NEW YORK – So Phil Spector wants a new judge for his new trial, does he?

Ashleigh Banfield thinks Phil Spector should stop blaming others for his predicament.

The latest figure to be blamed for everything that’s wrong with Spector’s wilting life is the Honorable Judge Larry Paul Fidler, who patiently presided over his trial for five long months last year.

It seems Mr. Spector doesn’t think the good judge was good enough.

But Spector’s complaints don’t end there, nor do his efforts to dole out blame for his miserable lot and defame all those involved.

It wasn’t good enough that his first trial ended with a hung jury.

It wasn’t good enough that his own lawyers secured him that deadlock, because he’s gone ahead and replaced every single one of them.

It wasn’t good enough that Spector besmirched Lana Clarkson’s memory while insisting during his defense that she simply shot herself in the mouth while waiting to leave his California mansion, purse slung over her shoulder.

It wasn’t good enough that he cast aspersions upon five women who had their deep, dark and embarrassing secrets unearthed during the prosecution’s case because they, too, had looked down the barrel of Phil Spector’s various guns while trying to end a bad date with him.

It wasn’t good enough that the renowned forensic scientist, Dr Henry Lee, came to Spector’s defense, because Spector’s own incessant legal wrangling caused Lee’s credibility to be thrashed in court.

It wasn’t good enough that Spector’s immigrant driver offered no embellishment when recounting seeing Spector with blood on his hand, holding a gun, and saying “I think I just killed somebody.” Instead, Adriano De Souza offered only the facts, and no more, even though he was so afraid for his own life he sped out of the driveway while dialing police. Spector’s reaction? This military veteran who excelled in advanced English classes had his reputation reduced to that of a dumb fool who doesn’t know guns, and doesn’t speak English well enough to be believed.

If all that weren’t enough, it’s now it’s the judge’s fault that Spector didn’t get everything he’s used to having — a room full of sycophantic people who tell him he can do (and has done) no wrong.

Bring on round two, whoever the judge may be. It only takes one person to hang a jury, and for a fleeting instant, that’s exactly what Spector got. One man — Juror Number 10 — who for some reason bought into Spector’s expensive defense.

It’s unlikely the music legend will see this chorus repeated.

Even though Spector just keeps spending his way out of a giant, roiling, wake of broken people, defamed professionals, jilted lawyers, weak arguments and disappointed music lovers, the evidence is what it is.

Message to Mr. Music: Here’s what’s up, Pussycat. Your nine legal lives are almost over.

– Ashleigh Banfield, In Session anchor

NEW YORK – I wasn’t sure what to expect from Mary Jo Buttafuoco when I agreed to a one-on-one interview with her this week. But I’ll say this: she is NOTHING like the woman she was during the sordid tabloid drama that began on Long Island in May 1992 and dragged on through the headlines for a decade and a half.

Mary Jo Buttafuoco is in love again.

I expected a –rightfully– angry woman to rail against the man who ruined her life, Joey Buttafuoco. I expected her to deride the ex-con and cheater who transferred sole blame onto his 17-year-old lover for shooting her in the face. I expected vitriol towards Joey, who continues to pull her family’s name into national punch lines by perpetrating a number of crimes and by peddling a pathetic sex tape.

I also expected indignation at Amy Fisher, her now-free attempted murderer who’s out peddling the same kind of dirty video.

Instead, I found Mary Jo to be an enlightened, forgiving woman who has not only put this foul past behind her, but who has also embraced personal happiness and optimism. Watch how she overcame her anger

The woman I spent 20 minutes interviewing live — an eternity on TV — is a woman I would happily welcome into my home and to my dinner table, and a woman I would readily introduce to my children. She has a few lessons I would like my children to learn.

Mary Jo can teach us a thing or two about love, loss, pain, suffering and the value of forgiveness. It took her eloquence and sincerity to finally help me understand how and why she stood by Joey Buttafuoco for so long.

I, like so many others following this unbelievable tale, had been mystified. Not anymore. Mary Jo’s living a new life, she’s about to marry a new man, and she’s got a whole new outlook that just might be more refreshing than anything I’ve encountered in this business before.

To say it shows on her face sounds like a cliché. But it does. She’s become more beautiful than she ever was, even before the shooting.

– Ashleigh Banfield, In Session anchor

NEW YORK – When are politicians and public figures going to wake up and smell the headlines? America’s favorite stories don’t just occur when juicy crimes are committed. They occur when juicy indiscretions are coupled with sexy hypocrisy and dazzling double-speak.

Gov. Eliot Spitzer faces reporters on Monday with wife Silda by his side.

Elliot Spitzer, the Harvard educated former top cop in New York, and, perhaps for now, the governor here, is learning this the hard way. That’s a $4,300 understatement. Watch Spitzer’s apology

Spitzer, if ANYONE, should know that the cover-up is always bigger than the crime, and that any criminal who precedes his crime by pontificating against it, falls hardest.

It’s not that allegedly paying a hooker is so difficult for Americans to digest. Next to farming, prostitution is the world’s oldest profession. But no one likes a no-good, double talking hypocrite who once locked people up for getting their jollies, then allegedly ascended to the quiet confines of an expensive hotel suite to, well, get his jollies.

This is not a debate about prostitution, or even pimping. It’s a debate about two-faced men like Spitzer, Mark Foley, Bill Clinton, Larry Craig, Jim McGreevy, Gary Hart, Jim Bakker, and the Reverend Ted Haggard not practicing what they preach.

Why is this so tough to process? It seems fairly simple. It’s wrong to say one thing, bust people for it, and then do another. It’s wrong to fight for the protection of kids, and then act as a sexual predator. It’s wrong to lead the nation, and then lie, even about sex. It’s wrong to condemn gay people for their lifestyle and then get caught allegedly engaging in the same behavior that is part of that lifestyle you condemn. It’s wrong to preach about family values, while getting down and dirty with hookers. And it’s wrong to dope up on methamphetamine while rubbing up next to a male prostitute, especially if you’re preaching against that.

Where’s the debate in any of this? Mr. Spitzer says he needs time alone with his family now, and that this is a “private matter.” I’m not sure where in his law degree he figures this is private. Perhaps he means “personal.” Because, yes, Mr. Spitzer, it is personal. It’s very personal to many of us who trusted in your good work only to see it revealed as hypocritical self-righteousness. It’s personal to publicly see your family suffer for your foolish indiscretions. And while it may be personal, Mr. Spitzer should be well aware that it is NOT private.

He saw to that when he ascended to his position of power and busted two sophisticated prostitution rings, decrying those involved as common criminals. Now that he could be facing a similar prosecution his newest crisis may be an identity crisis. Will his name forever be Mudd… or just Client #9?

– Ashleigh Banfield, In Session anchor

NEW YORK – Hand me a tissue, please. I’m about to be sick. Criminal defendants who lie through their tears in an effort to engender our sympathy deserve an extra consecutive sentence tagged onto their punishment.

Take for instance Bobby Cutts Jr., an Ohio police officer who was found guilty Friday of aggravated murder, a death penalty-eligible crime. The verdict was reached just four days after he led us down a tearful garden path on the witness stand.

A blubbering Mr. Cutts tried to persuade the world he was so frightened after “accidentally” killing his girlfriend, Jessie Davis, nine months pregnant at the time and the mother of his 2-year-old son, that he wrapped her body and dumped her in a national park, abandoning the toddler at the murder scene.

The hungry child was found wandering in a soiled diaper, near an open bottle of bleach (Prosecutors said it was used to destroy forensic evidence.) more than 24 hours later. For nine days, Davis and her fetus were left to rot, while 2,000 volunteers searched for her, and while Cutts pleaded with the country for her safe return.

It brings to mind Susan Smith, another peach of a criminal defendant, who back in 1994 tried to convince everyone that she’d been the victim of a carjacking in which a black man had abducted her two precious baby boys. The story was simply riveting. For nine days we listened to her repeated pleas for the safe return of those boys. Then police discovered Smith had strapped those children into their car-seats and rolled the vehicle into a lake, drowning them to appease her boyfriend. She’s serving 30 to life in South Carolina.

Next up, Scott Peterson, the murderous husband who in 2002 killed his wife, Laci (also nine months pregnant). For four months, Laci Peterson’s body and that of their unborn son, Conner, decomposed under the waters of San Francisco Bay. All the while, Peterson tearfully navigated his way through countless interviews, pleading for us to help find his beloved wife. But a jury convicted him of the crime, and he is now rotting on death row.

The unbridled insolence, the contemptuous gall, and the shameless audacity of these uncommon criminals all serve to highlight why we employ aggravating and mitigating penalty phases in American jurisprudence. Some people’s crimes are beyond the pale. And just when you think they can’t get any worse, they do. These liars cry like babies, and beg for our love and our sympathy. More often than not we oblige. But when their duplicitous deceit is exposed, we at least get retribution, sentences that equate to a lifelong “time-out” or a deadly “lights-out.”

– Ashleigh Banfield, In Session anchor

NEW YORK – I don’t take kindly to racists, skinheads or David Duke. But I do appreciate the Constitution of the United States. While waiting to be fingerprinted by Homeland Security a couple of days ago, I had the opportunity to browse through the sample questions for my upcoming citizenship test.

Ashleigh Banfield

Question 74 asked about the Bill of Rights, and explained that as a new citizen, I would be guaranteed freedom of expression.

Nice perk.

At the same time, a TV in the waiting room announced details of some criminal charges being levied against Jeremiah Munsen in Louisiana. Seems that on September 20, 2007, Mr. Munsen woke up, brushed his tooth, had one too many beers, tied a pair of nooses to his truck and trolled a civil rights rally. Full story

For this offending behavior, he’s been charged with a federal hate crime and civil rights conspiracy. It turns out “it is a violation of federal law to intimidate, oppress, injure, or threaten people because of their race,” as quoted by the U.S. attorney involved in the case.

Now, I’m no expert, but the last time I checked, Americans have always been allowed their freedom of expression, no matter how foolish or offensive. The U.S Supreme Court even told us so.

Back in the 70’s the Skokie affair taught us all that the First Amendment supports a “marketplace of ideas,” however unpopular. In that case, Nazi supporters in Illinois wanted to wave their swastikas and goose step through a predominantly Jewish part of town, and the High Court supported their right to do it.

Flash forward to 2008. Did Mr. Munsen’s behavior really intimidate, oppress, injure, or threaten the roughly 20,000 marchers he was up against? That standard is very tough to meet — that is if the case even gets heard. One thing we do know is that stupid people say and do stupid things all the time. They have just as many rights to free expression as the most sage among us. After all, this is America, where all men are created equal, even the ones missing a chromosome or two.

– Ashleigh Banfield, In Session anchor

NEW YORK — Before you start throwing peanuts at your screen, let me tell you why I, for one, am NOT sick of O.J. Simpson.

Ashleigh Banfield

Sure, he makes for good ratings. Sure, there’s an element of Schadenfreude that’s associated with him. But every move he makes delivers one more ounce of justice to the people who have suffered the most by his actions.

For the last 13 years, the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson have lived with pictures of a carefree O.J. Simpson golfing his way around America, while hundreds of thousands of people applaud him, pay for autographs, and buy into his innocence.

Thanks to one of the worst examples of American jurisprudence in history, Simpson was found not guilty of murder. But with every miss-step caught by the press, with every chapter penned about How He Would Have Done It Had He Actually Done It, with every sordid character he befriends, and with every snub to the bail system, public support for OJ Simpson has been hemorrhaging.

Back in October of 1995, a survey reported in the NY Times showed just 12 percent of black people said they believed Simpson was guilty of murder.

Fast forward to this past September, post book deal and post arrest. The Washington Post conducted a poll showing that disdain for O.J, Simpson had ballooned within the black community A whopping 45 percent of black respondents now said they believe OJ was guilty of murder.

Is hindsight 20/20? Or has the spotlight on a reckless criminal revealed his lack of contrition, his propensity for violence, and his sordid lifestyle?

Thanks to relentless coverage of Simpson’s travails, a window has been provided into this man’s true soul. You might call it a little clarity for those who were once blinded by his Heisman.

– Ashleigh Banfield, In Session anchor