Representative Matters - Civil Rights and Voting Rights ...



Representative Matters - Civil Rights and Voting Rights Litigation

Civil Rights Litigation

Institutional Practice

← Morgan v. Nucci

C.A. No. 72-911-G (D. Mass.) (Garrity, J.)

Represented the mayor of the City of Boston for twelve years in the well-known Boston school desegregation case. Principal issues during this period were challenges to the court’s remedial jurisdiction and authority and litigation over the court’s withdrawal from the case. See, e.g., Morgan v. Nucci, 620 F. Supp. 215 (D. Mass. 1985), modified 831 F.2d 313 (1st Cir. 1987); Morgan v. Nucci 617 F. Supp. 1316 (D. Mass. 1985); Morgan v. Nucci 612 F. Supp. 1060 (D. Mass. 1985); Morgan v. McDonough, 689 F.2d 265 (1st Cir. 1982).

← P.J. Gear and Sons v. City of Boston and P.J. Gear and Sons v. Boston Development Authority

Represented the City of Boston in challenges to the minority and women business enterprise (MWBE) programs of the City of Boston and the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA). MWBE programs provide a preference for minority- and women- owned businesses in the award of construction and service contracts. Principal issues included whether the city and the BRA had the fact-specific justification necessary to warrant these racial/gender preference programs under existing federal law.

← Tarantino v. City of Boston

Represented the City of Boston in a challenge to the city’s mandatory retirement for police officers at age 65, which was brought under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA).

Section 1983 Police Misconduct Cases

← Michael Cox v. City of Boston, et al.

C.A. No. 95-12729-WGY

Represented the City of Boston and the Boston Police Commissioner in litigation arising out of the beating of a plainclothes Boston police officer, Michael Cox, by other Boston police officers who mistook him for a fleeing homicide suspect.

← Hart v. Bourque

C.A. No. 80-1909-N (D. Mass.) (Nelson, J.)

Defended (as lead defense counsel) a City of Boston police officer in litigation arising out of the shooting death of 14-year-old young man by a Boston police officer. See Hart v. Bourque, 608 F. Supp. 1091 (D. Mass. 1985), reversed, 798 F.2d 519 (1st Cir. 1986).

← Pate v. Crowley, et al.

C.A. No. 67186 (Suffolk Superior Court)

Defended (as lead defense counsel and coordinating counsel)10 City of Boston police officers in a nine-week jury trial arising out of the shooting death of a young man by Boston police officers.

← Darryl Williams v. City of Boston, et al.

599 F. Supp. 363 (D. Mass. 1984), aff’d, 784 F.2d 430 (1st Cir. 1986) (Caffrey, Ch.J.) Represented the City of Boston, the former mayor, the former police commissioner, and a number of former members of the Boston School Committee and Boston School Department in connection with shooting of a high school football player during a game between Jamaica Plain High School and Charlestown High School. This was one of the first cases to raise the issue of the constitutional duty of the state to protect persons.

← Involvement in several other significant Section 1983 police misconduct cases, including many where the policies and customs of municipalities, as well as the specific conduct of particular police officers, were challenged.

Voting Rights Litigation

← Camacho v. Galvin

C.A. No. 02-10428-DPW (three-judge court)

Black Political Task Force v. Galvin

No. 02-11190-DPW (three-judge court)

Representing the Secretary of State of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in these challenges to the Massachusetts House of Representative electoral districts drawn after the release of the 2000 census, where plaintiffs allege that the redistricting plan unlawfully “packs” and “cracks” minority communities in the City of Boston and the City of Chelsea.

← United States v. City of Lawrence

C.A. No. 98-CV12256 (D. Mass.)

Represented City of Lawrence in Department of Justice’s Voting Rights Act challenge to the at-large component for electing members to the City Council and the alleged gerrymandering of electoral district lines relating to City Council and School Committee districts, on the grounds that the Latino voters in the city have less opportunity than other voters to participate in the political process and elect their candidates of choice.

← Vecinos De Barrio Uno v. City of Holyoke

C.A. No. 92-30052 – MAP (D. Mass.)

Successfully represented City of Holyoke in federal court in claim brought under Sections 2 and 203 of the Voting Rights Act. The First Circuit’s opinion in this case has become one of the leading opinions in Voting Rights Act jurisprudence. A three-week- bench trial resulted in finding the School Committee structure (seven district seats and two at-large seats) did not violate the statute but that the City Council structure (seven district seats and eight at-large seats) did. Vecinos De Barrio Uno v. City of Holyoke,

880 F. Supp. 911 (D. Mass. 1995) (“Uno I”). On appeal, the First Circuit vacated the judgment against the city on the City Council claim and remanded the claim to the district court. Vecinos De Barrio Uno v. City of Holyoke, 72 F.3d 973 (1st Cir. 1995) (“Uno III”). On remand, the district court conducted a one-week trial and thereafter found that the City Council plan complied with Section 2. Vecinos DeBarrio Uno v. City of Holyoke, 960 F. Supp. 109 (D. Mass. 1997) (“Uno V”).

← Latino Political Action Committee v. City of Boston

C.A. No. 83-2472-C. (Caffrey, Ch.J.), See Latino Political Action Committee v. City of Boston, 609 F. Supp. 739 (D. Mass. 1985), aff’d, 784 F.2d 409 (1st Cir. 1986) Successfully represented the City of Boston in litigation brought by African-American, Hispanic, and Asian persons under the Voting Rights Act and United States Constitution.

← Black Political Task Force v. Connolly

C.A. No. 87-1886-WD

Massachusetts Republican State Committee v. Connolly

C.A. No. 87-1953-WD (three-judge court)

Successfully represented the City of Boston in these consolidated cases where plaintiffs alleged that the electoral districts drawn by the City of Boston and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, based on the 1985 state census, violated the Voting Rights Act and the one-person, one-vote principle of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The case received a great deal of publicity because the three-judge court struck down the redistricting plan of the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The court upheld the City of Boston’s redistricting plan for city councilors and the School Committee representatives. Black Political Task Force v. Connolly, 679 F. Supp 109 (D. Mass. 1988).

← Litigated and tried many of the major Voting Rights Act cases in Massachusetts and the First Circuit.

← Advised a number of cities and towns across the country on voting rights issues.

← See Robinson & Cole’s voting rights website, , for more details.

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