Acting Supreme Court Justice Diane A. Lebedeff was censured for presiding over a case in which she had a “significant social and professional relationship” with the plaintiff, attorney Ravi Batra, in a determination released yesterday by the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct.
The commission’s ruling, which was laced with language highly critical of Justice Lebedeff, who sits in Manhattan, adopted the findings and recommendations of a stipulation worked out between the commission’s investigative staff and Justice Lebedeff’s attorney, Ben R. Rubinowitz of Gair, Gair, Conason, Steigman & Mackauf.
