towners to run her office, and has increased spending by 27% in three years?
While there seem to be some potential truth in your otherwise suspicious comment, particulary since rumors are utterly meaningless, nobody is likely to take anyone using the handle “PR Girl” seriously, and likely will suspect (as I do) that you’re just a shill. This is a shame, since Joy Watson is a great candidate, highly regarded and would likely make a terrific district attorney.
I am supporting Joy.
Yeah, I kinda figured that.
The other possibility is that nobody else was interested in running as a libertarian for DA in Nassau County, so that it was either Colleluori or nobody.
As far as I’m aware, this is the first time the Libertarian Party has fielded a candidate for the office. So, “nobody” is their standard bearer.