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Cyrus Sanai, the lawyer who publicized the existence of Judge Alex Kozinski's web stash as part of a grudge against the judge, files his report for the LA Weekly on attending the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference in Sun Valley. Excerpt:
The press was excluded from many of the events. I was escorted away from an unfenced cocktail party in the open air while looking to speak with the conference’s organizer, Circuit Judge Richard Clifton.The chief judge of the 9th Circuit, Alex Kozinski, whom I had tangled with in public in recent weeks when I discovered and publicized the porno-based humor he kept on his private Web site, canceled his question-and-answer event and made his way around the resort with a retinue of four to six armed U.S. Marshals. (Justice Kennedy, whom I saw out on the town during the conference, required just two marshals.)
The few times I did see him in the hallways and patios of the resort, Kozinski appeared particularly reluctant to chat with trial-court judges — the folks the appellate court oversees. This is hardly surprising. Kozinksi has a sharp tongue and an even sharper pen when reviewing lower-court decisions. Before the chief judgeship rotated to him, some District Court judges tried to find out if there was any way to disqualify Kozinski from holding the administrative conch, according to a solid source in the court bureaucracy.
To the extent that the faults of the 9th Circuit or any of its judges were discussed — these came up very rarely in this supposed retreat week of self-examination — the conference focused on the people who don’t accept our legal system.
Previously on LA Observed:
Where's Judge Kozinski?
Good week for blogs in L.A.
Judge Kozinski's stalker