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Verdicts & Settlements

Former George Mason University law prof says he’s ‘fully vindicated’ after ‘relatively modest’ defamation suit settlement

By Debra Cassens Weiss

March 12, 2025, 2:59 pm CDT

A former professor at the George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School has reached a settlement in his defamation lawsuit against two former students who alleged that he abused his power to initiate sexual relationships with them when they were law students.

Professor Joshua D. Wright settled with Elyse Dorsey and dropped his claim against Freshfields counsel Angela Landry, report Law.com, Law360 and Reuters.

His suit, filed in Fairfax County, Virginia, circuit court, had sought $108 million in damages.

The articles identify Dorsey as a Kirkland & Ellis partner, but the law firm’s website page for her appears to have been removed.

Dorsey’s settlement “provides Wright with a relatively modest amount of compensation and allows Dorsey to continue speaking out,” Law.com reports. Wright filed a motion to end the litigation last week.

Wright had maintained that the relationships were consensual, and the two women were “scorned former lovers.” In a statement released to Law360, he said he is “relieved to have been fully vindicated. The evidence has made it undeniably clear that the relationships in question were consensual from the start. I remain fully committed to defending my reputation and will not hesitate to take further legal action if necessary to hold accountable those responsible for false accusations.”

The two defendants said they were pleased with the development.

A statement by Dorsey’s lawyer said the settlement will exclusively be paid from insurance “and constituted less than 0.3% of the damages professor Wright sought in the litigation,” according to Law.com.

“Settling this case was a difficult decision, but it allows me to continue my advocacy work without the distraction or continued trauma of ongoing litigation,” Dorsey said in a statement cited by Law.com.

Wright has the option of refiling his claim within six months against Landry. Her lawyer, Stacey Rose Harris, told Law.com that the dismissal “obviously speaks for itself.”

“Parties ‘vindicated’ in litigation don’t voluntarily dismiss their own claims on the eve of trial,” Harris said.

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Judiciary

Judge resigns for second time after he’s accused of staging fake proceeding

By Debra Cassens Weiss

February 6, 2025, 11:23 am CST

A New York judge has resigned for a second time for allegedly staging a sham proceeding, but this time, he won’t be returning to the bench.

Judge Louis P. Violanti of the Lackawanna City Court in Erie County, New York, resigned Jan. 23 and agreed never to return, according to a Feb. 5 press release and documents noted by the Legal Profession Blog.

Violanti first resigned in March 2013 but made no promises that he wouldn’t return, according to the press release, a Jan. 2 stipulation and an August 2024 ethics complaint. He resigned the first time after learning that he was under investigation for allegedly staging a sham proceeding in January 2013 to dismiss a traffic charge for an acquaintance.

No prosecutor was present for the proceeding, and a police officer posed as the traffic defendant, according to the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct.

“Following the sham proceeding, and on the basis of fictitious evidence,” Violanti dismissed the charge, the ethics complaint said. The acquaintance had been accused of driving with a suspended vehicle registration.

The sham-proceedings allegation led to a two-year suspension of Violanti’s law license. The suspension decision by the Appellate Division’s Fourth Judicial Department of the New York Supreme Court said mitigating factors included Violanti’s “longtime and substantial community involvement,” his sincere expression of remorse, and his advice that all parties cooperate in the ethics investigation.

Violanti was reinstated to practice in March 2016. The mayor of Lackawanna, New York, appointed Violanti to a six-year term on the city court in March 2024. Five months later, the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct filed a new ethics complaint based on the same 2013 proceeding.

Robert H. Tembeckjian, the commission’s administrator, said in the press release Violanti “would have been removed in 2013,” making him “constitutionally ineligible to return” to the bench if the commission had not been constrained by time limits in the law.

“A decade later, he came back” to the bench, Tembeckjian said, “only to face discipline and agree to the inevitable: permanent departure from the bench.”

Violanti commented in a statement forwarded to the ABA Journal by his lawyer, Rodney O. Personius of Personius Melber.

“While now over a dozen years old” Violanti said of the proceeding, “I once again acknowledge my poor exercise of judgment in resolving a traffic citation for a close friend that arose from a mistake made by his auto insurance carrier. The disposition of the citation was not the issue, as recognized by the district attorney at the time.

“Whether I required the defendant to come to court or not, the underlying charge was subject to dismissal due to the insurance company’s error. At the time, I took full responsibility for my improper handling of this matter, which included voluntarily resigning from my judicial post and accepting without opposition the two-year sanction imposed by the appellate division.

“I understood the matter ended at that point, and therefore accepted the reappointment to the bench that was offered to me almost 12 months ago. I have since served the Lackawanna community honorably and competently as its associate judge. When this old matter resurfaced and my timeliness objection was denied, I decided the public, particularly our community, would be best served if I simply stepped aside. I am forever grateful for having had this additional opportunity, however brief, to again contribute to the good of our city.”

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A North Dakota man will spend the rest of his life in prison for the beating death of his wife, who he initially said face-planted on the stairs.

Spencer Moen, 32, learned his fate on Monday for the murder of Sonja Moen, 30. He was convicted in October.

“I just can’t seem to get out of that space. You beat the life out of my daughter. And to make it worse, you did it in front of the kids,” said the victim’s mother, Kristin Scofield, in court. “I will continue to pray for forgiveness, but currently, it is not in my soul. I’m sorry.”