35 Facts About Ellis Rubin

Ellis S Rubin was an American attorney who gained national fame for handling a variety of highly publicized cases in a legal career that spanned 53 years.

Ellis Rubin was famous for his innovative defenses and his propensity for handling lost causes.

Ellis Rubin worked to free a man, James Joseph Richardson, who had been wrongly imprisoned for 21 years for fatally poisoning his seven children, and created the nymphomania defense in a case involving prostitution.

Judge Wayne L Cobb, who handled the case of a confessed serial killer whom Rubin was defending in 1993, said Rubin was "famous for his psychobabble defenses".

Ellis Rubin was born in Syracuse, New York, and was raised in Binghamton, New York.

Ellis Rubin served as an officer in the Navy in World War II, graduated from the College of the Holy Cross, and then received a law degree in 1951 from the University of Miami School of Law.

Ellis Rubin was admitted to the bar to practice law in Florida and before the United States Supreme Court.

In 1972, Ellis Rubin led Miami Beach homeowners in opposition to a plan hatched by Jerry Ellis Rubin and the Yippies to occupy the municipal golf courses for housing for protestors at the Democratic and Republican Conventions.

Ellis Rubin, who was not related to Jerry, feigned disgust at the association and the event was "on".

Ellis Rubin continued trying variety of cases with eye-catching headlines.

Ellis Rubin ran unsuccessfully for public offices such as governor, attorney general, congress, and the US senate, more than a dozen times; but his intent was to develop a platform for discussion of difficult issues of the time.

When Ellis Rubin defended 15-year-old Ronny Zamora in 1977, for the murder of his 83-year-old neighbor in her Miami Beach home in a robbery, the trial was one of the first ever nationally televised.

Ellis Rubin tried unsuccessfully to provide evidence of the damaging effect of TV on young minds by issuing subpoenas to actor Telly Savalas, star of Kojak, and to nationally known experts on the relationship between violence and television.

The federal appeals court ruled that evidence against Zamora was overwhelming and that Ellis Rubin had made the best of a weak case; the defense had in fact helped Zamora by focusing attention on Zamora's deprived background.

Ellis Rubin, first fought to lift the blackout of the Orange Bowl Game by jogging from the outside distance of the blackout radius, 75 miles, in Palm Beach, Florida, down US Hwy 1, to Miami, gathering signatures on petitions for presentation to the City of Miami Commissioners in hopes that they would voluntarily lift the blackout of the Orange Bowl Game.

Ellis Rubin unsuccessfully fought to lift TV Blackouts in New Orleans, Los Angeles and Miami before he was able to bring the issue before the US Congress in the form of a challenge to the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.

Ellis Rubin was able to collaborate with Senator William Proxmire, who was Chairman of the Anti-Trust Committee, and couldn't get his own ticket to the Washington Redskins games.

In July 1986, serial killer Bobbie Joe Long announced that Ellis Rubin had agreed to become his new court-appointed attorney for the sentencing hearing for Long's conviction for the Simms murder.

At the hearing, Ellis Rubin shocked the courtroom by introducing Long's confession to a tenth murder in March 1984.

Ellis Rubin's tactic was to portray Long as a mentally ill man who needed help rather than the death penalty.

Ellis Rubin presented evidence of Long's head injuries as a child and young adult to support his defense that Long was predisposed to murder due to irresistible impulses.

Ellis Rubin handled some of the numerous appeals for Bobbie Joe Long, who was arrested in 1985 but who has engaged in a series of appeals involving numerous jurisdictions and agencies.

Sanborn's mother, a fruit peddler, asked Ellis Rubin to represent Sanborn pro bono.

Ellis Rubin entered the case and was prepared for trial however on the date of the trial, Ellis Rubin petitioned the court to withdraw, implying strongly that Sanborn was planning to give false testimony and he would not defend a client who would lie on the stand.

Ellis Rubin's petition was denied, and Rubin sought certiorari by the Third District Court of Appeal, which denied the petition.

When he again refused, the court issued a contempt order denying review of the district court decision and denying Rubin's petition for a writ of habeas corpus, Rubin was ordered to serve 37 days in jail for contempt of court.

Rubin, through his son and law partner, I Mark Rubin, brought the case to the Supreme Court, but the matter had already been settled by Rubin having served his jail time for refusing to represent a client who wanted to lie on the witness stand.

Ellis Rubin was hired as the fourth attorney for Lionel Tate, who at that time was on probation for the murder of six-year-old Tiffany Eunick in 1999 when he was 12.

Ellis Rubin's conviction received worldwide attention as the youngest American ever sentenced to life in prison.

Ellis Rubin's conviction was overturned upon appeal and Rubin entered a plea agreement that freed Tate in January 2004.

In 2005, Ellis Rubin agreed to defend Tate on charges of robbery of a pizza delivery man.

Ellis Rubin threatened to resign from the case, after Tate, without informing Ellis Rubin, wrote a letter to the judge trying to retract a plea bargain, a bargain that would have removed the possibility of two life sentences.

On March 1,2006, Ellis Rubin was the defense attorney in Tate's pizza robbery trial.

Ellis Rubin filed a lawsuit in Federal court under the Defense of Marriage Act to attain recognition of a lesbian couple's Canadian marriage.

Ellis Rubin died, aged 81, at his Miami home following a battle with cancer.