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NY Take Action: Court says Asm. Jeffrey Dinowitz defamed whistleblower in racist school admission scheme
A New York Supreme Court Judge held yesterday that Assemblymember Jeffrey Dinowitz lied about and defamed a whistleblower who exposed Dinowitz’s participation in a scheme to keep black and Hispanic students from attending a magnet school in his predominantly white and wealthy district. In an earlier investigation related to the case, Dinowitz admitted he had never hired a black employee in more than twenty years as an Assemblymember.   Please take action below to inform your Assemblymember and call for an Ethics investigation into Dinowitz's statements and actions.

Please read the article below from the New York Daily News

Dinowitz is the leading advocate for forced use of vaccines in the New York Assembly. He authored the bill in 2019 that eliminated the religious exemption from vaccine mandates to attend school in New York. Currently, he is the author of a bevy of bills that would force the use of vaccines, including bills that would mandate the COVID shot for all K-12 students (A2178), eliminate religious exemptions from vaccine mandates for college and employment (A2125), mandate COVID shots for all college students (A2143), mandate annual flu shots for all daycare, preschool and K-12 students (A1811), and creating a database to track all medical exemptions from mandates (A1736.) Dinowitz needs the overwhelming support of his Democratic party colleagues to win passage of any of these and other bills. 

Please click here to send a copy of the Daily News report to your Assemblymember and ask him or her to support a call for an investigation by the Assembly Ethics Committee (Yes, such a body really exists.)

State Assemblyman Dinowitz subjected whistleblower in race admissions scandal to “public contempt”

State Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz made “false statements” about a former school administrator who blew the whistle on an alleged conspiracy to shut kids of color out of a popular Riverdale elementary school, exposing him to “ridicule” and “public contempt,” a state judge has ruled.

Manuele “Manny” Verdi, a former assistant principal at P.S. 24, sued Dinowitz nearly seven years ago for defamation, after the lawmaker blamed him for enrolling students from outside the ritzy neighborhood.

Verdi said he was targeted after complaining that Bronx school officials had teamed up with a Dinowitz staffer to keep minority students out of the in-demand school.

Dinowitz, the lawsuit said, publicly blasted Verdi’s competence as the issue grew heated amid a debate over the expiration of a lease for an annex in a nearby building that housed more than 150 students in a bid to reduce overcrowding.

Verdi charged that the assemblyman’s comments caused him “humiliation and anguish” and led parents at the school to call for his ouster. And because of the remarks, he was unable to secure a position as an assistant principal, despite both accusations being beyond his control, he said.

“It is found that the defendant published false statements about plaintiff,” read the order from New York Supreme Court Judge Lynn Kotler, “and further finding that the statements exposed the plaintiff to public contempt, ridicule, aversion, or disgrace, or induced an evil opinion of him ‘in the minds of right-thinking persons.’”

Ezra Glazer, a lawyer for Verdi, encouraged the ethics committee of the state assembly to investigate Dinowitz as the chair of the codes committee.

“This assemblyman was lying, flat out lying, about the school process,” Glazer said.

According to court documents, Dinowitz, during a “heated, contentious, and ugly exchange, with a lot of yelling and finger pointing” at a Parents Association meeting in fall 2015, called Verdi and the principal at the time “incompetent” and “derelict in their duties,” and blamed them for the loss of a lease at a nearby annex.

Similar remarks also ran in hyperlocal outlets throughout the following year, with the assemblyman saying Verdi and the principal “made it their policy to enroll virtually any student into the school regardless of where they live and regardless of whether or not seats were available,” materials show.

The court determined that negotiating leases and enrolling students are handled, respectively, by the School Construction Authority of Facilities Department, and by the Office of School Enrollment.

Dinowitz testified that a lack of direct authority “does not relieve them from the obligation to fight for the school.” . He also claimed he was speaking out on behalf of his constituents, part of his duties as a legislator.

An attorney for Dinowitz said they are reviewing the decision and deciding whether to appeal.

“It doesn’t deal with the most basic issue,” said Charles Moerdler, senior counsel at Stroock & Stroock & Lavan, “as the court found, legislators only have one responsibility to legislation and not to constituents — which defies understanding.”

In a separate lawsuit, Verdi collected $230,000 in settlement money from the city in 2018 over allegations that ex-Bronx Superintendent Melodie Mashel tried to push him out of his job after he accused her of letting the Dinowitz staffer into the registration process.

Mashel resigned that year after independent watchdogs of the Department of Education found she used “poor judgment” in allowing the staffer to participate.

See the article here:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/state-assemblyman-dinowitz-subjected-whistleblower-in-race-admissions-scandal-to-public-contempt/ar-AA17dApT

 

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