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A former municipal court judge suspended and criminally charged two years ago with molesting a woman in his law office testified during a disciplinary hearing Wednesday that the contact was accidental and embarrassing — and not the intentional groping the woman tearfully described.
The woman told the Advisory Committee on Judicial Conduct she visited ex-Judge Nino F. Falcone’s North Bergen firm in August 2019 in her role as the office and billing manager for one of Falcone’s law clients.
She testified Falcone pulled her into a hug to celebrate her birthday, during which he rubbed her back and brushed and squeezed her breasts. When she objected, she said, he grabbed her wrist, implored her to “let me touch you, let me play with you,” and then pulled out his wallet to offer her “birthday money.”
“I felt disgusted. I felt violated,” said the woman, identified in court paperwork and during the virtual hearing only as A.C.
The woman fled the office and reported the incident to Teaneck police that night. Falcone acknowledged “inappropriate” touching and repeatedly apologized to the woman during a phone call the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office secretly recorded a few weeks later.
He was arrested in September 2019 for criminal sexual contact and eventually completed a pretrial intervention program, a diversionary, rehabilitative program for first-time offenders.
During Wednesday’s hearing, Falcone denied most of the woman’s testimony, saying: “Her version of the facts are not my version of the facts.”
“It was not premeditated, and it was not for any personal gratifications or malice on my part. It was just an accident,” he added.
Falcone, now 80, appeared before the committee to respond to its June complaint that he “demeaned the judicial office” and “impugned the integrity of the Judiciary.”
The nearly three-hour hearing ended without a decision. Any discipline would have little public impact, as Falcone retired from his part-time judicial position in North Bergen, which he had held since 1987, in August 2020.
On cross-examination, Falcone’s attorney, Jeff Garrigan, asked the woman if Falcone’s hands slipped and contacted her breasts unintentionally and if she initiated the hug, as Falcone contended.
“Seriously? Seriously?” the woman responded.
The woman told the committee Falcone tried to reach her by phone several times after the encounter, which she regarded as his attempt to possibly bribe her to stay silent.
“Why else would he call my office?” she said.
In one such call, she told the committee, Falcone rebuked her for not stopping the contact, saying: “Why didn’t you smack me? Why didn’t you kick me in the ass?”
Falcone denied the woman’s characterization of the incident and said he normally never makes physical contact with people in his professional work. A hug in this instance was a mistake, he said, and he couldn’t clearly explain why he did it.
“It should never have happened. There should never have been an embrace, there should never have been a hug, because that’s not what I do,” he said.
Falcone is one of a string of New Jersey judges accused in recent years of everything from making misogynistic comments in court to battling a school over youth sports.
New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com. Follow New Jersey Monitor on Facebook and Twitter.
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Arizona Republicans this week lined up behind a measure that would discipline teachers and open them up to lawsuits if they don’t tell parents everything a student tells them — even if the student confides that he or she is gay or transgender.
The legislation, House Bill 2161, would make it illegal for a government employee to withhold information that is “relevant to the physical, emotional or mental health of the parent’s child,” and specifically prevents teachers from withholding information about a student’s “purported gender identity” or a request to transition to a gender other than the “student’s biological sex.”
The bill would allow parents to sue school districts if teachers don’t comply.
Rep. Steve Kaiser, R-Phoenix, the bill’s sponsor, argued in the House Education Committee on Jan. 25 that the aim of the legislation is to reign in surveys sent out by schools that have made headlines in a number of states and locally. The bill also aims to allow parents additional access to certain medical records.
“I still feel this bill is not ready for prime time,” Rep. Daniel Hernandez, D-Tucson, said, adding that he felt there was some merit to schools surveying students. “This bill could’ve been done without this inclusion or without the trivialization of transgender children.”
Far-right groups
Kaiser initially said the bill was created via a “stakeholder group” and his “own inherent passion” for the issue. But when Hernandez pressed him on which stakeholders were involved in drafting the bill, Kaiser admitted he didn’t work with education groups or teachers, but with anti-LGBTQ advocacy groups — chief among them the Center for Arizona Policy, a conservative Christian lobbying organization that has pushed numerous controversial and bigoted bills since forming in 1995. CAP holds sway with most Republican lawmakers and Gov. Doug Ducey, and is widely considered one of the most powerful lobbying groups at the state Capitol.
“I know you have a long-standing (dislike) of that organization. I understand where the bait was in that question,” Kaiser told Hernandez, who is gay. “I’m not sure what education group I’d go to, because they’d be against this.”
Another stakeholder that Kaiser consulted is Family Watch International, which the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated an anti-LGBTQ hate group. That group also has its fingerprints on another piece of legislation that would ban any books that have “sexually explicit” content and that critics say would effectively make it illegal to teach about homosexuality.
Supporters of the bill said it was necessary to punish teachers in order to bring transparency to schools, who they said have been asking “inappropriate questions.” Some said the $500 fine for school districts in the bill’s language was not large enough, a thought echoed by Rep. John Fillmore, R-Apache Junction, who said that was a “drop in the bucket” for a school district and asked Kaiser if he’d agree to increase the amount.
Jeanne Casteen, the executive director of the Arizona Secular Coalition and a former teacher, worried about how the reporting function of the bill would impact child abuse. Teachers are mandatory reporters, and Casteen said that every time she had to report child abuse, it was being inflicted by a parent. Under Kaiser’s bill, she said, a teacher would also have to notify the parents — the likely abusers — that the child informed them of the abuse.
“I keep hearing about parental rights, but what about the rights of these students?” Casteen said.
One of the speakers for the other side was Nicole Eidson with a parent group called “Moms for Liberty” known for frequenting Chandler Unified School District meetings and complaining about alleged racism education and training.
“I’ve been hearing a lot about that kids have rights, but in my household, I gotta say, it is a dictatorship,” Eidson said, adding that schools have “no right” to put forward what is “right” for her to do in her household.
Although the bill cleared the committee along party-lines with Republican support, Rep. Joel John, R-Arlington, acknowledged there may be situations where a student may be more comfortable confiding with their teacher than with a parent.
John said that Kaiser will need to seek changes to the bill, specifically the issues relating to outing students, if he wants his continued support.
Arizona Mirror is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Arizona Mirror maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jim Small for questions: info@azmirror.com. Follow Arizona Mirror on Facebook and Twitter.
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CNN.com is reporting that Rep. Cori Bush's (D-MO) car was struck by bullets, though she wasn't inside it at the time.
It doesn't appear that Bush was the target of an attack and other cars in the area showed that their handles had been tampered with. In a statement from the congresswoman on Thursday, she announced the details about the incident and thanked those contacting her to check how she's doing.
READ: Republican Doug Mastriano threatened a Pennsylvania county if they didn't do an election 'audit'
"I'm touched by everyone who has reached out. Thankfully no one was harmed," Bush tweeted, linking to a local report. "But any act of gun violence shakes your soul. That's why our movement is working to invest in our communities, eradicate the root causes of gun violence, and keep everyone safe."
"No one should have to fear for their safety here in St. Louis and that is exactly why our movement is working every day to invest in our communities, eradicate the root causes of gun violence, and keep every neighborhood safe," Bush said to KSDK News.
I'm touched by everyone who has reached out. Thankfully no one was harmed. \n\nBut any act of gun violence shakes your soul. \n\nThat's why our movement is working to invest in our communities, eradicate the root causes of gun violence, and keep everyone safe.https://twitter.com/ksdknews/status/1486753623249928197\u00a0\u2026— Cori Bush (@Cori Bush) 1643305895
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