By Brendan O’Brien
(Reuters) – A federal judge whose son was killed and husband wounded in a shooting by a disgruntled lawyer at her New Jersey home two weeks ago broke her silence on Monday, calling for measures to keep personal information of jurists private.
“This is a matter of life and death. We cannot just sit back and wait for another tragedy to strike,” U.S. District Court Judge Esther Salas, the first Latina to serve on the District Court of New Jersey, said in a nine-minute video statement. She noted that her family’s attacker easily found her personal information on the internet.
Roy Den Hollander, a lawyer and self-described anti-feminist, went to the judge’s North Brunswick home on July 19, and shot her son Daniel Anderl, 20, and husband Mark Anderl, 63, when they opened the door.
Salas said he had her family’s personal information, including her home address, and used it to target them. Such easy access to information about judges on the internet must end, she said.
“The monster knew where I lived and what church we attended,” she said. “My son’s death cannot be in vain, which is why I am begging those empowered to do something to help my brothers and sisters on the bench.”
While the motive for the shooting remained unclear, Hollander once had a case before the judge and had published an online screed filled with misogynistic and racist remarks deriding her ethnicity and career. Hollander was found a day after the shooting in an apparent suicide about 90 miles (145 km) north of New York City.
Salas said that while federal judges understand their rulings may leave people upset, a national dialog on the issue must commence.
Salas, 51, was nominated to her position by President Barack Obama in 2010 and in the following year began serving. She has presided over a number of high-profile cases.
The shooting took place after a weekend in which the family celebrated her son’s 20th birthday with some of his close friends from Catholic University of America in Washington D.C.
Salas, who was in the basement when the shooting occurred, was not hurt.
(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Chicago; Editing by David Gregorio)
