A plaintiff who snuck a cellphone into the federal courthouse in lower Manhattan and recorded his two-day trial has been sanctioned. Pro se plaintiff Anibal Oritz was held in contempt by Southern District Judge Jesse Furman (See Profile) and ordered to pay a $1,000 fine for breaking the rules on recording devices and for defying the court.
Ortiz claimed he was mistreated by two police officers on Oct. 17, 2010, on Third Avenue, when he says the officers searched him without probable cause, seized his cellphone while he was recording the encounter and slammed him into the window of a building.
