Morgenthau remembered as being incorruptible, fun
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor lavished praise on her onetime mentor, former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, saying at his funeral Thursday that he made her the human being and legal mind she is today.
More than 1,000 mourners filled Temple Emanu-El, the Manhattan synagogue where he was a trustee for more than 50 years. Other notables included New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., as well as journalist Dan Rather, former Mayor David Dinkins, former Gov. Eliot Spitzer and former U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel.
Morgenthau died Sunday after a brief illness, 10 days short of his 100th birthday.
“I hope my voice will not break too much with tears as I speak today,” Sotomayor said. “Without Morgenthau, I would be neither the person nor the justice I am today.”
He gave Sotomayor, a New York native, her first job out of Yale Law School in 1979, as an assistant district attorney.
Morgenthau’s seven children each spoke at the service, describing a father who never raised his voice and “always, always backed us up,” said daughter Anne Grand. “He rarely, extremely rarely, told us to do anything — no bedtimes, no curfews. He was a lot of fun.”
She recalled temper tantrums as a 3-year-old over having her throat examined for possible illnesses each day as she entered school. One morning, her father went to see the doctor who insisted on the exams.
“Dad said calmly, but firmly, in his best dad voice, ‘We’ve talked it over and the answer is, no,’” Grand said.
Officiating at Thursday’s simple, emotion-filled ceremony capped with music from the synagogue’s choir was its rabbi emeritus, Ronald Sobel, a Morgenthau friend of nearly six decades.
Sobel called Morgenthau “incorruptible ... a legend in the legal profession.”
Standing near the casket draped in an American flag in honor of Morgenthau’s World War II service in the Navy, the rabbi said: “We weep, we mourn, we celebrate.”
Another longtime friend, attorney Stephen Kaufman, recounted a moment when Morgenthau’s vessel was torpedoed and he ended up in Mediterranean waters with a life preserver. Nearby was a sailor without one. “Without hesitation, Bob took off his life preserver and gave it to the shouting sailor.”
Years later, Kaufman quoted Morgenthau as saying, with his wry humor, “‘I think it was one of the stupidest things I ever did.’”
He was nearly 90 when he retired in 2009 after 35 years as Manhattan district attorney, having overseen thousands of cases, including that of John Lennon assassin Mark David Chapman, subway vigilante Bernard Goetz, mob boss John Gotti and “Preppy Killer” Robert Chambers.
Sotomayor credited him with transforming the district attorney’s role, creating specialized teams that are now a staple of many prosecutors’ offices, devoted to sex crimes, identity theft, fraud, cold cases and a citywide narcotics unit. The justice said Morgenthau also expanded the scope of the office, tackling corruption, racketeering and financial crimes on an international scale.
Looking out at those gathered, the justice said she was speaking on behalf of all who had worked under “the boss,” as his staff called him.
Earlier in his career, Morgenthau was Manhattan’s top federal prosecutor, appointed by President John F. Kennedy in 1961.