Resume
Philly DA’s Office, 1984-1990
PA Senior Deputy Attorney General, 1990-2001
PA Office of Inspector General, 2003-2004
Philadelphia Mortgage Foreclosure Rescue Effort, Volunteer Judge, 2008-2010
William-Michael Associates, 2001 – Present
Background, Notable Events, and Controversies
Michael Untermeyer is a real estate developer with properties in prime locations all over the city, according to his 2008 and 2016 statements of financial interest.
He has considerable business dealings with a developer named William Isenberg from Chester Springs. Isenberg donated $5,000 to Untermeyer’s campaign. While conducting research, a question arose concerning whether or not Untermeyer he profited from the Philadelphia foreclosure crisis by purchasing real estate cheaply at sheriff sale.
It was not easy to find out, so a potential question for researchers, journalists, or citizens at a DA forum would be, “Did you or any entities in which you own at least 50% stake purchase any property in Philadelphia at a sheriff sale between 2007 and 2010?”
When running for DA in 2009 Untermeyer promoted using electronic monitoring anklets to save money by using them to track offenders rather than incarcerating them.
In 2009, he supported using the death penalty under limited circumstances, including cases involving the death of a police officer.
In January 2017 he said he wanted to file homicide charges against heroin dealers who lace products with fentanyl, resulting in overdose deaths. Untermeyer promotes his work of prosecuting narcotics dealers during his tenure at the Philly Attorney General’s Office, which coincided with America’s “tough on crime” era:
“In the 1980s and 1990s, incarceration became de facto urban policy for impoverished communities of color in America’s cities. Legislation was passed to impose mandatory minimums, deny public housing to entire families if any member was even suspected of a drug crime, expand federal death penalty-eligible crimes, and impose draconian restrictions of parole. Ultimately, multiple generations of America’s most vulnerable populations, including drug users, African Americans, Latinos, and the very poor found themselves confined to long-term prison sentences and lifelong social and economic marginality … State and federal prisons imprisoned more people under Clinton’s watch than under any previous administration. During his two terms, the inmate population grew from roughly 1.3 million to 2 million, and the number of executions to 98 by 1999.” — The New Republic, “The Clintons’ War on Drugs: When Black Lives Didn’t Matter”
Endorsements and Donors
Philadelphia’s Real Estate Developers
Untermeyer’s donor list includes numerous real estate developers and contractors from Philadelphia and beyond. He received $6,000 from Park American President and Founder Jay Weitzman, who was one of the biggest individual donors to Donald Trump’s inaugural committee from the Philadelphia region, with a contribution of $25,000. Weitzman’s wife Carole kicked in another $6,000 to Untermeyer, making the two some of Untermeyer’s top donors. The Weitzmans own a house near Mar-a-Lago. As a member of that club, Jay Weitzman recently got quite a show at a now-infamous dinner there when he witnessed Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe organize their response to North Korea’s missile firing.
He received $5,000 from Daniel Berger, an attorney whose law firm has been one of the highest-grossing in the nation, and which represented plaintiffs suing Exxon-Mobil over the Valdez oil spill, Holocaust survivors suing Swiss Banks, and investors suing large corporations.
Bizarrely, law firm, Obermayer Rebmann Maxwell & Hippel LLP, where opponent Richard Negrin currently works, donated $3,500 to Untermeyer’s campaign.
