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Bell judge: just another unhappy customer

By Mark Obbie

The Daily News' Nicole Bode gets Judge Arthur Cooperman on the phone long enough to hear him unload on journalists who tried to talk to him at home over the weekend. "That's not journalism," says the judge whose ruling in the Sean Bell police shooting was a big story in New York City. Big enough to stake out a judge's home? Not in my view. I've knocked on my share of doors, but what is the point when the judge took the unusual step of spelling out his reasons for the verdict in a written decision? The point, I am assuming, was the lack of visuals of the judge -- and the hope that he might utter a few words on camera. We act quite mindless and annoying when we resort to the home-invasion tactic on any big story, regardless of whether the subject is ducking responsibility or denying access (neither of which the judge really did here). Saddest quote in the story? When the 74-year-old judge said this about his previous musings about how he might have enjoyed a career in journalism:

Full post as published by Lawbeat on April 29, 2008 (boomark / email).