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Judge Stanley Brotman Leaves Important Legacy in Territory

Judge Stanley S. Brotman has left a strong and multifaceted legacy in the Virgin Islands, which he served for more than 30 years in various judicial capacities.

Brotman died Feb. 21, 2014, at the age of 89.

A U.S. district judge in his home state of New Jersey, Brotman is remembered there for a long tenure on the bench and numerous high profile decisions. He enjoyed a reputation for courage and integrity; an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer credits him with sending mob boss Nicodemo Scarfo to jail and with negotiating a $32.5 million settlement to clean up a landfill in Gloucester County, among other well-known cases in the area.

President Gerald Ford appointed Brotman, then a prominent attorney, to the bench in 1975, and Brotman continued to serve until his retirement in September 2013. In 1997 he was appointed to a seven-year term on the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The FISA court is the body charged with hearing applications to authorize clandestine surveillance operations, and Brotman’s appointment overlapped with the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Brotman’s association with the Virgin Islands started in 1979 when he began “sitting by designation” in the territory, which was facing a shortage of full-time judges and a backlog of cases. At the time, the District Court heard many types of cases that are now handled by the V.I. Superior Court. Brotman traveled back and forth from the mainland to the territory to help clear the docket.

From December 1989 until August 1992, Brotman served as the acting chief judge of the District Court in the Virgin Islands. He also served periodically on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, the appellate court for the territory.

His name became well known to V.I. residents when he presided over cases stemming from the Tutu wells and aquifer contamination that was first discovered in 1983 and that resulted in actions which dragged through administrative and judicial proceedings for more than a decade. Brotman also presided over actions attempting to institute competition in the telephone industry.

The judge also ruled on complaints involving the local government’s operation of prisons and jails in the territory. Brotman famously held the V.I. government in contempt for failing to move mentally ill inmates out of prison and he issued an order under which the court had oversight for corrections. He also established a special fund for improvements to the prisons, ordering that collections made by the U.S. Marshals Service and by Immigration and Naturalization be placed into the special fund rather than slipped into the General Fund and mingled with other operations money.

Brotman was in the territory when Hurricane Hugo ripped through the islands in 1989, destroying an estimated 80 percent of structures on St. Croix and causing significant damage on St. John and St. Thomas. He was evacuated amid fears that he could be a target of revenge among some of the prisoners who escaped from the devastated prison. But Brotman returned days later and led in rebuilding the courthouses and in re-establishing order to the court system.

“Judge Brotman was a giant among men, who walked humbly amidst his Virgin Islands District Court family,” Chief Judge Wilma A. Lewis said in a prepared statement this week. “We will remember him fondly for his calm demeanor, genuine interest in the lives of the court personnel, and his unwavering love for the Virgin Islands. Judge Brotman will be missed, but the legacy he leaves on the District Court of the Virgin Islands and our territory will exist in perpetuity.”

Born in New Jersey, Brotman earned his undergraduate degree from Yale and his law degree from Harvard. He enlisted in the Army at the age of 18 near the start of U.S. involvement in World War II. He was in the specialized training program for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS – now CIA) and he studied the Burmese language and was stationed in Burma. He also served in the Korean conflict in 1951. He opened a law practice in 1952 in Vineland, N.J., which grew to the largest firm in the area.

Brotman received numerous awards including the American Judicature Society Herbert Harley Award in 1994; both the William J. Brennan Jr. award from the Association of the Federal Bar of New Jersey and the Special Recognition Award from the Trial Attorneys of New Jersey in 1975; and the John Gerry Award for the Camden County (N.J.) Bar Association in 2001. In April 2005, Gov. Charles Turnbull honored him by declaring a Judge Brotman Day in the Virgin Islands.

He is survived by his wife, Suzanne; son, Richard; and daughter, Alison. Funeral services were held Tuesday at the Beth Israel Synagogue in Vineland, N.J. Donations in his name may be made to Beth Israel Congregation, 1015 East Park Ave., Vineland, NJ 08360.

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