Feature

The Sixtysomething Upstart

She is incredibly smart, and some lawyers had crushes on her. “She’d charm the pants off you,” says Richman. Now they’re being charmed by her defense-friendly platform: expanding discovery; alternative sentencing for nonviolent offenders; Rockefeller drug-law reform. “She’s trying to convince us that we won’t need to fear her when she’s omnipotent,” Greenfield jokes.

Her pro-death-penalty stance may be a liability, however. Snyder says she would consider it for particularly heinous crimes where there was significant corroborating evidence, “like DNA.”

Grandstanding is another frequently voiced concern. Snyder sees herself too much as an advocate and not as someone simply bound to do justice, another skeptical defense lawyer worries. “As D.A., I could see her offering coercive pleas and focusing on those cases that promote herself.”

In 1995, there was an audible harrumph downtown when Snyder went on TV and talked about the O. J. Simpson trial. A rule was then clarified that no sitting judge in New York could discuss the merits of any pending case in the country. Snyder engaged manager Lou Pitt, who grew the careers of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jessica Lange, then smartly published her memoirs and hit the talk shows. Lately, she’d been surfing the airwaves, deep-thinking Scott Peterson, Martha Stewart, and Kobe Bryant as a legal analyst for NBC.

Political is a word that comes up a lot with Snyder. “I’ve been at a hundred parties with her,” says a lawyer. “She likes the action.”

Snyder’s only prior political experience was stuffing envelopes for Bobby Kennedy’s presidential campaign and reading a lot of Michael Beschloss. She’s made some rookie mistakes: a disastrous waltz around the room with power-brokering private investigator Bo Dietl. A first press conference was ended abruptly when a question about her TV sideline raised her ire.

Manhattan’s “boss politics” were a shocker, she says. “Don’t get me wrong; I’ve met a lot of good people. But it’s just a closed system—I mean, this isn’t that much better than Tammany Hall. Several times, I’ve thought I was in Brooklyn.” Then there was that time Morgenthau volunteers hired people from a shelter for the mentally ill to picket a Snyder fund-raiser at Elaine’s.

To many, Bob Morgenthau is the Great Oz, beloved but feared. He’s got incredible reach: The number of people in government and in the courts who have worked for him is astonishing. He’s the insider’s insider, advising the mayor and governor on judicial job-filling, and people like to imagine he’s behind all sorts of appointments.

But cross Morgenthau, and he might just pick up the phone and . . . who knows? There’s a perception that judges who displease him have ended up trying cases in the Bronx—which the Manhattan judiciary sees as akin to the Russian front. Even as a myth, it works for him. “The people in his office are afraid to buck anything,” says Robert Tannenbaum, who ran homicide in the Hogan era. “They’re fearful that if they ever try to get another job, he’ll say all these crappy things about them.”

“Morgenthau has that quality,” says another lawyer. “He gets even.”

In 1976, homicide chief John Keenan was named special anti-corruption prosecutor and hired Snyder out of the office. More staff followed—to Bob Morgenthau’s vast displeasure, Snyder has said. Snyder always wanted to be a judge, and after Koch was elected mayor, he made a slew of appointments to the bench. Snyder’s application languished. “Someone was opposing my appointment,” she wrote in her book. Snyder has discussed the notion that it was Morgenthau with a few people. “Maybe someone suggested that to me, but I never thought that,” she says now. In his confidential letter (a copy was shown to New York), Morgenthau praised her performance: “Mrs. Snyder has a pleasing presence and is well-spoken,” he said.

Though Koch eventually appointed her, the perceived snub rankled.

Snyder now has $1.4 million of the $2 million she’s looking for. But it’s been tough. “Sorry, but Bob’s been too good to us” is the usual response. “A number of people have told me that he called them and said, ‘You can’t support her,’ ” says Snyder. “People tell me all the time they have been intimidated by him.” More than $100,000 has been raised by young friends of Snyder’s sons (her son Nick is in the foreign service) with names like Bass, Forbes, LeFrak, Santo Domingo, Rockefeller, and Trump. Some had visited Snyder’s courtroom as third-graders.

Parents were called: Bob Morgenthau cooked hot dogs with Eleanor Roosevelt! So what was Teddy Roosevelt V doing, mailing $150 to Judge Snyder?

People do seem to wish Morgenthau would designate an heir. “If Morgenthau’s made a deal with Pataki to appoint a successor,” says civil-liberties lawyer Richard Emery, “the person would have a huge leg up on fund-raising. If something happens to Morgenthau, I’m worried about Pataki appointing a hack, which is the likelihood.”

In 1973, Frank Hogan overcame a primary challenge on his way to serving his own ninth term. That August, he checked into St. Luke’s for what was first described as a routine physical, then “fainting spells and exhaustion,” and finally a stroke and a malignant lung tumor only after the New York Post got hold of stolen medical records. He was overwhelmingly reelected, resigned a month later, and passed away in April of the following year, age 72. In the special election, the D.A. appointed by the Republican governor lost to the New York Times– endorsed candidate: Robert Morgenthau.

Now Robert Morgenthau is saying he’s got unfinished business at the D.A.’s office. Judge Snyder clearly does, too. It remains to be seen who will have the last headline.