It’s a clear case for the state Commission on Judicial Conduct: a convicted fraudster steering people facing debt-collection cases to lawyers who somehow manage to appear before Judge Noach Dear, regularly winning sweet rulings from a judge elected with the fraudster’s help.
Mind you, Dear was elected to the state Supreme Court in 2015, but manages to “help out” in Civil Court most Mondays and Tuesdays. This when the state’s chief judge kicked him off the Criminal Court bench years ago for bizarre rulings there.
As Melissa Klein reported in Sunday’s Post, the ex-con is Chaim Pinkesz, who pleaded guilty in 1986 to trafficking in phony Cartier watches and other counterfeits, serving four months in federal prison.
Now he’s a fixer in Brooklyn, helping mostly Orthodox Jews link up with lawyers who then manage to get the case heard by Dear. And he’s a fixture in Dear’s courtroom — where the judge regularly dismisses consumer-debt cases or forces settlements that greatly favor the debtor.
At least one Jewish leader says Pinkesz actively campaigned to help Dear nab his Supreme Court spot in a deal among county Democratic Party factions.
Yet this hack shouldn’t be on any bench: There’s no sign he ever practiced law, he was dogged by scandals as a city councilman and as a Taxi & Limousine Commission member and first won a Civil Court seat in a backroom bargain with the late, notoriously corrupt county leader Vito Lopez (despite a thumbs-down from the Brooklyn Bar Association).
Once it receives a formal complaint, the Commission on Judicial Conduct has the power to investigate judges for unethical behavior and impose a range of punishments. It has removed 169 jurists since 1975; here’s hoping it reaches 170 soon.