Ron Kuby

Ron Kuby
Ron Kuby (center) at the "We Will Not Go Back" march and rally called by Al Sharpton and the National Action Network, to demand justice for the family of Eric Garner.
Born	(1956-07-31) July 31, 1956 (age 60) Cleveland, Ohio
Nationality	American
Alma mater	University of Kansas (B.A.) Cornell Law School (J.D., 1983)
Occupation	Trial attorney
Spouse(s)	Marilyn Vasta (m. 2006)

Ronald L. Kuby (born July 31, 1956) is an American criminal defense and civil rights lawyer, radio talk show, host and television commentator. He has also hosted radio programs on WABC Radio in New York and Air America radio. Kuby currently leads the Law Office of Ronald L. Kuby in Manhattan.

Kuby was born in Cleveland, Ohio. His parents divorced when he was five years old, after which Kuby lived with his mother. At 13, he joined the Jewish Defense League under the influence of his father, who was a follower of Meir David Kahane.

In junior high school, Kuby says he was nearly expelled for publishing an underground newspaper critical of the school's administration. He left junior high school in ninth grade and emigrated to Israel in 1971. He became disenchanted with what he perceived as the anti-Arab racism he found there and was deported five months later, likely for participating in anti-government activities.

He returned to Cleveland and lived in a commune for the next several years. In 1973, he briefly attended an accredited alternative high school. After graduating, he attended Cleveland State University for one year.

Kuby dropped out of college in 1974 and moved to St. Croix, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, where he worked on a tugboat and developed an interest in West Indian ethnobotany and medicinal plants. He moved briefly to Maine, then to Kansas in 1975, where he completed his degrees in cultural anthropology and history at the University of Kansas. Kuby was a free-speech and anti-apartheid activist while at KU, where he graduated with highest distinction, had a 4.0 average, and conducted and published original fieldwork, including the 1979 "Folk medicine on St. Croix: an ethnobotanical study", after returning to St. Croix several times. Kuby's arm was broken intentionally—as alleged by Kuby—by Kansas University police, when they broke up an anti-apartheid protest during a commencement ceremony. Protesters were urging the KU Endowment Association to divest itself of investments in companies doing business in South Africa.