Opposing Murder = Discrimination, Lawyer Says

Truth is stranger than fiction. 

A restaurant owner told O.J. Simpson to get out of his restaurant, exercising his right not to associate with murderers on his own property. 

Simpson’s paid mouthpiece and lawyer, Yale Galanter, is now threatening to sue the restaurant and take away its liquor license. 

He’s claiming that the only reason Simpson could have been kicked out of the restaurant was his race.  After all, no one could possibly object to murder, right?  

In Yale Galanter’s world, you have to be a racist to dislike a murderer, if the murderer happens to be black.  People like Galanter give the legal profession its bad image.

(A California jury found O.J. Simpson liable for murdering two people, including his ex-wife, in a civil case.  Citing clear and convincing evidence of malicious wrongdoing, it awarded the families of his victims millions of dollars in punitive damages, which Simpson has never paid.   In an earlier criminal prosecution, where the burden of proof was more exacting, requiring overwhelming proof beyond any “reasonable doubt,” a jury failed to convict Simpson.)

The EEOC is currently attempting to force employers to hire people with criminal convictions, citing workplace “disparate impact” rules.  Disparate impact rules ban employment criteria that have the effect of rejecting more minority applicants than white applicants.  The EEOC claims that such criteria include taking into account a job applicant’s criminal history.

But laws banning racial discrimination against customers, like 42 USC 1981, generally don’t contain any “disparate-impact” rules similar to workplace discrimination laws.

And under cases like Coe v. Yellow Freight (1981), you can’t base a disparate-impact claim on a single decision (like a restaurant owner’s telling a single customer (O.J.) to get out of his restaurant).

So they provide little ammunition for the ambulance-chasers and Galanters of this world.