Sam Goldberg’s uncle in the Ellen Greenberg case is James Schwartzman, a prominent Philadelphia attorney who entered the couple’s Manayunk apartment the morning after Greenberg was found dead and removed her computers, phone, keys, and handbag before police had finished with the scene.1Court TV. Parents Hope Federal Investigation May Bring New Light to Ellen Greenberg Case His conduct that morning, combined with his standing in Pennsylvania’s legal establishment, is one of the central reasons the Greenberg family has spent more than a decade challenging the ruling that their 27-year-old daughter’s stabbing death was a suicide.
Who Is James Schwartzman
Schwartzman is not a peripheral figure in Philadelphia law. He chaired the Ethics and Professional Responsibility Group at the firm Stevens & Lee and previously served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. By appointment of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, he sat on the Disciplinary Board, chairing it from 1986 to 1987, and on the Continuing Legal Education Board.2Judicial Conduct Board of Pennsylvania. Election of Board Officers Press Release
He was later appointed to the Pennsylvania Judicial Conduct Board and served a four-year term from 2014 to 2018, during which his fellow board members unanimously elected him Chair in both 2016 and 2017.3Judicial Conduct Board of Pennsylvania. Election of Board Officers Press Release The Judicial Conduct Board is the independent state agency that reviews, investigates, and prosecutes complaints of judicial misconduct in Pennsylvania. Chairing it placed Schwartzman at the top of one of the state’s core lawyer-discipline institutions.
None of those positions concerned the Greenberg investigation directly. But the Greenberg family has repeatedly pointed to his standing within Philadelphia’s legal establishment as context for how the case was handled from its first hours.
What He Removed From the Apartment
Ellen Greenberg was found dead on the kitchen floor of the Manayunk apartment she shared with Sam Goldberg on January 26, 2011, with roughly 20 stab wounds. The following morning, Schwartzman entered the apartment. He reportedly said he was there to retrieve a suit for the funeral. He also removed Greenberg’s private computers, phone, keys, and handbag.1Court TV. Parents Hope Federal Investigation May Bring New Light to Ellen Greenberg Case
The Greenberg family disputed his authority to take any of it. They maintained that the property was Ellen’s and belonged to them, not to Sam Goldberg or the Goldberg family, and that Schwartzman took it without their permission.1Court TV. Parents Hope Federal Investigation May Bring New Light to Ellen Greenberg Case
The devices were eventually handed over to police, but only after the manner of death was briefly reclassified as a homicide two days after the autopsy. By then, the apartment had already been professionally cleaned. The family’s legal team has characterized that sequence, devices out of the apartment, scene cleaned, evidence handed over only after a reclassification, as one that compromised the integrity of the investigation.4People. Where Is Ellen Greenberg’s Fiancé Sam Goldberg Now
Why the Family Considers His Role Significant
Two threads run through the Greenberg family’s objections to Schwartzman’s involvement.
The first is evidentiary. Greenberg’s phone and computers were the sort of records a homicide investigation would ordinarily want to secure at the scene: her communications in the hours and days before her death, her contacts, anything indicating her state of mind, anything documenting the relationship with Goldberg. Those items left the apartment in the hands of the fiancé’s uncle before being turned over to police, and the apartment itself was cleaned in the interval. Whatever a fresh forensic examination of the scene might have shown, and whatever an immediate police examination of the untouched devices might have shown, was no longer available in the same form.
The second is institutional. Schwartzman was not simply a family lawyer stepping in during a crisis. He was a former federal prosecutor who had sat on and chaired boards that discipline Pennsylvania lawyers and judges. The Greenberg family has argued that his connections are part of why they view the investigation as a systemic failure rather than a series of isolated errors. That argument is theirs, not a finding by any court or agency, and Schwartzman has not been accused of any crime in connection with Greenberg’s death.
How Schwartzman’s Actions Fit Into the Broader Case
The manner-of-death ruling itself has moved back and forth. Medical Examiner Dr. Marlon Osbourne performed the autopsy and initially ruled the death a homicide, citing the number of stab wounds, including ten to the back of the neck.5NBC Philadelphia. Ellen Greenberg Medical Examiner Ruling Within days to two weeks, after a closed-door meeting with police and the district attorney’s office, he changed the ruling to suicide.6Court TV. Medical Examiner Again Classifies Ellen Greenberg’s Death as Suicide
Osbourne later testified that a key factor in that switch was his understanding that the doorman, Phil Hanton, had witnessed Goldberg force open a swing-bar-locked door from the inside. Lobby surveillance footage obtained during the family’s civil suit showed Hanton never went upstairs with Goldberg, and Hanton signed a declaration saying he did not witness the entry. In a deposition, Osbourne acknowledged that without a witness to the forced entry, he would not have ruled the death a suicide and would have leaned toward an “undetermined” classification.7Philadelphia Inquirer (via Lamb McErlane). A Civil Suit Reveals New Details in the Case of Ellen Greenberg In January 2025, Osbourne signed a sworn statement declaring that in his professional opinion the manner of death “should be designated as something other than suicide,” although he no longer holds a Pennsylvania medical license and the reversal carried no legal effect on the official record.8CNN. Ellen Greenberg Philadelphia Case Update
Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Lindsay Simon reaffirmed the suicide ruling in a 32-page report in October 2025, and a Philadelphia Common Pleas Court judge closed the case on October 14, 2025.9ABC7. Philadelphia Medical Examiner Reaffirms Ellen Greenberg’s Death Was Suicide6Court TV. Medical Examiner Again Classifies Ellen Greenberg’s Death as Suicide
A separate line of inquiry is now underway. In December 2025, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the same office where Schwartzman once served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney, issued subpoenas to the Philadelphia Police Department and other agencies involved in the original investigation. The federal inquiry is reportedly focused not on re-investigating the death itself but on whether institutional missteps in the handling of the case amount to criminal corruption.10PennLive. Ellen Greenberg’s Parents Hail Federal Probe11NBC Philadelphia. Federal Government Joins Investigation Into Death of Ellen Greenberg The U.S. Attorney’s Office has declined to confirm or deny the investigation.
Sam Goldberg has never been named a suspect or charged in connection with Greenberg’s death, and neither has his uncle.4People. Where Is Ellen Greenberg’s Fiancé Sam Goldberg Now What Schwartzman did the morning after Ellen Greenberg died is, at this point, a documented sequence of actions: he entered the apartment, he removed her devices and personal effects, and those items reached police only after the scene had been cleaned and the ruling briefly changed. What that sequence means is the question the Greenberg family, and now potentially federal prosecutors, are still trying to answer.