Danielle R. Sassoon shot as a laser through the Manhattan US Public Prosecutor, with stints struggling for violent crime and title fraud, and handling the appeals before the raised, at the age of 38, being the interim his head.
There, a few weeks in her tenure running the most famous office of the country’s federal prosecutor, she faced an obstacle that threatened to stop her rapid rise: the desire of President Trump’s administration to reduce corruption charges against the New York Eric Adams.
Given her experience – and the bulletproof conservative credentials as a member of the federal company – Ms. Sassoon seemed ready to drive an office that saw a hectic era during Mr Trump’s first term, when she shot two of the US lawyers. In recent days, prosecutors have been watching Ms Sassoon eagerly seeing how he could respond to the Ministry of Justice’s request to expel the Adams case, which he had backed in a court registration.
She has a lot of experience to stand for her values ​​before skeptical audiences. Now it has to mediate between an office where this kind of independence is award -winning and an administration that has explicitly given a political class to end Adams’ prosecution.
Through a representative, Ms Sassoon refused to comment on this article.
Before the Adams case blurred her in the spotlight, her life was characterized by an achievement that was remarkable even in environments where the achievement is the rule. Born and raised in New York, she attended the Modern Orthodox Ramaz School in Ano East of Manhattan, where she was the first in her class and received awards for academic excellence. In the Gymnasium, she spent hours every day studying Talmud, an effort that said she prepared her to study the law.
Rebecca Kaden, a close girlfriend who met with Mrs Sassoon, before starting their first year at Harvard University, said she always knew that Ms Sassoon would be a lawyer. The future US lawyer was a stroke, a dynamic thinker who was willing to discuss and discuss ideas.
He wrote columns on the Middle East policy for Student newspaper, one of them in her role as Harvard Student Press Secretary for Israel, as well as a soft -focusing profile of a classmate for “SCENE”, a magazines of a friend of a friend .
One of its ranks, “justice”, is taught by Professor Michael J. Sandel, in a full of hundreds of students, some of whose observations received enthusiastic applause. In this class, Ms Sassoon stood and gave a sincere argument against the race -based confirmation action.
“You could argue that positive action perpetuates divisions between the tribes, rather than achieving the ultimate goal of the race to be an irrelevant factor in our society,” he said.
There was no applause when it was over.
But if she was not afraid to speak honestly with her peers, Ms Sassoon could talk to campus consultants. A family friend introduced her to Alan Dershowitz’s law professor, who soon brought her as a research assistant. Mr Dershowitz said that Ms Sassoon understood “all sides of all arguments”, but reminded her of “different, excluded” and “shy”.
“It will cause you very kindly and gently will cause you,” Mr Dershowitz said, adding: “He is always interested in public service.”
After graduating from Harvard Magna Cum Laude in 2008, Mrs Sassoon attended the Yale Law School, known for her focus on the public interest law. He graduated in 2011 and served in consecutive staff for conservative judges.
The first, J. Harvie Wilkinson III of the Federal Court of Appeal for the fourth circuit, in Richmond, VA., Reminded Ms. Sassoon as a whip and versatile home on the upper wall of the secondary law and before a jury.
He said he would not comment “in any way, shape or form” for decisions faced by Ms Sassoon in the Adams case or others. He added: “All I would say is that Danielle is someone who is very basic and strictly honest and plays it straight.”
Later, an employee of the Supreme Court of Justice Antonin Scalia, a giant of the conservative legal movement. In an essay after his death in 2016, he wrote: “Justice Scalia was my kind of feminist.
“He didn’t call me any business punches and demanded rigor from my job,” he added. “He taught me how to shoot a pistol and a rifle, and made me feel like I had cracking. He fought my skin, which was the best preparation for a career in a dominated area.”
In the year the essay wrote, Ms Sassoon, a registered Republican, began working as a prosecutor at the US lawyer office, where political neutrality is a value of prime importance. He was hired in the southern area of ​​New York under Preet Bharara, appointed by President Barack Obama, was transferred through General Crimes and Drugs before focusing on violent crime and fraud. He handled eight tests, including two cases of murder.
In a trial, he won the belief of Lawrence V. Ray on charges of blackmail and trafficking in sexual abuse of Sarah Lawrence students. He received 60 years in prison.
It is known for the prosecution of the fraud of Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of Cryptocurrency Exchange FTX. Mrs Sassoon is baked Mr Bankman-fried in a four-day cross-examination, shaking him with a line of dispute Rat-a-tat that contradicts his public statements with his private behavior. The columnist Joe Nocera, after watching the front and back, wrote to the Free Press that Mr Bankman-Fried was “a dead man who was walking”.
He was sentenced and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
In 2023, according to the US attorney then, Damian Williams, Ms. Sassoon was promoted to co-head of the criminal appeal unit, where he would probably have revised the legal evidence of some of the highest office of the Office of the Office-including the prosecution of the mayor Adams.
This was the position she held last month, when Trump’s administration raised her to temporarily drive the office. Her term was expected to be relatively short. He has a baby due to mid -March and President Trump’s choice to drive the office permanently, Jay Clayton is expected to fly through the Senate confirmation process.
He has become an active leader, watched social rallies from office units and recently appeared in court to observe the conviction of Robert Menendez, a former Democratic Senator of New Jersey, over the corruption charges. He received 11 years in prison.
Shortly after the name of the US Temporary Lawyer last month, Ms Sassoon participated in talks on the case against Mayor Adams. On January 31, he traveled to Washington, DC, for a personal meeting at the Ministry of Justice to discuss the possibility to reduce the charges.
For friends, it looked intact: Two days after the meeting, she and her husband, Adam Katz, threw a birthday party for her young daughter (Mr. Katz is co -founder of Irenic Capital Management.)
This week, the section 2 employee, Emil Bove III, ordered Ms. Sassoon to leave the case in a note, directing that he is rejecting the pending categories “just possible”.
Ms. Sassoon cannot reject the categories. She – or a prosecutor in her office – should ask the judge to oversee the case to do so. After Mr Bove’s note was made public, the office veterans began quickly discussing how Ms. Sassoon could respond.
This month, Mrs Sassoon published an essay in The Wall Street Journal, in which she criticized President Biden for moving the penalties of about 2,500 “alleged non -violent offenders” without advising prosecutors or judges involved.
Mrs Sassoon wrote: “The lack of decision -making process has shown an indifference to the work and knowledge of prosecutors and judges.
“At the moment of the transition,” Mrs Sassoon added, “I am looking forward to making my own place to ensure that prosecutors can repeat their noble work smoothly, except for the scene and at the service of the public.”
