Miss Sotomayor in Manhattan

[ruggerson]

I think she fits the "compassionate" criteria just fine.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0509/Miss_Sotomayor_in_Manhattan.html?showall

A prosecutor forwards on this passage on Sotomayor as a hardboiled, chain-smoking young prosecutor, from a 1983 Times story on assistants in the office of the Manhattan District Attorney, then and now, Robert Morgenthau:

Sonia Sotomayor, now in her fifth year as an A.D.A., tried to examine her own motives in making the decision to join the office of the prosecutor. The daughter of immigrants, Miss Sotomayor was born in the South Bronx and grew up speaking mostly Spanish. Her father died when Sonia was 9, and her mother supported the family for years on a small salary. Miss Sotomayor graduated from Cardinal Spellman High School in the Bronx and won a scholarship to Princeton University, where she graduated summa cum laude. She went on to Yale Law School, where she was a member of the Law Journal, then she joined the Manhattan District Attorney's office in 1979.

"There was a tremendous amount of pressure from my community, from the third-world community, at Yale," she recalls. "They could not understand why I was taking this job. I'm not sure I've ever resolved that problem.

"What I am finding, both statistically and emotionally," she continues, "is that the worst victims of crimes are not general society — i.e., white folks —- but minorities themselves. The violence, the sorrow are perpetrated by minorities on minorities."

Some of Miss Sotomayor's initial misgivings about working as a prosecutor were resolved when she moved from misdemeanors to more serious crimes. "I had more problems during my first year in the office with the low-grade crimes — the shoplifting, the prostitution, the minor assault cases," she says. "In large measure, in those cases you were dealing with socioeconomic crimes, crimes that could be the product of the environment and of poverty.

more

[thereismore]

1. Uh-oh, she is soft on crime (prostitution a low-grade crime)! WTF is a socioeconomic crime, is she a

SOCIALIST?

:hide:

[Thrill]

2. She clearly is compassionate. They are going to have a field day

with some of her quotes. I dare she care about people

[ruggerson]

3. something tells me she'll be able to deflect whatever they throw at her

n/t