William SchabasSend a message to

William Schabas

William Schabas

I met Ben sometime in the 1990s, I don't exactly remember when, and have been associated with him in one way or the other ever since. Ben was the first recipient of the Vespasian Pella medal of the Association internationale de droit pénale. Cherif Bassiouni was the second (Ben's choice), and I was the third (Cherif's choice). The photo shows the three of us, together at a conference in Florida that Ben organised. After the meeting, I drove with him to his home in Delray Beach. He tried to convince me to buy a condominium there! One of the most poignant moments for me was Ben's dismay when the amendments to the Rome Statute were finally adopted, late in the night in Kampala. Ben had worked so hard for them, for many decades, and in some sense this was the culmination of his life's work. I found his disappointment to be unsettling. I wasn't alone in trying to convince him that an important incremental step had been taken and that he should be celebrating the accomplishment. But Ben sensed a fraud and he was right. We've all seen the impotence of the Rome Statute faced with the crime of aggression. He understood that the amendments were feeble and inadequate better than any of us. I think that I felt especially close to Ben because he reminded me of my father, who also passed away recently. They had both grown up as sons of Jewish immigrants in New York City. They even sounded the same when they spoke, My dad was just a few years younger than Ben. They'd both been in the US army in the war. Ben was a very lucky man to have had such a brilliant career, and to have remained active and healthy for more than a century. He was also fortunate to be surrounded by a loving family, not to mention the enormous circles of admirers. It was a privilege to know him and to count myself among his friends.

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