ALAN JULES WEBERMAN, pro se

345 EAST 94TH Street 28C

New York, New York 10128
Tel. 212-987-8659
ajweberman@verizon.net
http://ajweberman.info

VIA ECF
Hon. Gregory H. Woods USDJ
United States District Court, S. D. N. Y.
500 Pearl Street, Room 2260
New York, New York 10007

Saturday, July 30, 2016

Re: Weberman v. Rayman No. 16-cv-3567 Request for Pre-Motion Conference

Dear Judge Woods:

The United States Supreme Court in Haines v. Kerner, (1972) No. 70-5025
Argued: December 6, 1971 Decided: January 13, 1972 that a prisoner's pro se
complaint seeking to recover damages for claimed physical injuries and
deprivation of rights in imposing disciplinary confinement should not have been
dismissed without affording him the opportunity to present evidence on his
claims. Essentially Supreme Court found that pro se pleadings should be held to
"less stringent standards" than those drafted by attorneys. I am asking your Honor
to do the same and not deprive me of my chance to adjudicate this issue. I
choose to draft my own complaint but have my attorney present arguments
before you, as I am a researcher not an attorney.

I made two errors in the Complaint. The first was the Cause of Action. As
you pointed out “Because the United States Constitution regulates only the
Government, not private parties, a litigant claimed his constitutional rights have
been violated must first establish that the challenged conduct constitutes state
action.” I also failed to meet the threshold of $75,000 in my claim for
compensatory damages and overstated the amount of punitive damages.

As a result of these errors I have drafted an amended complaint and filed

it via ECF. Since the defendant has no answered the complaint it should not
inconvenience defendant from answering an amended complaint. I also
implore this Court to allow me to have a separate pre-motion conference in
advance of the Defendant moving to dismiss my amended complaint at which
time my attorney, Michael Drobinaire, will represent me.

Defendant states that since its publication in January 2010 by The New
Press The New Jim Crow has been respected and relied on by the judiciary. This
is all the more reason that a book taking a different point of view on the causes
of high Black crime and incarceration rates should not be suppressed. The New
Crow Jim argues that an indigenous black criminal subculture has come into
existence in America and that this should be factored into the equation. It also
argues that racism is not a one way street and that Black racism exists as well as
White racism. The book was doing well in the category of law enforcement until
Mr. Rayman had it censored.

The content of this book is not being questioned for trademark or

copyright violations. The cover is. The cover is clearly a parody of the New Jim
Crow and Steven Eric Rayman, a professor at Cardozo College, knew this when
he had the book removed from Amazon and Kindle. He is an expert on parody
and could have advised The New Press that the cover was Fair Use. His attorney
even admits there is an element of parody in the book when he compared the
back cover description of the New Jim Crow to that of the New Crow Jim.

This Plaintiff did not know that Eric Rayman represented The New Press until
July 29, 2016 so this lawsuit was not “a frivolous and vexatious attempt to
retaliate against Mr. Rayman personally for representing this particular client”
because I was unsure of whom that client was so I had no choice but to name
Mr. Rayman as the defendant.

Accordingly, I am asking your Honor make your determination on the

basis of my amended complaint if this law suit has merit and should be litigated.

Respectfully Submitted

Alan Jules Weberman