Brother Against Brother

The New York Law Journal has a report on allegations against a judge

A Sullivan County Court judge has been placed on restricted status amid an investigation of whether the judge intentionally ran over his older brother with an all-terrain vehicle.

Peter Labuda, 70, is accusing his brother Judge Frank LaBuda, 66, of breaking his leg and his rib by intentionally knocking him over with an ATV on Sept. 25 on property Peter Labuda owns in Wurtsboro, which adjoins property owned by the judge. The brothers capitalize their name differently.

Sheriff’s deputies responded to a call about the afternoon incident but did not arrest Frank LaBuda, as his brother requested. The next day, from his hospital bed at the Orange Regional Medical Center, Peter Labuda told the Middletown Times Herald-Record that he believes his brother drove over him “full throttle” without trying to avoid him, after he told the judge to get off his property.

 Relations between the brothers were known to have been strained prior to Sept. 25, with the Times Herald-Record reporting that Frank LaBuda refused to talk to his brother when the two ran into each other the previous week at a local coffee shop, according to Peter Labuda.

No charges had been filed in connection with the case as of Monday, state and county officials said.

Benjamin Ostrer, an attorney representing Frank LaBuda, said that while the brothers’ relationship has been difficult at times, he believes the judge will be exonerated.

“I can’t imagine Judge LaBuda having intentionally struck his brother,” Ostrer, of Chester, said Sunday. “I am confident that the investigation will reveal that it was truly an accident.”

After the Sullivan County Sheriff’s Department initially investigated the incident last week, Sullivan County District Attorney James Farrell announced Friday that he was handing the case over to state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office, and that the sheriff’s department would forward all information it had gathered to state police.

“While I believe that my office could have fairly and impartially handled this matter, out of an abundance of caution and to avoid even the appearance of impropriety, I have requested the attorney general take over this case,” Farrell said in a statement. “All of the people involved in this incident, Peter Labuda, Frank LaBuda and the citizens of this county deserve a full, fair and independent evaluation of the facts of this case.”

Farrell said he is certain that state authorities will handle the matter in a “thorough, comprehensive and professional” way.

Lucian Chalfen, a spokesman for the Office of Court Administration, said LaBuda was placed on “annual leave” effective Monday after the judge conferred with Thomas Breslin, the chief administrative judge for the state’s Third Judicial District.

Chalfen said that under annual leave, a judge remains on the bench but takes vacation time for the interruption in service. He said LaBuda will not return until the investigation and any prosecution of the Sept. 25 stemming is resolved.

Chalfen said LaBuda began to handle only civil cases last week once it was clear the allegations by his brother were being handled as a criminal matter.

In LaBuda’s absence, Chalfen said Sullivan County Supreme Court Justice Stephan Schick and County Court Judges Michael McGuire and Mark Meddaugh will handle his caseload.

(Mike Frisch)