Casalena.org

She WAS a character from a Tom Wolfe novel. In the 80's she had been responsible for the jailing of a wealthy landlord for not providing heat and hot water to tenants in his 20 something buildings in Brooklyn. That afternoon, running to the Appellate Court, she glimpsed the cover of the NY Post and saw a full page photo of the defendant behind the bars of the local jail with the headline, "DRACULA LANDLORD JAILED"....Twenty years later she left that crazy city after 9/11, the denials of 9/11, working for Giuliani closing the Mafia filled Fish Market, running for Judge in a multi-corrupt Tammany Hall political system "against the wishes of the Democratic Party District Leader". She lost that election in which it had been arranged by the system to have only this one race contested in the wealthiest district in Manhattan. Only 4% of the registered Democrats voted. But a few thousand had voted for her to the great chagrin of the party regulars. No fundraising allowed by the sitting Judge, she spent $150,000 of her own money from the recent sale of the family coop. Having resigned from her job working for NYC to run for city office, her single private practice was in shambles, no clients, lying clients, crazy clients and crazy judges screaming at her in every court room. The uncontested second election for judges who only have to run every 10 years is viewed as part of their pension plan and she had endangered their life security.
Other lawyers told her last clients to make complaints to the "Disciplinary Committee", a group formed by judges to make sure some lawyers are investigated for the small stuff but no one in the big firms can steal from their clients (and the 9/11 fund) with impunity. Her manic depressive crack-addled Irish boyfriend stalked her and her children throughout Manhattan. Having moved to Queens, she realized her calls to the Police were fruitless when he would continually break into her house stealing cash, checks, credit cards, once by jumping through a front window. His father had run scams his whole life, starting out with running with the Westies, once selling fake Picasso's to wealthy Madison Avenue shoppers. Now in his elder years his fix with the Police was so tight that as soon as the Police arrived the call was already made to the house. Throw him in the Psych Ward at Elmhurst, Gracie Square Detox for the Suicidal and then he was out again.
Finally, as reported in the Daily News from information provided by the head of the alcohol besotten Disciplinary Comm., she fled with her daughters to "somewhere in the Midwest", her mother having sent her an airplane ticket. Soon thereafter she was "disbarred" as an attorney on default, that is, not sufficiently answering each and every rambling gruntlement of her five last clients. They also insisted she return to NYC to their Star Chamber interrogation, further endangered by her continuing PTSD symptoms from 9/11. The DC took the position that such medical condition does not effect the practice of law in any manner, using the continuing practice of law by others as examples. Of course that would mean that those lawyers are not, in fact, pathologically worse after 9/11, if possible, given their prior reputation of the ability to lie, cheat, and otherwise overcharge anyone within arms distance.
Well if you've read this far, is their a book here? All of the above is my story, some names changed to protect the guilty that would figure some way to sue or harass me. Life is strange, mine seems to be stranger I think. I can't work in the law field or even at Macy's as all this is readily accessible in a Google search, now used by all employers in their HR offices. I'm hoping that retraining in another field will net me some little salary to live the rest of my life, somewhere in the Midwest.
I write as I saw your photos of the collapsed building on Reade. My office was at 100 Church. By the way the collapse was most likely intentional by the owners, as the apartments were protected by the Loft Law, the lovingly corrupt Building Department just down the street on West Broadway.
Who would live at Broadway and Chambers? The noisiest intersection in the area. On the other hand you are across the street from City Hall, another lovely den of iniquity, and that memorial to hundreds of years of graft and corruption, the renovated "Tweed Hall", now home to the otherwise just as filthy Board of Uneducation. So the swirl of greed, lust, and every evil spirit in your neighborhood must make for an energizing aura. It always gave me extra zest during my traipses back and forth to the "Courts".
What does anyone think? A novella or just another episode of Law and Order?

This is a beginning attempt of my description of Living NYC Back to MN. Still rolling around the many strange encounters I experienced, totally naively. Comments requested.