Justice Leslie E. Stein's background is in family law. In 2001, she served as Albany's Acting Family Court Judge and before that, she was in a private practice that dealt exclusively with matrimonial and family law for almost 15 years. Sounds like she's be a great one to have on your side if family issues are your deal. She takes her identity as a woman in the Court seriously--who wouldn't?-- and was chair of the Gender Fairness Committee for some years. Her history serving as a Judge for the Rensselaer County Integrated Domestic Violence Part further shows her commitment to gender and family issues. Since being nominated to the Supreme Court, she's been asked to head a task force to study diversity on the bench in which her job is to identify ways to improve ethnic, racial and gender diversity at all levels of the judiciary in New York State. I can't imagine there'd be anyone better suited to the 14-year post. Earlier this year, she dissented with the rest of her peers on the bench in a decision whether or not to admit evidence that had been obtained through the use of a GPS tracking device. The Court found that such evidence was a-ok, but Justice Stein disagreed, stating that "while the citizens of this state may not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a public space...they do have a reasonable expectation that their every move will not be continuously monitored". In this age of questionable privacy-reducing technology, I, for one, like the idea that there's someone up there watching out for my right to hide away.
Justice Leslie E. Stein's background is in family law. In 2001, she served as Albany's Acting Family Court Judge and before that, she was in a private practice that dealt exclusively with matrimonial and family law for almost 15 years. Sounds like she's be a great one to have on your side if family issues are your deal. She takes her identity as a woman in the Court seriously--who wouldn't?-- and was chair of the Gender Fairness Committee for some years. Her history serving as a Judge for the Rensselaer County Integrated Domestic Violence Part further shows her commitment to gender and family issues. Since being nominated to the Supreme Court, she's been asked to head a task force to study diversity on the bench in which her job is to identify ways to improve ethnic, racial and gender diversity at all levels of the judiciary in New York State. I can't imagine there'd be anyone better suited to the 14-year post. Earlier this year, she dissented with the rest of her peers on the bench in a decision whether or not to admit evidence that had been obtained through the use of a GPS tracking device. The Court found that such evidence was a-ok, but Justice Stein disagreed, stating that "while the citizens of this state may not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a public space...they do have a reasonable expectation that their every move will not be continuously monitored". In this age of questionable privacy-reducing technology, I, for one, like the idea that there's someone up there watching out for my right to hide away.