Judge Mennin Lays Down the Law

New York Judge Felicia Mennin was featured in a New York Times "City Room" article about an artist given a summons for leaving his art materials unattended in Grand Central Terminal. The most relevant passage states:

Mr. Thomas went to Midtown Community Court on May 1, accompanied by Thomas E. Wojtaszek, a Brooklyn lawyer he hired after striking up a conversation with him – where else? — on the subway.

Mr. Wojtaszek asked the judge, Felicia Mennin, to dismiss the summons because leaving an unattended bag did not seem to fall under the New York State penal code’s description of disorderly conduct.

He disputed the description by the officer on the summons – that Mr. Thomas showed “intent to cause a hazardous condition by leaving a bag unattended, causing a crowd to disperse and cause alarm” – saying Mr. Thomas certainly did not intend this, nor did his action cause dispersion or alarm.

And the state’s penal code does not make leaving baggage unattended a crime.
“The bag was still within his custody — what artist would leave the tools of his trade behind?” Mr. Wojtaszek said in an interview last week. “But this judge was not susceptible to reason.”

“She said, ‘I think in the light of the facts of the last two weeks,’ and I cut her off because it was apparent that she meant the bombing of the Boston Marathon,” he recalled. “I said, ‘This happened back in February,’ and she said, ‘But it happened after 9/11.’”

“The judge did not cite any precedent or case law,” Mr. Wojtaszek said.

The case will be tried on June 20.