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TIBOR TAJTI Civil contempt is ‘remedial and coercive in nature,’ and it therefore has the dual purpose of “/enforcing] mandates of the court relating to the rights and remedies of one party against another in private actions and [insuring] that orders and decrees affecting these rights are obeyed.”'* Criminal contempt’s function, as opposed to that, is to “preserve the power and vindicate the dignity of the courts." A more recent source states rather that normally, “civil contempt addresses present or future compliance with an order, judgment, or decree, rather than punitive sanctions for past noncompliance. The latter is the subject of criminal contempt.”'* It is a further exacerbating factor that the tandem often appears in cases together, the civil contempt normally being the first, milder “punishment,” and the criminal one being reserved for repeat and more severe contempts of courts. In a 2015 New York case, the court added that “/t/he element which serves to elevate a contempt from civil to criminal is the level of willfulness with which the conduct is carried out" Justice Scalia consequently rightly noted in his concurring opinion in the International Union, UMWA v. Bagwell’® case that “our cases have employed a variety of not easily reconcilable tests for differentiating civil and criminal contempt.” This was a case in which the Supreme Court, involving a $25 million contempt fine imposed for “widespread and ongoing violation of labor injunction” on a trade union, found the imposed contempt be criminal rather than civil because it was ‘significant.’ As a result, jury trial should have been mandated. Though US courts have found, for example, turnover orders to be of ‘quasi-criminal’ nature.’” The differentiation is important for more reasons, including the different proving standards: the civil contempt’s ‘preponderance of the evidence’ versus its criminal kin’s higher-standard ‘beyond reasonable doubt’ threshold. Further, 4 Ibid, at 14. 15 Ibid, at 14. Rosemary E. Williams, Annotation, Proof of Motion Seeking Sanctions of Criminal Contempt for Violation of Order of Bankruptcy Court and Automatic Stay Pursuant to 11 U.S.C.A. § 105(a), Fed. R. Bankr. P. 9020 and Defenses, 133 Am. Jur. Proof of Facts 3d 273 (2013 & Supp. April 2017). McCarthy v Ciano, 50 Misc.3d 861 (2015). 18 114 S.Ct. 2552 (1994). % Oriel v. Russel 278 U.S. 358 (1929). As Siegel, commentator of the case put it back then: “Although it is conceded that the turn over proceeding is civil in its nature, it is argued that the contempt motion is quasi-criminal and therefore the degree of proof required on a motion to punish for contempt should be beyond a reasonable doubt.” Benjamin Siegel, Contempt in Bankruptcy Cases, American Bankruptcy Review: The Monthly Magazine for Lawyers, Bankers, and Business Men 4 (1928), 291-322, 297. He quoted also the following passage from Free v. Shapiro: “By the weight of authority, in attaching for contempt for failure to turn over assets adjudged to be withheld, the Court will not imprison the bankrupt unless satisfied beyond reasonable doubt of his guilt.” +172 +
