Arnold Weiss’ career is characterized by his full and rich participation in wide variety of areas that include competitive sports, academic achievement, politics, public service and the practice of law.
Education
Arnie was a quarterback on his Tilden High School football team and was elected to Tilden's Sports Hall of Fame. He later played forward for his Brooklyn College basketball team.
Arnie enjoyed high academic achievement at Brooklyn College while at the same time, serving as an active member of its basketball team, its debate team, and its student government, and also as Chancellor of the Epsilon Phi Alpha Fraternity, and as Co-Chairman of the organization that paved the way for the College's first Student Union Building. Arnie was recently honored with the Brooklyn College Lifetime Achievement Award.
Arnie attended Harvard Law School on a partial scholarship. He was elected to its prestigious Board of Student Advisors by virtue of finishing in the top 5% of his first year class. He was also the Gallery Editor of the Harvard Law School Bulletin. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Arnie served in the National Guard/US Army.
Politics
Arnie was an organizer, and then State Chairman, and National Vice Chairman, of the New Democratic Coalition, the activist reform wing of the State and National Democratic Party. On a national level, as a member of the Commission created to reform the National Democratic Party, he played a significant role in restructuring the Party to make it dramatically more responsive to grass roots and minority voters. Later, as Democratic State Committeeman in New York, he was the prime architect of a similar restructuring of the State Democratic Party, which opened the process of selecting delegates to Democratic Party Presidential Conventions. Arnie served as Campaign Manager in successful campaigns for a number of candidates, including Bella Abzug and Ed Koch.
Law Career
Arnie began his law career as an Assistant Counsel to the New York State Commission of Investigation. Its mission was to ferret out organized crime and official corruption. Arnie was involved in the stunning raid of the secret meeting of nearly 100 of the nation's leading Mafia dons in Appalachia, New York (spoofed in the recent movie "Analyze This"). He was instrumental in securing the lengthy incarceration of many of the dons who refused to reveal the purpose and details of the notorious meeting.
Arnie also played key roles in corruption investigations in Buffalo and Albany, New York, and in widely covered public hearings revealing the misconduct uncovered during those investigations. In New York City, he led the Commission's investigation into police and other public officials' notorious shakedowns of Greenwich Village Coffee Houses.
Since his four years with the Commission of Investigation, Arnie has been an active lawyer, engaged primarily in commercial litigation and commercial transactions. He is a hard-nosed attorney who knows when to use a carrot rather than a stick. Arnie has litigated, tried and/or resolved a broad range of cases in federal and state courts, before arbitration panels, and in mediation. Arnie has produced extraordinary results in many of his cases. For example, in one such case, an attorney who committed serious ethical misconduct against his two clients was compelled to disgorge his right to approximately $60,000,000 in royalties fees that were deemed properly due to his clients. In an action brought against the same clients' licensee, alleging a broad range of misconduct in the calculation of royalties due to the clients, Arnie and his team were able to secure a $116,000,000 settlement for their clients interests in the licensed products.
On another occasion, Arnie was referred three cases for which, despite intensive efforts over a two-year period, his client was unable to collect any part of the aggregate sum of $450,000 due. Arnie's characteristically aggressive approach resulted in the quick recovery of more than 98% of the sum due -- this, despite the fact that one of the three defendants had already ceased doing business. In fact, the defendant that owed 75% of the money agreed to pay the full amount within 24 hours after Arnie's complaint was served.
More recently, Arnie was instrumental in the legal proceeding that resulted in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art's backing down on its plans to remove the world-famous fountains, to remove large portions of green space, and to engage in a massive expansion that would have overwhelmed the neighboring historic district.
Public Service
In addition to his extensive volunteer political career, his public service includes years of intensive civil rights activity, including the registering and organizing of African Americans in Greenville, Mississippi, during the Freedom Summer, his many years of service as a Director of the Brooklyn College Alumni Association, and as president of its Manhattan Chapter; and his service as counsel to NYCMedics, a volunteer group of paramedics, EMTs and physicians engaged in medical relief missions, including the treatment and sheltering of victims of the recent Pakistan earthquake. Arnie is counsel to Global Emergency Relief, an organization that specializes in humanitarian logistics that is currently helping to rebuild the largest medical center in Haiti. Arnie was recently honored with the Brooklyn College Lifetime Achievement Award. He is also a member of America's Registry of Outstanding Professionals.
Areas of Practice:
Litigation of Arbitration
Business & Commercial Transactions
Land Use, Envirnomental, Real Estate, Employment Law & Other
Bar Admissions:
New York, 1958
U.S. District Court Southern District of New York, 1963
Education:
Harvard Law School, Cambridge, Massachusetts J.D.
Honors: Cum Laude
Honors: Board of Student Advisors
Honors: Partial Scholarship
Honors: Top 5% of First Year Class
Brooklyn College, Brooklyn, New York, B.A. 1954
Honors: Cum Laude
Basketball Team; Debate Team; Student Government; Fraternity Chancellor
Student Union Building, Co-Chairman
Professional Associations and Memberships:
Brooklyn College Alumni Association, 1997-2008
Member, Board of Directors
Brooklyn Colleger Alumni Association, Manhattan Chapter
Vice-President, 2008-Present
President, 2000-2007
National New Democratic Coalition, 1969-1973
Vice Chairman
NYS New Democratic Coalition, 1970-1972
State Chairman
NYS Democratic State Committeeman, 1966-1977
Village Independent Democrats, 1967-1968
Chairman
Bella Abzug, 1972
Campaign Manager
Ed Koch, 1966
Campaign Manager
Voter Registration Project in Mississippi, 1966-Present
Counsel to NYC Medics, 2005-2007
Counsel to Global Emergency Relief, 2010
Brooklyn Lifetime Achievement Award
America's Registry of Outstanding Professionals
Past Employment Positions:
NYS Commission of Investigation, Assistant Counsel, 1958-1962
Rubin, Rubin, Pearlman & Weinberg, Associate, 1962-1966
Law Office of Arnold W. Weiss, 1966-1979
Weiss & Marks, Partner, 1980-1982
Power Weiss & Marks, Partner, 1982-1994
Power, Weiss & Kurnit, Partner, 1994-2001
U.S. Army/New York National Guard, Active Duty, 1957-1958
Pro Bono Activities:
Registering Voters in Mississippi, 1965-Present
Fraternities/Sororities:
Epsilon Phi Alpha
