Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?

By now you likely know of the unfolding, slow-motion public crucifixion of 9th Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski. On Thursday, the New York Times published a lengthy column by Dara Purvis, an associate professor of law at Penn State, vilifying Kozinski for supposed acts of sexual harassment dating as far back as nine years.

I found the Purvis column typical of the sort of commentary now gushing forth about Kozinski, including in these pages in recent days, in these respects:

• The author admitted basing her accusations on "rumors," "stories," a "whisper network," and not being able to recall "who told me specific examples";

• The author expressed unqualified belief in all of the women's accounts, and discarded or ignored entirely what Kozinski's response might be;

• The author's use of the word "horrified" to describe accounts of Kozinski's jokingly having referred to a woman clerk as his "slave," shown pornography to some woman clerks who worked for him, and suggested that another clerk ought to exercise naked when she had the gym to herself; and

• The author's view that women offended by Kozinski's actions had "nowhere to go."

Purvis went on to accuse law schools of failing their female students who might apply to clerkships with Kozinski, by not warning them of his supposed behavior. She closed with this romantic sentence: "We must stop being complicit in enabling [abuse] in our own ranks."

In one year of clerking at the 9th Circuit and 30 years of law practice, I've heard some whispers. Some are unfounded. Others are motivated by petty personal grievances felt by small and vindictive people. Others are lies.

None of that is to say that those few women who have accused Kozinski must be lying. It is to say that rumors, stories and whisper networks are no proper basis for ruining a man's career and reputation. In law school, we are taught respect for a system of rules that aims, ultimately, at fairness in both outcome and process. Purvis (ironically, a law professor herself) and others seem blind to the irony that the public lynching of Kozinski is based on no more than rumors which differ little from those circulated by the Republican sleaze machine in its attempt to discredit Anita Hill in 1991.

Purvis and others lament that women supposedly victimized by Kozinski had "nowhere to go." I'm male, and so presumed oblivious to the suffering of women in the workplace. But I know what it is to experience inappropriate behavior by a boss. What about telling him you don't like it and to cut it out? Strong people -- male and female -- know how to do this firmly and without utterly torpedoing their careers by doing so. Kozinski's critics imply that the few woman clerks who have recently complained about him must be incapable of saying something in the moment. The implication is an unintended insult to those clerks. But it's an insult nonetheless. Would you want to hire an attorney so timid that she was afraid to speak up about a personal slight so jarring that it warranted a public crusade against the offender?

We are told we should believe "all the women." Unqualified belief in unsworn tales of events that happened decades ago would not pass muster in any courtrooms I know of in this country. In no part of our culture except the current discourse is unquestioning faith in one person's recollection of events viewed as an absolute substitute for other evidence or the account of the accused. The cases in which we have departed from this norm are notorious -- the McMartin preschool and Dale Akiki cases foremost among them.

Yes, I understand that rules of evidence prevail in court cases such as those and not in the public square. To me, that can't justify jettisoning even the pretense of skepticism about the lurid accusations now being breathlessly repeated about Kozinski in the media. But healthy skepticism is not something in which Purvis and her colleagues are interested.

During the 1980s, prosecutors accused the U.S. secretary of labor, Raymond Donovan, of defrauding and stealing from the New York City Transit Authority. Donovan had to resign his office, lose his career, suffer financial ruin, endure an eight-month trial, and undergo over two years of public shaming. Much to the government's surprise, a jury acquitted him -- after the defense called no witnesses. Following his acquittal, Donovan said this on the courthouse steps: "Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?"

Of course, there was no answer to that question. And there is no such office.

By all accounts and no matter the side of today's bitter partisan divide on which one lives, Alex Kozinski is a great judge. He has served the public and the 9th Circuit brilliantly and efficiently since 1985. He has boosted the careers of hundreds of people. Among them are women who now enjoy lucrative careers as law professors, lawyers and, in at least one case, professional novelists. Many of those who purport to know what they experienced reveal themselves for what they mostly are: pious, tiresome whiners, self-appointed judges without portfolio.

It would matter not to writers like Purvis whose minds are made up, but I once worked at the 9th Circuit. During my year there I met and worked with other law clerks both male and female. In a court which had a coconut telegraph no less busy than any other court's, I never once heard any rumor or story about Kozinski mistreating women. His interactions with his clerks at the time were known to be warm and collegial (unlike in many other chambers, where the judges were notoriously cold and impersonal to their clerks). I visited his chambers in Pasadena only a couple of times. But on those occasions, they resembled a happy family. Of course, my account, and others like mine, have no currency in the condemnatory onslaught now besetting Kozinski. Though it will pass, it will also leave a cloud over someone who is a good man and a great judge. It's a shame. Kozinski has life tenure. But, as in Raymond Donovan's case, once it's all over, there will be no office he can petition to get his reputation back.