Roy Cohn

Born to an affluent Jewish family in the Bronx, New York City, Cohn was the only child of Dora née Marcus (1892–1967) and Judge Albert C. Cohn (1885–1959); his father was an Assistant District Attorney of Bronx County, then appointed as a judge of the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court.

His maternal great-uncle was Joshua Lionel Cowen, the founder and longtime owner of the Lionel Corporation, a manufacturer of toy trains.

Cohn's maternal grandfather, Joseph S. Marcus, founded the Bank of United States in 1913.

Roy Marcus Cohn (February 20, 1927 – August 2, 1986) was an American lawyer and prosecutor who came to prominence for his role as Senator Joseph McCarthy's chief counsel during the Army–McCarthy hearings in 1954, when he assisted McCarthy's investigations of suspected communists.

The bank failed in 1931 during the Great Depression, and its then-president, Bernie Marcus, Cohn's uncle, was convicted of fraud.

Bernie Marcus was imprisoned at Sing Sing, and the young Cohn frequently visited him there.

After attending Fieldston School and the Horace Mann School and completing studies at Columbia University in 1946, Cohn graduated from Columbia Law School at the age of 20.

After his graduation from law school, Cohn worked as a clerk for the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York for two years.

In May 1948, at age 21, he was old enough to be admitted to the state bar.

He became an assistant U.S. attorney later that month.

In 1948, Cohn also became a board member of the American Jewish League Against Communism.

As an Assistant US Attorney, Cohn helped to secure convictions in a number of well-publicized trials of accused Soviet moles.

As a prosecuting chief counsel during the McCarthy trials, his reputation deteriorated during the late 1950s to late 1970s after McCarthy's downfall.

One of the first began in December 1950 with the prosecution of William Remington, a former Commerce Department employee and member of the War Production Board who had been charged with espionage following the defection of former KGB handler Elizabeth Bentley.

Although an indictment for espionage could not be secured, Remington had denied his longtime membership in the Communist Party USA under oath on two separate occasions and was later convicted of perjury in two separate trials.

While working in Saypol's office for the Southern District of New York, Cohn also assisted the prosecution team of eleven senior members of the American Communist Party for advocating for the violent overthrow of the U.S. Federal Government, under the Smith Act.

Cohn played a prominent role in the 1951 espionage trial of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.

Cohn's direct examination of Ethel's brother, David Greenglass, produced testimony that was central to the Rosenbergs' conviction and subsequent execution.

Greenglass testified that he had assisted the espionage activities of his brother-in-law by acting as a courier of classified documents that had been stolen from the Manhattan Project by Klaus Fuchs.

Greenglass would later change his story and allege that he committed perjury at the trial in order "to protect himself and his wife, Ruth, and that he was encouraged by the prosecution to do so."

Cohn always took great pride in the Rosenberg verdict and claimed to have played an even greater part than his public role.

He said in his autobiography that his own influence had led to both Chief Prosecutor Irving H. Saypol and Judge Irving Kaufman being appointed to the case.

Cohn further said that Kaufman imposed the death penalty based on his personal recommendation.

Cohn denied, however, participation in any illegal ex parte discussions.

There is now a consensus among historians that Julius Rosenberg was guilty of being a highly valued NKVD spymaster against the United States, but that his trial was marred by prosecutorial misconduct – mainly by Cohn – and that the Rosenbergs should not have been executed.

Distilling this consensus, Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz wrote that the Rosenbergs were "guilty – and framed."

The Rosenberg trial brought the 24-year-old Cohn to the attention of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director J. Edgar Hoover.

With support from Hoover and Cardinal Spellman, Hearst columnist George Sokolsky convinced Joseph McCarthy to hire Cohn as his chief counsel, choosing him over Robert F. Kennedy.

Cohn assisted McCarthy's work for the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, becoming known for his aggressive questioning of suspected Communists.

Cohn preferred not to hold hearings in open forums, which went well with McCarthy's preference for holding "executive sessions" and "off-the-record" sessions away from the Capitol to minimize public scrutiny and to question witnesses with relative impunity.

He rose to prominence as a U.S. Department of Justice prosecutor at the espionage trial of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, where he successfully prosecuted the Rosenbergs leading to their execution in 1953.

Cohn and his mother were close; they lived together until her death in 1967 and she was constantly attentive to his grades, appearance and relationships.

When Cohn's father insisted that his son be sent to a summer camp, his mother rented a house near the camp and her presence cast a pall over his experience.

In personal interactions, Cohn showed tenderness which was absent from his public persona, but exhibited deeply ingrained vanity and insecurity.

In the late 1970s and during the 1980s, he became a prominent political fixer in New York City.

He also represented and mentored New York City real estate developer and future U.S. President Donald Trump during his early business career.

His other clients included New York Yankees baseball club owner George Steinbrenner; Aristotle Onassis; and Mafia bosses Fat Tony Salerno, Carmine Galante, and John Gotti.

Cohn was born in The Bronx in New York City and educated at Columbia University.

In 1986, he was disbarred by the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court for unethical conduct after attempting to defraud a dying client by forcing the client to sign a will amendment leaving him his fortune.

He died five weeks later from AIDS-related complications, having vehemently denied that he had HIV.