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May 16, 2011 | 3:28 pm

Benjamin Brafman: Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s Orthodox Jewish attorney

Posted by Danielle Berrin

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Attorney Benjamin Brafman, lead counsel for IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn who is currently awaiting trial in New York

His image may be in permanent ruin, but whether or not the disgraced IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn will set his sights on the Eiffel Tower anytime soon is largely up to one man: his attorney, Benjamin Brafman.

No stranger to celebrity scandal, the New York-based Brafman has represented stars from all over the famous/infamous continuum, from the rappers Sean “Diddy” Combs and Jay-Z, to pop icon Michael Jackson to various reputed members of the mafia. New York Magazine dubbed him “the man to have on speed-dial when you’re in really big trouble.”

According to that same 1998 New York profile, Brafman’s wife Lynda, a librarian, had nicknamed him H.P. for “high profile”. At the time, he was representing “a Talmudic scholar-businessman accused of laundering money for the Cali drug cartel; a retired cop charged with murder; a rabbi charged, with Assemblyman Dov Hikind, of misusing federal funds; and the nightclub impresario Peter Gatien, who [was charged with] running his popular nightspots…as anything-goes drug supermarkets.”

The son of Holocaust survivors, Brafman grew up in Brooklyn and Queens and put himself through Brooklyn College night school and then Ohio Northern University Law School, before getting an additional Master of Laws degree from New York University: “Okay, so it’s not Harvard,” reported New York writer Meryl Gordon, “but Brafman uses his down-to-earth pedigree to put people at ease. He’ll even joke about his equally down-to-earth stature (he boldly claims five feet six) to score points with juries. ‘He’s short, and he uses it well,’” she quotes criminal-defense lawyer Fred Hafetz as saying of Brafman.

Fortunately for Strauss-Kahn, Brafman doesn’t cower from the lurid, the depraved, or the perverse. He defended Michael Jackson against those unforgettable child molestation allegations, as well as an alleged member of the Gambino crime family accused of car theft and murder (Brafman got this guy acquitted on 21 of 22 counts, according to The Financial Times). He also got Sean Combs out of a sticky spot, after that infamous nightclub shooting back in 1999, clearing Combs of the illegal weapons and bribery charges that could have marred his career. Despite eyewitness reports that claimed Combs culpable, the incident is a footnote in the bad memories department.

Now all eyes are on Brafman to see what he can do for Strauss-Kahn, the would-be French Socialist party presidential candidate who is now embroiled in an ugly sex scandal that threatens his ruin. Strauss-Kahn is currently awaiting trial on allegations of sexual assault, attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment of a hotel chambermaid. According to ABC News, the complaint filed with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office says “he forcibly touched the housekeeper’s breasts, attempted to pull off her panty hose, twice, ‘forcibly made contact with his penis and the informant’s mouth’ and that ‘the defendant engaged in oral sexual conduct and anal sexual conduct with another person by forcible compulsion.’”  Earlier today, Strauss-Kahn was denied bail because he is considered a potential flight risk.

It’s tough enough pitting a lowly chambermaid against a powerful international politico, but with Brafman in the mix, it seems even more unlikely the housekeeper will get a fair shake. In addition to legal skills, Brafman has a reputation for being charismatic, verily persuasive, and “imaginative and clever,” as Brafman’s colleague, L.A. attorney Mark Geragos put it to The Financial Times. He is, by many accounts, something of a star himself, a guy with real Hollywood style—and a background in performance.

The Financial Times notes:

Mr. Brafman’s wit, honed during a youthful stint as a stand-up comedian, has become a hallmark of his courtroom style.

Brafman is also known to be an observant Jew whose father rescued an endangered Torah on Kristallnacht, which Brafman wrote about for the Jewish press in 2007.

When earlier today prosecutors suggested Strauss-Kahn be denied bail because he might flee “like Roman Polanski”, Brafman vowed to appeal the ruling.

“This battle has just begun,” he told reporters.

And apparently, Brafman knows how to fight. According to New York Magazine:

His detractors see a darker side, accusing Brafman of using underhanded, albeit legal, courtroom tactics to win, and cynically manipulating the press with carefully orchestrated leaks. It’s fair to say that Perry Mason had a gentler style. But Brafman is effective, even if he doesn’t always play by Marquess of Queensbury rules. So fearsome is his reputation that critics, talking on the phone, sound a lot like Brafman’s Mafia clients fearing a wiretap. “I could trash him,” sniffs one antagonist, “but I’d rather take the high road.”

Despite his track record, Brafman has a tough road ahead. He acknowledged as much in 1998: “The baggage that comes with a remarkable track record,” he told New York, “is that people feel that you can pull off an acquittal despite what seems overwhelming evidence. But you can’t do it every time.”

Read more on Brafman’s Jewish background and the rest of the New York profile here:

Brafman was the class clown, a lazy, directionless student who dozed through yeshiva classes. Aaron Brafman, Ben’s studious older brother, now an Orthodox rabbi in Far Rockaway, says, “Our mother always worried: What’s Ben going to turn into? I was the goody-goody; he used to always be in my shadow.”

The two boys and their sisters, Malkie and Shevy, grew up in a house with shadows, the impermeable sadness of a family shattered by the losses of the Holocaust. Their mother, Rose, who died in 1996, fled Czechoslovakia for New York in 1938 at 16, the only one in her family to get papers to leave; her parents and sister were later killed in concentration camps. Ben recalls that he said in her eulogy, “This is the first day my mother is not afraid.” Their father, Sol, escaped Vienna with his parents after Kristallnacht in 1939. Shortly after meeting and marrying Rose, he was drafted into the U.S. Army.

After the war, the Brafmans settled first in Williamsburg, then in Crown Heights, and finally in the more upscale Belle Harbor. Sol made a modest living as a production manager for a lingerie company. This was a strict, deeply religious Orthodox household with a classic immigrant work-hard-my-child ethos. To this day, Brafman remains observant, scheduling trial dates around Jewish holidays, taking Saturdays off from work, and leaving the office early on Fridays to try to get home before sundown. “I figure God will understand if I’m trying to save someone’s life and I’m home five minutes late,” he says.

15 Comments — Leave your comment

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Is Strauss-Kahn a jew? I think yes. Then the selected attorney is best choice because a Jew can defend another Jew.

Comment by Naeem Javed on 5/17/11 at 1:51 am

Well I am bluffed.

Comment by Leo on 5/17/11 at 6:29 am

May I ask humbly what is the point of this article?  It’s like a half-assed bio on some guy who doesn’t sound like he has many redeeming qualities (other than being a Jew wink , yet you don’t really take him much to task… other than writing “it seems even more unlikely the housekeeper will get a fair shake”. 
I find it disturbing and reinforcing of negative stereotypes of Jews/Jewish attorneys that you give short shrift to the victim’s violation and the suggestion that this lawyer will likely “screw” this maid by freeing her violator should perhaps be accompanied by a bit of moral outrage.  (contd)

Comment by Ribben on 5/17/11 at 8:36 am

(contd)
...Outrage that is curiously absent from your article which is just another puff piece on a horrible example of Our People, the Jews.
Don’t you ever get tired of expose-ing people just because they are Jewish?  If you are going to do that here, in this case, I think you have a responsibility as a journalist to probe deeper and ask some difficult questions.  Otherwise you’re just Entertainment (Jewish) Tonight.  I think you could do better than that, but unfortunately you don’t seem to -want- to.  Why bother writing this stuff?

Comment by Ribben on 5/17/11 at 8:37 am

Very lazy article- just regurgitating a 14 year old NYM article. If the focus is on Mr. Brafman as a proud Jewish attorney, why not focus on contributions to many worthy Jewish causes, both in the US and in Israel?

Comment by proud israel ema on 5/17/11 at 10:01 am

Moral outrage? For what? I see that the the article, as well as the comments, have already judged the accused and found him guilty. Life has shown that things are sometimes not what they seem to be. So it would be wiser to see what transpires. Also, the writer of this article, as well as others, should know the difference between to kill and to murder. The Jews in the Holocaust were MURDERED, not killed.

Comment by nina on 5/17/11 at 10:31 am

Mr. Ben Brafman is an incredible man and does all kinds of wonderful things for the Jewish community! Any attempt to defame or insult him simply reflects very poorly on the accuser. He is far above reproach and a pillar of the Jewish community!

Comment by Ben Packer on 5/18/11 at 3:25 am

A few years back, BabagaNewz, the popular magazine for Jewish middle schoolers, interviewed Ben Brafman. We asked him about the Jewish value of justice and how he can justify defending people he knows to be guilty. His answers are fascinating. Check out the interview at http://babaganewz.com/articles/ben-brafman-the-defense-rests.

Comment by Aviva Werner on 5/18/11 at 6:03 pm

As a liberal yankee jew living in the deep south and making a living as a ex prosecutor now criminal defense attorney i am so looking forward to watching this liberal yankee jew living in the deep north making a living as a ex prosecutor now criminal defense attorney try this case!

Comment by dan summer on 5/18/11 at 6:15 pm

I FIND THIS ARTICLE AND THE PERSON / ATTORNEY TO BE AN EMBARRASSMENT TO MY HERITAGE.  HAVING SPENT HALF OF MY LIFE AS A POLICE OFFICER, AND BEING DEEPLY INVOLVED FROM THE ASPECT OF THE VICTIM WHO HAS BEEN VIOLATED. TO HAVE THIS SCUM-BAG ATTORNEY BE PROUD OF USING WHATEVER MEANS THAT HE USES, TO HAVE THE CRIMES SQUASHED IN COURT PLACES THE VICTIM IN THE POSITION OF BEING VIOLATED A SECOND TIME.  (TO BE CONTINUED)
.

Comment by DONALD H. PINSKER on 5/21/11 at 9:07 am

CONTINUED——-I COME FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF HAVING SPENT HALF OF MY LIFE AS A POLICE OFFICER.  THE VICTIM, BY HAVING A SCUM-BAG ATTORNEY REPRESENTING THE PERPETRATOR, IS VIOLATED A SECOND TIME.  THE PERPETRATOR DOING THE CRIME, BETTER BE PREPARED TO DO THE TIME.  IN THIS CASE, THE PERPETRATOR, HAS A REPUTATION FOR UNACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOR, AND IS PROUD OF HIS STUPIDITY. WITH A SCUM-BAG ATTORNEY GETTING HIS CLIENT “OFF” FROM ANY CHARGES, ALLOWS THAT PERPETRATOR TO VIOLATE OTHERS. MAY THE ATTORNEYS FAMILY BE THE NEXT VICTIMS.  BOTH THE PERPETRATOR AND THE ATTORNEY ARE AN EMBARRASSMENT TO MY HERITAGE.

Comment by DONALD H. PINSKER on 5/21/11 at 9:18 am

This guy defended people from the mob, that’s all that needs to be said. Jews always work for the bad guys. That’s why Khan hired him, he knows he’s guilty and needs this kike to get him out.

Comment by mbj on 5/21/11 at 10:32 pm

kol ha kavod for retaining your Jewish identity in a country where assimilation is on the rife. If you are meant to be successful HASHEM will guide you accordingly.

Comment by Marilyn Braude on 5/22/11 at 6:44 am

Jews defend their own no matter the crime and always circle the tents. Look at Henri-Levi and Ben Stein.It doesn’t bother them that he raped a devout Muslim woman from Guinea. And they wonder why’s there is so much anti-Jewish hatred amond Muslims?
Pathetic.

Comment by Devils Lapdog on 5/27/11 at 9:20 am

A word from a non-jewish European woman: I am stunned how you americans judge this man before he even had the chanse to open his mouth in court. This is in fact the opinion of most Europeans. We all are shocked by how he seems to be judged in advance. What background he or his lawyer has, jewish or other, is not interesting at all!

Comment by JL on 6/06/11 at 1:21 am

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