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Lawyer Suspected In Fatal Shooting At Federal Judge's Home Attacked Her By Name In Deranged Screeds Found Online

This is pretty disturbing.

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Roy Den Hollander, 72, the “anti-feminist” lawyer named as a suspect in the fatal shooting at the home of Judge Esther Salas (District of New Jersey), left a long and disturbing paper trail in his wake — one filled with racist and misogynistic rhetoric that attacks the judge by name.

Den Hollander, who once worked as an associate at Cravath, stands accused in the violent shooting death of Salas’s son, Daniel Anderl, 20, as well as the wounding of her husband, criminal defense attorney Mark Anderl. The self-proclaimed Trump campaign volunteer was later found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

In his more than 10,000 pages of PDF screeds against women and people of color, Den Hollander referred to Salas as an “affirmative action” case and “a lazy and incompetent Latina judge appointed by Obama.” In 2019, Salas presided over a case filed by Den Hollander where he argued that barring women from the mandatory male draft was illegal. Apparently angered that Salas had allowed the Department of Justice to file a fourth motion to dismiss, he wrote that she “clearly wanted to further her career by moving up the judicial ladder to the Court of Appeals or maybe even the Supreme Court. After all, there was now a Latina seat in the form of Sotomayor on the Court.” The Atlantic has additional details on his writings:

“Female judges didn’t bother me as long as they were middle age or older black ladies,” he writes when discussing a lawsuit he filed that went before Judge Salas, the first Hispanic woman appointed a federal judge in New Jersey. “They seemed to have an understanding of how life worked and were not about to be conned by any foot dragging lawyer. Latinas, however, were usually a problem—driven by an inferiority complex.”

Along with the attacks on Salas, Den Hollander’s writings also go after President Barack Obama (who he said has an “obsession to turn America into a banana republic”), Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor (who he claimed was “angry that nobody had invited her to her high school senior prom”), Hillary Clinton (whose supporters were “teary-eyed, sad-sack, PC loonies watching their power of intolerance go down the drain”), and an Obama appointee (whom he describes as part of “that Orwellian party of feminists, ethnics, Muslims, illegals and queers who think they are superior to everyone else, especially white males.”)

Den Hollander, who was an active participant in anti-feminist and misogynist groups on Facebook, including Humanity Vs. Feminism and Men Going Their Own Way, self-published a 1,700-page autobiography this year where he switched gears often, at one point writing of Salas that he “wanted to ask the Judge out, but thought she might hold me in contempt.” According to NBC News, Den Hollander also repeatedly denigrated and railed against female judges, including “fantasizing about the rape of another judge who presided over his divorce case.”

In his writings, Den Hollander also revealed his terminal cancer diagnosis, and voting system researcher Mike Farb of Unhack the Vote thinks that, coupled with his hate for Salas, may have served as his “impetus for murder.”

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We will continue to follow this tragic case and provide updates should more information about Roy Den Hollander be revealed.

The New Jersey Shooting Suspect Left a Pro-Trump Paper Trail [The Atlantic]
Suspect in federal judge’s home ambush railed against her in misogynistic book [NBC News]

Earlier: Former Cravath Lawyer Named As Suspect In Fatal Shooting At Federal Judge’s Home
Shooting At Federal Judge’s Home Leaves One Dead, One Critically Injured

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Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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