French lawyer disbarred for motion to replace Jewish judge

(JTA) — A lawyer from Lyon in eastern France was disbarred for filing a motion to disqualify a Jewish judge because of his origins.

The French Bar Association disbarred Alexis Dubruel on Wednesday for citing Judge Albert Levy in a 2012 motion to disqualify him from presiding over a custody case in which one of the parents was called Moses. He attached the Wikipedia definitions of Moses and Levy to his motion.

Dubruel has appealed his disbarment and his attorney called the punishment “disproportionate,” Le Figaro reported Wednesday.

In his 2012 motion, Dubruel said Levy was “aggressive” toward his client but cordial in his demeanor toward the man called Moses. Dubruel accused Levy of “miscarriage of justice” during a hearing before the criminal court in Lyon in June.

Levy has in the past been the subject of anti-Semitic insults, according to Le Figaro.

In a separate trial last week, a Paris criminal court sentenced the French blogger Boris Le Lay to eight months in prison and gave him a $670 fine for posting material that “incites discrimination, hatred and violence against Jews” on websites he administers, according to French daily Le Telegramme.

Additionally, he is to pay $2,000 in damages to associations he had targeted, the court ruled.

Also separately, prosecutors in Correze in southern France indicted a 40-year-old Norwegian heavy metal musician named Kristian Vikernes for inciting hatred and other charges linked to his alleged anti-Semitic and xenophobic blog posts.

The trial was set for June after his lawyer asked for more time to read documents and prepare his defense, the BBC reported on Thursday.

In Norway, Kristian is a well-known neo-Nazi and former associate of Anders Breivik, the Norwegian militant who killed 77 people in Norway in 2011.