In Search Of Balance In Dershowitz v. Cassell

Article here.  Excerpt:

'In a recent column about allegations leveled against Harvard Law professor emeritus and criminal defense lawyer Alan Dershowitz, Professor Tamara Tabo initially admonishes us to be skeptical about Jane Doe #3’s accusations. Tabo says pointedly – and I might add, accurately – that “the accuser should not be stigmatized for reporting the crime, but the accused should not be stigmatized before he has an opportunity to present evidence in his defense.” But Tabo doesn’t practice what she preaches.

First, she suggests that these accusations are credible because of the respectability of the lawyers representing Jane Doe #3; the author then describes Professor Cassell’s academic and professional credentials, including his service as a federal judge. I know both Professors Cassell and Dershowitz professionally and indeed, as friends. I respect them both. I have known Professor Dershowitz for forty years, as co-counsel and colleague, and Professor Cassell from when both of us were on the bench and since then in our work on federal sentencing.

But Tabo has to separate the lawyer from the client. We have all been down the rabbit hole of a client’s allegations that – to put it mildly – did not pan out, no matter how much we believed them at the outset. And Tabo can’t value Professor Cassell’s reputation without also valuing Professor Dershowitz’s. After all, at issue here are not accusations about whom Dershowitz chooses to represent or the positions that he advocates, with which she may disagree. This is about his personal conduct, which has been without blemish for his lengthy career. In fact, although the author may not mean to, Tabo’s comments come perilously close to saying that just because Professor Dershowitz represented Jeffrey Epstein he must have been complicit in Epstein’s acts.'