Ronald L. Kuby (born July 31, 1956) is an American criminal defense and civil rights attorney. Kuby is also a radio talk show host, and television commentator. He has hosted radio programs on WABC (AM) in New York City and Air America radio.
Kuby has defended many high-profile criminal cases, ever since his early career as a colleague of the activist attorney William Kunstler. Kuby leads the Law Office of Ronald L. Kuby in Manhattan.
Kuby was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Ruth Miller, a secretary, and Donald Kuby, a salesman. His mother was from a Jewish family and his father, who died in 1990, was a Franciscan friar who converted to Judaism and became a militant Zionist before becoming Christian again. Kuby's parents divorced when he was five years old, after which he lived with his mother and grandparents. At 13, he joined the Jewish Defense League under the influence of his father, who was a follower of Meir David Kahane. As a teenager, Kuby emigrated to Israel, but returned to the U.S. after being disillusioned by what he describes as "anti-Arab racism".
He returned to Cleveland and lived in a commune for the next several years. In 1973, he briefly attended an accredited alternative high school. After graduating, he attended Cleveland State University for one year.
Kuby dropped out of college in 1974 and moved to St. Croix, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, where he worked on a tugboat and developed an interest in West Indian ethnobotany and medicinal plants. He moved briefly to Maine, then to Kansas in 1975, where he completed his degrees in cultural anthropology and history at the University of Kansas. Kuby was a free-speech and anti-apartheid activist while at KU, where he graduated with highest distinction, had a 4.0 average, and conducted and published original fieldwork, including the 1979 "Folk medicine on St. Croix: an ethnobotanical study", after returning to St. Croix several times. Kuby alleged the University of Kansas police intentionally broke his arm when they responded to an anti-apartheid protest during a commencement ceremony. Protesters were urging the KU Endowment Association to divest itself of investments in companies doing business in South Africa.
Kuby earned his Juris Doctor from Cornell Law School in 1983. Kuby said his grades entitled him to a position on the prestigious Cornell Law Review, but he declined the invitation. He also said to have graduated as one of the top students in his class.
On January 23, 2006, Kuby married Marilyn Vasta, a psychotherapist and climate activist, on the 20th anniversary of their first date. They have one daughter, Emma Vasta-Kuby, who is a lawyer with the D.C.-based Second Look Project, working on de-incarceration.
Partnership with William Kunstler
While in college, Kuby interned with William Kunstler, a senior lawyer with 20 years' experience, notable for many high-profile cases, including the defense of the Chicago Eight in their 1969-70 trial. From 1983 until Kunstler's death in 1995, Kuby worked as an unofficial partner in Kunstler's law firm, with both men taking up "the fight for the poor, the oppressed and the downtrodden". The two men declared they were not only colleagues, but best friends as well.
Kunstler and Kuby never formalized a partnership with a contract or tax filings. Despite a letterhead that read "Kunstler and Kuby", Kuby was paid as an employee and never shared in the firm's profits and losses. On this basis, Kuby was denied ownership rights to the firm's case files, accounts, and name after Kunstler died, and Kunstler's widow, Margaret Ratner, put her late husband's archives under lock and key. Kuby filed a complaint against her with the attorney disciplinary committee; the committee dismissed the complaint in August 1996. In December 1996, a court case brought by Ratner to restrain Kuby from using the name "Kunstler & Kuby" resulted in Kuby's being denied any rights in the Kunstler firm.
Kuby, with Kunstler, represented many high-profile defendants:
Tom Manning and Richard Williams, who would be convicted for killing New Jersey State Trooper Philip J. Lamonaco on December 21, 1981.
Gregory Lee Johnson, a protester who burned a U.S. Flag at the 1984 Republican National Convention.
Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, the blind cleric who headed the Egyptian-based militant group Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, accused of planning and encouraging terrorist attacks against Americans.
Colin Ferguson, the man responsible for the 1993 Long Island Rail Road shooting (who chose to represent himself at trial).
Nico Minardos, the Hollywood TV and movie actor, accused in an FBI sting operation of conspiracy to ship arms to Iran.
Qubilah Shabazz, the daughter of Malcolm X, accused of plotting to murder Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam.
Glenn Harris, a New York City public school teacher who absconded with a 15-year-old girl for two months.