Judge hit over case-fix tries

A MANHATTAN judge tried to use her clout to help her baby-sitter erase a criminal conviction and to reopen the murder conviction of the jurist’s son, authorities said Tuesday.

The state Commission on Judicial Conduct formally admonished Acting Supreme Court Justice Leticia Ramirez for lending “the prestige of her judicial office to advance the private interests of” the baby-sitter and her son.

In 2013, Ramirez (photo) wrote a letter on official stationary on behalf of a family sitter — identified only as “Ms. S.” — who was asking the court to vacate a 2004 conviction for a misdemeanor promoting gambling charge. The commission did not reveal if the baby-sitter’s conviction was vacated.

At the time, she was a Civil Court judge and an acting Family Court judge. She has since been appointed as an acting Supreme Court justice.

A year later, Ramirez wrote an affidavit for her son’s habeas corpus motion to reopen his second-degree murder conviction. In 2004, the son, Michael Tineo, was convicted of fatally shooting a man on Long Island that he told police had molested his daughter. Ten years later, he filed a motion to reopen the case — charging that Suffolk County detectives had coerced him into confessing. Ramirez, wrote an affidavit for her son that he attached to his motion in which she described herself as a judge and asked the court to “grant the relief sought.” She was aware of the potential for conflict because she even asked that the case be moved to an appellate division that didn’t oversee her court. Ultimately, the appeals court denied the son’s motion. Ramirez said in a statement that she was “keenly aware of the potential impact of the transparent, albeit mistaken, method of my assistance to a close friend as well as a close family member, my son. I have learned from this unfortunate experience.”