Elisabeth Haub School of Law News

For Bennett Gershman, a law professor at Pace University and a former Manhattan attorney, an indictment should be a matter of "days now, not weeks."

"You’re talking about something that is totally unique in American history. People are talking about what’s common, what's usual. Throw that out the window," said Bennett Gershman, a law professor at Pace University who previously spent six years as a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office, referring to the unprecedented nature of investigating a former president and his business.

Bennett Gershman, a former prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office for six years and now a law professor at Pace University, said it's not typical to bring a prosecution for allegedly neglecting to pay taxes on corporate benefits and perks, but said the investigation is unique.

“Such a child would lack the capacity to understand that a penis and vagina could make a baby,” said Bridget J. Crawford, an expert on guardianship law at Pace University law school. “And that certainly is not the Britney Spears case.”

"The law is the law. Here's the simple issue, what are they afraid of, that people will know the truth?" asks Randolph McLaughlin, a law professor at Pace University. "They're claiming that's part of the FOIL law but I think it's just an effort to stop people from getting access to the records that they need to determine whether or not their police department is functioning efficiently, constitutionally, or abusively," said McLaughlin.

Pace University environmental law professor Katrina Fischer Kuh said it's worth comparing the climate torts to Juliana v. U.S., in which a group of young people claim the federal government is unconstitutionally pushing policies that exacerbate climate change.

"The record is pretty clear that the office has been pretty aggressive in fighting white collar crime," said Bennett L. Gershman, a professor at Pace University's Elisabeth Haub School of Law and a former prosecutor with the Manhattan DA's office. "The office has been out front, more so than any DA in the country by far." Gershman noted that any new district attorney will benefit from having ample resources to address corruption and Wall Street misdeeds, as well as the support of high-caliber prosecutors who are attracted to the job because of the office's reputation.

“I don’t know of another case in which a special prosecutor who was assigned to prosecute a case, investigated the case and obtained an indictment against the defendant, and then asked to withdraw from the prosecution of that case,” Pace University Professor Bennett Gershman, a leading national expert on prosecutorial ethics issues, told me.

As predicted by Nicholas A Robinson of Pace University, New York; “More than just air pollution and the loss of natural resources, future policies must cope with threats from cyber wars, nuclear war, genetic mutations, and artificial intelligence.” Therefore, international governance is proposed to deal with the practical challenges of repairing environmental conflict.