This blog is for those that are victims of official, police, attorney, prosecutorial, and judicial misconduct. This forum is also for the furthering of rights of non-custodial parents and their children. We will lobby legislators, propose laws, and inform the public. Feel free to post your story, comment, or email your video in.
War on Pro Se litigants? Any case can be used to deny ALL Americans their right to defend themselves in court. Lawyers can be instructed to lose cases by a judge to avoid being disbarred and confined. [example]
High Court Weighs Self-Representation The Washington Post by Robert Barnes - March 27, 2008
It was six years after Ahmad Edwards was charged with firing a gun outside an Indianapolis department store that the delusional and schizophrenic man finally was found competent to stand trial. And when the day arrived, Edwards believed he should be his own attorney. An Indiana judge said no.
In lively arguments yesterday that included the plight of the mentally ill, fantasies about Martians and no shortage of lawyer jokes, the Supreme Court considered whether that decision violated Edwards's right under the Sixth Amendment to represent himself at his trial.
The federal government and 19 states have joined Indiana in urging the court to find that government should be able to set a higher standard for whether a defendant may represent himself than simply whether he has been judged competent to stand trial. Indiana Solicitor General Thomas M. Fisher told the court that states have an interest in ensuring that trials are orderly processes, fair to both prosecution and defendant, rather than incoherent proceedings "descending into a farce."
But Mark T. Stancil, who is representing Edwards, said the Constitution and the court's precedents require that when a defendant is found competent to stand trial, he must be allowed to represent himself if he chooses.
"The expressed premise of the Sixth Amendment and of our adversarial system generally is that the defense belongs to the accused and not to the state," Stancil told the court. "Eliminating the right of self-representation based on concerns about a defendant's courtroom ability violates that fundamental principle."
A majority of the court seemed sympathetic to Fisher's position, although there was one notable and relentless exception.
Justice Antonin Scalia repeatedly challenged Fisher and U.S. Deputy Solicitor General Michael R. Dreeben, who supported Indiana's position, and questioned the ability of a judge before the start of trial to determine that a defendant's self-representation would turn the trial into a farce. "Give it a try," Scalia said. "The person wants to represent himself. It's his constitutional right. If, indeed, it turns out that this is turning into a sham, fine, bring in a lawyer to represent him."
Fisher said that could mean a mistrial or taint the jury. "I think that the state's interests in having a proceeding that proceeds smoothly without episodes that render the proceedings potentially a mockery also are strong." Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg read from some of Edwards's writings to the Indiana court -- "gibberish," she called them -- and suggested "you could say when it gets to that level, you don't have to wait to see how it's going to play out."
In Edwards's case, the judge did appoint a lawyer for him, and he was convicted of attempted murder, among other charges. The Indiana Supreme Court ordered a new trial because of the self-representation issue. Several justices did not seem comfortable with Fisher's proposed test that a judge could override the right if a defendant could not "communicate coherently" with a judge or jury.
Scalia said that sounded like some lawyers he knew. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wondered about the defendant, who could quite clearly communicate to the jury that "Martians did it." Justice Anthony M. Kennedy hypothesized a defendant who was quite capable of communicating to the jury, but whose goal was to turn the trial into a farce.
Justice Stephen G. Breyer seemed an advocate of letting judges find a way to make sure the mentally ill were represented. "Very disturbed people are being deprived and end up in prison because they're disturbed rather than because they're guilty," he said. hat tip exposecorruptcourts.blogspot.com
A 23-year Atlanta Police Department veteran pleaded guilty on Monday to conspiring to violate civil rights by searching a private residence without a warrant, federal prosecutors said.
Wilbert Stallings, 44, of Conyers, a sergeant in the department's narcotics unit, faces up to 10 years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines. A sentencing date wasn't immediately set.
After a hearing before federal Judge Julie Carnes, U.S. Attorney David E. Nahmias called the actions of Stallings and his unit a "blatant" rights violation. He also said it was part of a pattern that led to the 2006 botched raid in which 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston was shot and killed in her northwest Atlanta home.
"What we've said is they developed on the team a [pattern] of breaking the rules and bending the rules that ultimately crossed over into the breaking and bending of the Constitution," Nahmias said. "That ultimately is a crime."
The charge against Stallings was an outgrowth of the Johnston investigation, Nahmias said. Stallings supervised the unit in the botched raid but wasn't charged in the case.
Prosecutors said that in October 2005, Stallings led a narcotics team executing a search warrant at an apartment on Dill Road in Atlanta.
Also on the team was Gregg Junnier, one of two narcotics officers who have pleaded guilty to charges in Johnston's death. Junnier had obtained the warrant for one apartment in the 2005 incident, prosecutors said. The team found some marijuana behind the apartment but not inside, they said. Stallings and Junnier then decided to search an adjoining apartment but no one was home and they found nothing inside.
Stallings told the team to leave the apartment and shut the door so it would appear there had been a break-in, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors argued the the incident was part of a pattern of conduct by Stallings and his team, which included misrepresenting unregistered drug informants as registered ones in order to secure warrants.
Stallings and his lawyer declined to comment on the plea.
Nahmias would not rule out the possibility of more prosecutions as the investigation Atlanta narcotic's tactics winds to a close. Federal authorities, he said, plan to produce a report of their findings that will go to Atlanta Police Chief Richard Pennington.
Will those in the "Legal Mafia" make up rules as they go, now legally, with the passage of [this bill]?
The Connecticut State Police Crime Lab has been caught in the past for their racist emails and for manufacturing evidence. With the passage of [this DNA collecting bill], with more excuses to take DNA, will more citizens, that have been framed, be framed for other crimes in Connecticut?
courtesy of Francis C. P. Knize, we filmed [this video] at a national hearing on judges judging judges, ADA abuse, and national judicial misconduct at the Federal Court, Brooklyn, New York.
Heather Lyn Johnston, left, and Ashley Nichole Miller are seen in police booking photos from February 2007. Johnston was sentenced to 10 years probation. Miller must serve two years in prison, then eight years on probation.
MARIETTA, Ga. - The “Barbie bandits” who went on a shopping spree after they were videotaped wearing sunglasses and laughing during an $11,000 bank heist were sentenced Monday, one to prison and another to probation.
Ashley Miller, 19, will have to serve only two years of a 10-year prison sentence and must complete the rest on probation. She pleaded guilty to theft and drug charges.
Heather Johnston, also 19, was sentenced to 10 years’ probation for her role in the February 2007 heist in Acworth, northwest of Atlanta.
The two were caught on tape as they appeared to rob a Bank of America branch in a supermarket. They admitted to plotting with a teller to take the money and later going on a shopping binge that included a stop in a fashionable hair salon.
Cobb County Superior Court Judge Mary Staley urged Miller to learn from her crimes.
“I want you to correct yourself,” Staley told Miller, a former exotic dancer. “There’s no reason you can’t become a productive citizen when you get out of jail.”
Miller’s mother and sister hugged and kissed her before deputies led her out of the courtroom.
Benny Allen — who worked at the bank as a teller — was sentenced to 10 years, to serve five. The judge imposed an additional penalty on Allen because she said he did not testify truthfully in the trial of Michael Chastang, a co-defendant convicted of his role in plotting the heist. Chastang is to be sentenced Tuesday.
Johnston was the first of the group to plead guilty, speeding up the prosecution of her co-defendants.
During her sentencing hearing, Johnston took the witness stand and between sobs apologized for hurting and embarrassing her family and friends.
“A lot of people look down on me,” Johnston said. “I feel terrible. I want to set a good example for my little sister. She’s a great kid. I don’t want her to end up like me.”
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I resisted getting mugged on my own property and I received worse punishment than at least one of these bank robbers. [more]
Father Brings Case On Parents’ Right Before [Connecticut Supreme] High Court, On His Very Own
Aimee Dutkiewicz shows her son, Garth, his parents' case on the Supreme Court agenda as Garth's father Bristol truck driver Tom Dutkiewicz and his mom, Gail Fuller, look on.
By COLIN POITRAS | Hartford Courant Staff Writer March 19, 2008
For 30 minutes Tuesday, Tom Dutkiewicz, a 47-year-old Bristol truck driver, stood before the Connecticut Supreme Court passionately arguing that the state routinely violates parents' constitutional rights.
Not many laypeople get the opportunity to be heard before the state's highest court, and Dutkiewicz waited six years for this single, defining moment.
As Dutkiewicz bolstered his argument with a scattering of legal citations that he had pulled from the Internet, the panel of five black-robed jurists, including Chief Justice Chase Rogers, listened with a patient ear. They asked no questions.
When asked later why he didn't hire a lawyer, Dutkiewicz said, "No guts no glory. When you hire a lawyer, they say what they want to say. I wanted to be there to speak for myself."
Dutkiewicz was in court to challenge the constitutionality of a state law requiring divorcing parents to participate in parenting education classes. He insists the state has no right to compel parents to take such classes unless the parents are deemed unfit. Simply getting divorced, Dutkiewicz said, doesn't cut it.
"The state wrongly assumes I need help," Dutkiewicz told the court in what was at times a rambling opening statement. "To me, that's arrogance."
"Who are they to tell me how I should act? How I should speak to my child? Every child is different," Dutkiewicz said. "To say I need parenting classes is an insult to me. I'm 47. I've raised my children for 15, 20 years."
Dutkiewicz is no stranger to a courtroom. He represented himself in a waste-hauling case that reached the U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston in 1998 and won. He is a relentless researcher and pores over legal rulings on the Internet like a kid eyeing treats in a candy shop.
Tom and his ex-wife, Aimee Dutkiewicz, have three children. They have been carrying the torch for embattled parents ever since the Department of Children and Families investigated them for possible education and medical neglect six years ago.
Following the experience, the pair created a web-based parent advocacy group called Connecticut DCF Watch that urges parents to know their rights and resist any intrusions by state child abuse investigators without a court order or warrant.
"There is absolutely no compelling interest for the state to get involved," Aimee Dutkiewicz said in support of her former husband's case. "Just because a child is involved in a divorce proceeding does not mean that child is going to have emotional problems."
When the couple divorced in 2006, they both challenged the need for parenting classes. And although a Superior Court judge eventually waived the requirement, Tom Dutkiewicz continued to pursue the matter on appeal, filing legal motion after legal motion on his own until he caught the attention of the Supreme Court.
Dutkiewicz claims parents have a right to determine what is in their child's best interest and any court order requiring him to participate in the program infringes on his constitutionally protected right to raise his family as he sees fit.
The trial court, in its ruling, recognized that parents' interest in the care of their children is one of the oldest and most fundamental liberties recognized by the courts. Yet, it pointed out that the right is not unlimited and that the state's interest in the welfare of a child justifies "appropriately bounded intervention" as long as an individual's due process rights are retained.
The court further ruled that the purpose of the parenting classes was to teach parents about the impact divorce has on children.
Whether the high-school educated Dutkiewicz will win his case remains to be seen. But the experience, as they say, was priceless.
"God, it's better than sex!" a flushed and exhilarated Dutkiewicz exclaimed as he left the courtroom clutching a handful of legal briefs. "It's like getting the golden ticket."
I was one, and was fired because of an injustice that happened to me in Connecticut. I need your help to activate as a first responder disaster worker as I did after Hurricane Katrina, deploying to Mississippi and Louisiana.
I had no shower facilities and the national guard helped get me water and food as I helped people get back on their feet, doing something about their loss of their homes. [photos]
I had invested in rental properties in Connecticut. Two, I had fixed up from a boarded up condition. I invested years and hundreds of thousands of dollars. I had gone to CT Senators Kissel and Guglielmo with the bias in the courts and how State and local Police target landlords and downtown small business owners that lack political and even organized crime connections.
The police and members of the judiciary seemed to be involved in a conspiracy to keep unofficial “Jim Crow” policies alive of separate and unequal, and to retaliate against complaining citizens and internal whistle blowers. [retaliation and unfairness]
6 gang members recently killed a young man. They received no jail time from a Connecticut judge. A probation officer repeatedly raped a mentally challenged man over years of time, got no jail time. Such is “justice” in Connecticut.
Ironically, the druggie felons “deployed” after I had contacted Senators Kissel and Guglielmo about needing courteous help, and actual protection and service from police to make money as an investment property investor and downtown business owner, also complaining about “fixed” court cases.
I resisted being beaten up on my Stafford property by a druggie felon, allegedly, encouraged to do so by the Connecticut State Police. Another druggie felon was at my Somersville property trying to catch me out on my yard there, to attack me, so only I would be arrested. [my former properties]
I was not offered AR, had no criminal record, and a VHS tape of how to find me guilty, but nothing about reasonable doubt and finding me innocent was shown to a jury where a worker for the police was jury forum.
My lawyer, Attorney Michael H. Agranoff refused to call any witnesses that would have proven my case, and attacked the only witness with any information aiding the prosecution, telling me that he was instructed by Judge Jonathan Kaplan to lose my case.
Two Connecticut State Troopers committed perjury [Docket # CR01-0074672] on the stand saying I had never requested to lodge a complaint about being assaulted, stalked, having my life threatened, and about the attempt of the druggie felon, police operative, to try and also rob me.
I was sentenced to a year in prison for “overreacting” to being mugged, stalked, and having my life threatened, being terrorized by operatives of the Connecticut State Police and by officers following me around for an extended period of time. [CT Police Enemies List Proof]
I had upset the police by complaining. Judges in Connecticut help retaliate. It is a sad fact, but it is current reality.
A Connecticut former teacher, Julie Amero [info], is still facing 40 years in prison because something beyond her control, popped up on a laptop computer, beyond her control. This is just another example of judicial abuse. Please, also, look into remedying her situation, as the court system does not seem to address fixing prosecutions that defy commonsense.
There is no justice, so I am writing you.
For me there was no sense in building a small business over 2 decades, maintaining credit, investing in a home, getting married, and raising a family. All can go “poof” if police use tax dollars to ruin your life if you are put on the Connecticut State Police “Secret Enemies List”
I have nothing, and can’t even get a decent job or an apartment in my name with a bogus criminal record. How is this helping the economy and acting in the best interest of the public?
I can get my job back as a first responder if I have no criminal record.
Will you please look into facilitating that and putting my request through proper channels so there is action. The courts are simply for collecting revenue and abusing those that dare complain about abuse. I have seen where citizens such as Christopher Kennedy of Ellington, CT, and Francis Knize appeal wrongful and illegals actions perpetrated in Connecticut courts and face having their cases dismissed without legitimate reasons and retaliation for daring to questions the “Gods of the Court”.
Please don’t delay, please act today.
Thank you,
Steven G. Erickson
c/o Francis Knize
50 Sunset Pass Rd
Wilton, CT 06897
P.S. a phone number where I can be reached available upon request
Is there a connection between organized crime, prostitution, and White lawyers, politicians, police, prosecutors, and elected officials getting together at private, all White male, clubs? [click here]
What Bush was up to on September 14, 2001, says volumes. He knowingly lied about an African Iraqi Uranium transaction. We were lied into a war. If there was a war on terror, there would have been more activity going after terror links in Afghanistan and the Ground war in Iraq would have never been pursued.
Those in power in the US have no concern for what the public wants and care little what all this will cost us. George W. Bush might well be the most hated figure in the world, hands down.
Primary school children should be eligible for the DNA database if they exhibit behaviour indicating they may become criminals in later life, according to Britain's most senior police forensics expert.
Gary Pugh, director of forensic sciences at Scotland Yard and the new DNA spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), said a debate was needed on how far Britain should go in identifying potential offenders, given that some experts believe it is possible to identify future offending traits in children as young as five.
'If we have a primary means of identifying people before they offend, then in the long-term the benefits of targeting younger people are extremely large,' said Pugh. 'You could argue the younger the better. Criminologists say some people will grow out of crime; others won't. We have to find who are possibly going to be the biggest threat to society.'
Pugh admitted that the deeply controversial suggestion raised issues of parental consent, potential stigmatisation and the role of teachers in identifying future offenders, but said society needed an open, mature discussion on how best to tackle crime before it took place. There are currently 4.5 million genetic samples on the UK database - the largest in Europe - but police believe more are required to reduce crime further. 'The number of unsolved crimes says we are not sampling enough of the right people,' Pugh told The Observer. However, he said the notion of universal sampling - everyone being forced to give their genetic samples to the database - is currently prohibited by cost and logistics.
Civil liberty groups condemned his comments last night by likening them to an excerpt from a 'science fiction novel'. One teaching union warned that it was a step towards a 'police state'.
Pugh's call for the government to consider options such as placing primary school children who have not been arrested on the database is supported by elements of criminological theory. A well-established pattern of offending involves relatively trivial offences escalating to more serious crimes. Senior Scotland Yard criminologists are understood to be confident that techniques are able to identify future offenders.
A recent report from the think-tank Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) called for children to be targeted between the ages of five and 12 with cognitive behavioural therapy, parenting programmes and intensive support. Prevention should start young, it said, because prolific offenders typically began offending between the ages of 10 and 13. Julia Margo, author of the report, entitled 'Make me a Criminal', said: 'You can carry out a risk factor analysis where you look at the characteristics of an individual child aged five to seven and identify risk factors that make it more likely that they would become an offender.' However, she said that placing young children on a database risked stigmatising them by identifying them in a 'negative' way.
Shami Chakrabarti, director of the civil rights group Liberty, denounced any plan to target youngsters. 'Whichever bright spark at Acpo thought this one up should go back to the business of policing or the pastime of science fiction novels,' she said. 'The British public is highly respectful of the police and open even to eccentric debate, but playing politics with our innocent kids is a step too far.'
Chris Davis, of the National Primary Headteachers' Association, said most teachers and parents would find the suggestion an 'anathema' and potentially very dangerous. 'It could be seen as a step towards a police state,' he said. 'It is condemning them at a very young age to something they have not yet done. They may have the potential to do something, but we all have the potential to do things. To label children at that stage and put them on a register is going too far.'
Davis admitted that most teachers could identify children who 'had the potential to have a more challenging adult life', but said it was the job of teachers to support them.
Pugh, though, believes that measures to identify criminals early would save the economy huge sums - violent crime alone costs the UK £13bn a year - and significantly reduce the number of offences committed. However, he said the British public needed to move away from regarding anyone on the DNA database as a criminal and accepted it was an emotional issue.
'Fingerprints, somehow, are far less contentious,' he said. 'We have children giving their fingerprints when they are borrowing books from a library.'
Last week it emerged that the number of 10 to 18-year-olds placed on the DNA database after being arrested will have reached around 1.5 million this time next year. Since 2004 police have had the power to take DNA samples from anyone over the age of 10 who is arrested, regardless of whether they are later charged, convicted, or found to be innocent.
Concern over the issue of civil liberties will be further amplified by news yesterday that commuters using Oyster smart cards could have their movements around cities secretly monitored under new counter-terrorism powers being sought by the security services.
Will the Spitzer scandal open up a can of worms of Judicial Misconduct cover ups?
Was NY Governor Eliot Spitzer known as "client 9" to a prostitution ring? [more]
* * * *
Has there been election rigging involving public officers, Eliot Spitzer, Hillary Clinton, the New York Times, and other media? Has there been "back door borrowing" being done by politicians using their corrupt "installed" judges?
ELECTIONS: Preserving Democracy by Informing the Voters
Their Records in Office
2008 Hillary Rodham Clinton -- Would-Be Democratic Presidential Candidate
2006 Eliot Spitzer -- Democratic Candidate for Governor of NY David Paterson -- Democratic Candidate for Lieutenant Governor of NY Hillary Rodham Clinton -- Re-Election to U.S. Senate from NY
Then on Tuesday, you can film them as they come into the building. To recognize them, you can go to the website of each court and print their photo. http://www.uscourts.gov/courtlinks/.
Moreover, you can share that information with your colleagues and acquaintances in the press. Indeed, the impact of your video will be much more powerful if you can film a crowd of journalists in front of the building all asking the judges to let them in only for them to repeat time and again that theirs is a “confidential” meeting. (See photo at http://www.uscourts.gov/library/annualreports/2006/2006_annualreport.pdf, page 54.)
By the end of it all, they will sound as if they were members of a secret society, not the highest policy-making body of public officers charged with administering justice in public.
What a masterful touch of journalistic ingenuity if you could life stream that scene on the Internet and attract even more journalists or even protesters!
This is an opportunity for you and your colleagues to stage the news since they will not let you videotape their meeting. Show imagination and take the initiative in leading others. If you have to start orchestrating the scene today, then get on with it. You can be the man who organized a most embarrassing but revealing scene for the judges.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Dr. Richard Cordero, Esq. ********************************
--- George McDermott wrote:
> Dr. Cordero,
> Thank you for forwarding the e-mail to me I > have checked the calendar of the judicial Center and > was unable to determine at what time or date this > would be held. By supplying me with these important > contacts I can now make arrangements to cover this > event for secretjustice.com. Secretjustice news.com > and secretjustice news @ YOU TUBE. > Mr. James C. Duff > Judicial Conference Secretary & AO Director > Judicial Conference of the U.S. > c/o Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts > One Columbus Circle NE > Washington, DC 20544 > > For details, contact Judicial Conference Staff > Member > Sharon Zdobysz at (202) 502-2400; > sharon_zdobysz@ao.uscourts.gov. > > Once again thank you for the information I will be > contacting sharon_zdobysz@ao.uscourts.gov. For the > exact time and permission to videotape the > conference for if these judges are so arrogant as to > put themselves above the law of common man then they > should not object to having their actions > memorialized on videotape and broadcast throughout > the nation. > My sincerest thanks > > George McDermott secretjustice news.com ************************************************
Dear Judicial Reform Advocates,
The Judicial Conference of the U.S., which is the highest policy-making body of the Federal Judiciary and presided over by the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, will meet in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, March 11, to in all likelihood adopt the Revised Rules for processing misconduct and disability complaints filed by any person against a federal judge.
These Rules were drafted in self-interest by the Conference’s Committee on Judicial Conduct and Disability. They change in no way the current rules that they are supposed to replace. Therefore, they will continue to allow federal judges to dismiss systematically those complaints in order to self-exempt from any discipline and exercise their vast judicial power over people’s property, liberty, and even life immune to any disciplinary control.
The exercise of vast uncontrolled power is absolute power, which corrupts absolutely. This is all the more so when the Rules for exercising such power free of any control are adopted in secrecy, as they will be by the Conference next Tuesday.
Therefore, I encourage you to contact the following journalists, who have shown interest in the subject, in order to ask that they and their media outlets both:
1) cover the Conference meeting, most likely to be held at the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, where you can contact these officers for details or to express your views:
Mr. James C. Duff Judicial Conference Secretary & AO Director Judicial Conference of the U.S. c/o Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts One Columbus Circle NE Washington, DC 20544
For details, contact Judicial Conference Staff Member Sharon Zdobysz at (202) 502-2400; sharon_zdobysz@ao.uscourts.gov.
2) investigate the issue of wrongdoing coordinated among life-tenured judges who can engage in misconduct and experience disability with total immunity if only they protect each other.
1. National Law Journal Reporter Pamela A. MacLean, who wrote the series “Policing the Bench, Judging federal judges” concerning the Revised Rules; Washington, D.C., PMacLean@alm.com;
2. National Law Journal Opinion Page Editor Ruth Singleton, who published my comments on Reporter MacLean’s second installment, New York City, rsingleton@alm.com;
3. CBSNews News Analyst Natasha Rudnick, who requested information about the Revised Rules; New York City, tel. (212)352-1930, cell (646)724-6099; rudnickn@cbsnews.com;
4. Legal Times Reporter Joe Palazzolo, who expressed interest in obtaining information about the Revised Rules; Washington, D.C., tel. (202)828-315, cell (314)898-2058. See also the email pages of the Legal Times editorial team members at http://www.law.com/jsp/dc/specials.jsp?p=contact#publisher;
5. McClatchy News Investigative Editor James Asher, Director of the I-Team, who indicated that he would look into the subject of the Revised Rules; Washington, D.C., jasher@mcclatchydc.com;
6. Bocce Balls Productions, Inc., Film Producer and Editor Barbara Ricci, who will publish my open letter to Chief Justice Roberts; New York, studio43@optonline.net;
7. Los Angeles Times Michael J. Goodman and William C. Rempel, who directed a two year investigation of corruption in the state and federal judiciary of Nevada and coauthored the series “Juice v. Justice”; Los Angeles, mj.good@yahoo.com and william.rempel@latimes.com;
8. Los Angeles Daily Journal Staff Writers Amy Yarbrough and Troy Anderson, who have written articles on the attempt by local authorities to disbar Att. Richard I. Fine for claiming corruption among the judiciary and the bar; Los Angeles, Amy_Yarbrough@dailyjournal.com and troy.anderson@dailynews.com.
Swapping e-mails among us will continue to do no good for judicial reform. The judges will not even have to ignore them; they will never know about them at all.
The only reasonable strategy is for us, through collaborative activity, to cause journalists to investigate the judges and put their wrongdoing on the public spotlight through their reporting so that an outraged public put pressure on law enforcement and legislative authorities to conduct their own investigation of the judiciary and eventually adopt meaningful judicial discipline policies and reform legislation and ensure their effective application.
That is a strategy that requires us to bring the subject to the attention of journalists and bloggers in such a sustained and massive way that it may register with them and lead them to recognize that there is an audience for the story. Journalists do not write articles on stories that nobody cares about.
By the same token, it shows that others must join the effort. Implementing that strategy requires that we divert some effort, time, and resources from our individual judicial misconduct cases and bring them to bear on a common task reasonably calculated to move us a step forward. That is the way of achieving unity of purpose aimed at attaining effectiveness of action.
Unity is not achieved by coming physically together in a room only for each of us to vent our pain, frustration, and resentment and voice ill-considered ideas on the spur of the moment. Moreover, after such meeting somebody would have to sit and write down the basis for an agreement of understanding of common action that eventually becomes signed and binding. We can do that now through emails. If we cannot reach an agreement now, we will not do so by simply meeting in a place.
The concrete steps for action now on the proposed strategy are the following:
1) to participate in an emailing and phone campaign to contact the journalists listed above as well as many others as possible;
2) to bring a lawsuit after the adoption of the Revised Rules to challenge their Constitutionality as well as that of the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act of 1980 from which they derive.
A lawsuit requires:
a) knowledgeable lawyers to research and write briefs; read, analyze, and respond to those served on them; argue motions, conduct depositions; hold press conferences; etc.;
b) a most committed team of lay people willing to do the enormous amount of work involved in typing, proof reading, printing, mailing, and serving papers; arranging the logistics of depositions…that is, if the case survives a motion for summary judgment; searching for judicial complainants in order to ensure the growth of the base of similarly situated people who can become coworkers and financial supporters;
c) a most realistic team of people capable of recognizing that such a lawsuit costs money, lots of money, and are willing to make a corresponding financial contribution to defray the cost of the lawyers, court filing fees, other court costs, court reporters to record depositions and transcribe hearings, long distance telephone calls and conferences, mailing, transportation, meeting places; etc.;
d) a most disciplined team of people who are willing to engage in publicizing the lawsuit and will not highjack the opportunity to highlight their own cases and blast the judges that harmed them, thereby not only causing the group to speak with many voices and offer divergent positions on the lawsuit, but also exposing themselves and the others to defamation suits as well as building a record of statements that opposing counsel will use to paint all of us as a bunch of disgruntled losers at law, pro se litigants that have no clue as to how the law works and cannot see their cases but from their narrow personal point of view to the exclusion of the broader context of many opposing interests in a complex society like ours.
Only such a team can reasonably take on the powerful and wealthy judges of the Third Branch of Government of the United States and the best and brightest of lawyers that will represent them. I encourage you to examine yourself to determine whether you are one of them and, if so, to look for other like-minded people so that we can unite to collaborate effectively.
Meantime, between now and Tuesday, you can contact the above-listed journalists to insist that they cover the Judicial Conference meeting and the adoption of the Revised Rules.
Re "Little public airing of abusive judges: Reforms may not fix the problem": The second installment of the "Policing the Bench" series could be resubtitled "Reforms will not fix the problem" of abusive judges who go undisciplined. Indeed, the revised rules for processing misconduct and disability complaints against federal judges will change nothing with respect to the current rules they are supposed to replace.
Yet they will in all likelihood be adopted on March 11 by the Judicial Conference of the United States, which is the highest policy-making all-judge body of the federal judiciary, presided over by the chief justice of the Supreme Court.
For one thing, proposed Rule 2(b) provides that the revised rules are mandatory unless there is a finding of "exceptional circumstances," which is an easy finding to make since no two cases are ever identical. This means that in practice the rules will be optional. Hence, they will allow the circuits and the U.S. courts subject to them to apply the rules capriciously and inconsistently so as to exempt their abusive peers from any discipline. The judges will also continue to do exactly what they do now because the revised rules:
• Do not change the procedure or participants in the judicial complaint system.
• Do not change the judge-protective secrecy that turns a filed judicial complaint into a nonpublic document and prohibits even the name of the judge to be written on the envelope of the complaint.
• Do not change the lack of a requirement for the judge to respond to the complaint, so he or she does not even have to bother reading it, nor do they make any response filed by a judge available to the complainant.
• Do not change the scope of discretion to dispose of complaints, which, in the period 1997-2006, resulted in only seven appointments of a special investigative committee and nine disciplinary actions out of 7,462 complaints filed.
• Do not change the policy of no public access to special committee reports.
• Do not change the review-seeking discretion of circuit councils, which the councils have abused by not submitting their decisions to the Judicial Conference Committee on Judicial Conduct and Disability, thereby giving rise to the extraordinary fact that in the 28 years since the passage of the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act of 1980, the committee has issued only 18 decisions.
• Do not change the indifference of the Judicial Conference, the last appellate body under the complaint procedure, which in the act's 28-year history has not reviewed any decision of a judicial council or the committee, let alone issue a single opinion, if only to resolve a dispute about the scope of its own jurisdiction.
• Do not change the unlawful practice of preventing complainants from appealing to the Judicial Conference despite the act's clear provision allowing "A complainant or judge aggrieved by an action of [a] judicial council" to do so.
<>Barbara C. Johnson, Advocate of Court Reform and Attorney at Law
6 Appletree Lane
Andover, MA 01810-4102
978-474-0833
barbaracjohnson@verizon.net False Allegations: http://www.falseallegations.com Participating Attorney: http://www.lawguru.com/cgi/bbs2/user/browse.shtml Campaign 2002: http://www.barbforgovernor.com ----- The judicial system is very broken. It must be fixed. There are four people who can do the job: Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. Everybody thinks Somebody will surely do it.
It is a job Anybody can do. But Nobody is doing it. At least I'm trying. What are you doing?
It is dangerous to be right
when the government is wrong.
—VOLTAIRE
All truth passes through three stages.
First, it is ridiculed.
Second, it is violently opposed.
Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
— ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER (1788-1860)
Dongxiao Yue wrote:
Dear All,
I think we should focus on the issue of "merits-relatedness" in judicial misconduct complaints. The judiciary recognizes that "[t]he Act itself is permissive when it comes to the investigation of claims that are related to the merits... A finding of merits relation does not prohibit the chief judge from appointing a special committee..." McBryde v. Committee to Review Circuit Council Conduct and Disability Orders of the Judicial Conference of the U.S., 347 U.S.App.D.C. 302, 264 F.3d 52 (D.C.Cir. 09/21/2001)
Steven G. Erickson interviews Massachusetts Attorney Barbara C. Johnson by telephone:
Barbara C. Johnson allegedly represented a client in Rockville, Connecticut, Superior Court. Judge Jonathan Kaplan allegedly became aware of Johnson's website blasting judges for misconduct, and called Massachusetts judges to have Johnson disbarred. Are attorneys to be disbarred for Free Speech and for breaking ranks with judges, to instead, actually serve their clients?
Barbara is a former candidate for Massachusetts Governor.
Sounds good on the surface, but there has been public corruption, scandals, lack of public trust, and gross police, prosecutorial, official, and judicial misconduct in Connecticut. Police in Connecticut can't operate an internal affairs department that safeguards the public and curtails police brutality, misconduct, thefts, rapes, and assaults committed by Connecticut Police officers and members of the judiciary complicit in covering up misconduct and in helping retaliate against whistle blowers. [my reasons]
LCO No. 1534 {D:\Conversion\Tob\h\2008HB-05675-R00-HB.doc } 1 of 6 General Assembly Raised Bill No. 5675 February Session, 2008 LCO No. 1534 *01534_______JUD* Referred to Committee on Judiciary Introduced by: (JUD)
AN ACT CONCERNING OVERSIGHT OF INTELLIGENCE GATHERING BY LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Assembly convened:
1 Section 1. (NEW) (Effective October 1, 2008) (a) For the purposes of 2 this section: 3 (1) "Public agency" means public agency as defined in section 1-200 4 of the general statutes; and 5 (2) "Public official" means public official as defined in section 1-79 of 6 the 2008 supplement to the general statutes, any elected or appointed 7 municipal official, a judge of any court either elected or appointed and 8 a senator or representative in Congress. 9 (b) A law enforcement agency may collect and maintain criminal 10 intelligence information concerning individuals and organizations for 11 the purposes of (1) ensuring the safety and security of public officials, 12 and (2) preventing the disturbance or disruption of, or the interference 13 with, the performance by a public official of his or her official 14 functions, powers or duties or with the meetings of a public agency. Raised Bill No. 5675 LCO No. 1534 {D:\Conversion\Tob\h\2008HB-05675-R00-HB.doc } 2 of 6 15 (c) A law enforcement agency may collect and maintain criminal 16 intelligence information concerning an individual or organization 17 pursuant to subsection (b) of this section if: 18 (1) Such agency has an articulable suspicion that such individual or 19 organization is engaged in or will engage in criminal conduct or 20 activity directed toward a public official or with respect to the 21 performance by a public official of his or her official functions, powers 22 or duties or with respect to the meetings of a public agency; 23 (2) Such individual has been convicted of an offense involving the 24 use, attempted use or threatened use of physical force against another 25 person; 26 (3) Such individual has been convicted of threatening, harassing or 27 stalking a public official, violating a restraining or protective order 28 involving a public official or committing criminal trespass in a 29 building or other premises where a public official resides or frequents; 30 or 31 (4) Such individual has been convicted of an offense involving the 32 disturbance or disruption of, or interference with, the performance by 33 a public official of his or her official functions, powers or duties or with 34 the meetings of a public agency. 35 (d) A law enforcement agency may collect and maintain criminal 36 intelligence information concerning an individual or organization 37 pursuant to subsection (b) of this section for reasons other than those 38 specified in subsection (c) of this section whenever such agency deems 39 it appropriate for the purposes set forth in subsection (b) of this 40 section. 41 (e) A law enforcement agency shall not collect or maintain criminal 42 intelligence information about the political, religious or social views, 43 associations or activities of any individual or organization unless such 44 information directly relates to criminal conduct or activity and there is Raised Bill No. 5675 LCO No. 1534 {D:\Conversion\Tob\h\2008HB-05675-R00-HB.doc } 3 of 6 45 an articulable suspicion that the subject of the information is engaged 46 in or will engage in criminal conduct or activity. 47 (f) Whenever a law enforcement agency briefs its officers concerning 48 the safety and security of public officials or preventing the disturbance 49 or disruption of, or the interference with, the performance by a public 50 official of his or her official functions, powers or duties or with the 51 meeting of a public agency, and disseminates information about 52 individuals or organizations that it has collected under this section, the 53 agency shall include in such briefing an explanation of statutory and 54 constitutional rights that citizens have at such public events including, 55 but not limited to, freedom of speech, freedom from unreasonable 56 searches and seizures, freedom from arrest, detention or punishment 57 except where clearly warranted by law, and the right to peaceably 58 assemble and petition their government for a redress of grievances. 59 (g) Not later than January fifteenth of each year, each law 60 enforcement agency that has collected and maintained criminal 61 intelligence information concerning an individual pursuant to 62 subsection (d) of this section in the preceding year shall report to the 63 Commissioner of Public Safety the information required by this 64 subsection with respect to such individual. The Commissioner of 65 Public Safety shall, based upon the reports filed by each law 66 enforcement agency and not later than January thirty-first of each year, 67 submit a report, in accordance with the provisions of section 11-4a of 68 the general statutes, to the joint standing committee of the General 69 Assembly having cognizance of matters relating to criminal law and 70 procedure concerning the collection and maintenance of criminal 71 intelligence information concerning individuals pursuant to subsection 72 (d) of this section in the preceding calendar year. The report shall 73 include the following information: (1) The reasons the agency collected 74 and maintained criminal intelligence information with respect to such 75 individual; (2) the criminal activity the agency believed the individual 76 might engage in; (3) whether the individual was investigated, detained 77 or arrested, and the facts and circumstances of any such investigation, Raised Bill No. 5675 LCO No. 1534 {D:\Conversion\Tob\h\2008HB-05675-R00-HB.doc } 4 of 6 78 detention or arrest; and (4) the status of any criminal prosecution 79 resulting from the arrest of such individual. 80 (h) Nothing in this section shall be construed to prevent the receipt 81 by a law enforcement agency of a tip concerning actual or suspected 82 criminal conduct or activity and the investigation thereof by such 83 agency. 84 (i) Nothing in this section shall be construed to prevent or limit a 85 law enforcement agency collecting and maintaining criminal 86 intelligence information for purposes other than those set forth in 87 subsection (b) of this section. 88 Sec. 2. Section 1-215 of the general statutes is repealed and the 89 following is substituted in lieu thereof (Effective October 1, 2008): 90 (a) Notwithstanding any provision of the general statutes to the 91 contrary, and except as otherwise provided in this section, any record 92 of the arrest of any person, other than a juvenile, except a record 93 erased pursuant to chapter 961a, shall be a public record from the time 94 of such arrest and shall be disclosed in accordance with the provisions 95 of section 1-212 and subsection (a) of section 1-210 of the 2008 96 supplement to the general statutes, except that disclosure of data or 97 information other than that set forth in subdivision (1) of subsection (b) 98 of this section shall be subject to the provisions of subdivision (3) of 99 subsection (b) of section 1-210 of the 2008 supplement to the general 100 statutes. Any personal possessions or effects found on a person at the 101 time of such person's arrest shall not be disclosed unless such 102 possessions or effects are relevant to the crime for which such person 103 was arrested. 104 (b) For the purposes of this section, "record of the arrest" means (1) 105 the name and address of the person arrested, the date, time and place 106 of the arrest, [and] the offense for which the person was arrested and 107 the facts and circumstances that constituted probable cause for the 108 arrest, and (2) at least one of the following, designated by the law Raised Bill No. 5675 LCO No. 1534 {D:\Conversion\Tob\h\2008HB-05675-R00-HB.doc } 5 of 6 109 enforcement agency: The arrest report, incident report, news release or 110 other similar report of the arrest of a person. 111 Sec. 3. (NEW) (Effective October 1, 2008) (a) There is established a 112 select legislative committee on intelligence oversight to oversee and 113 make continuing studies of the intelligence activities and programs of 114 the state and municipalities. The select committee shall: 115 (1) Review the intelligence activities and programs of state and 116 municipal law enforcement agencies; 117 (2) Report to the General Assembly concerning such intelligence 118 activities and programs and submit to the General Assembly any 119 recommendations for legislation related thereto; and 120 (3) Provide legislative oversight over the intelligence activities of the 121 state and municipalities to assure that such activities are in conformity 122 with the laws and Constitution of the state and the United States 123 Constitution. 124 (b) The select committee shall be comprised of the chairpersons and 125 ranking members of the joint standing committees of the General 126 Assembly having cognizance of matters relating to the judiciary, public 127 safety and government administration. 128 (c) The president pro tempore of the Senate and the speaker of the 129 House of Representatives may jointly convene the select committee 130 whenever they deem it necessary. 131 (d) The select committee shall be subject to the provisions of chapter 132 14 of the general statutes and meetings of the select committee shall be 133 open to the public except when the select committee meets in executive 134 session, as defined in section 1-200 of the general statutes, or meets to 135 receive criminal intelligence information pursuant to 28 Code of 136 Federal Regulations, Part 23. 137 (e) The select committee shall be deemed a law enforcement Raised Bill No. 5675 LCO No. 1534 {D:\Conversion\Tob\h\2008HB-05675-R00-HB.doc } 6 of 6 138 authority performing a law enforcement activity for purposes of 139 receiving criminal intelligence information pursuant to 28 Code of 140 Federal Regulations, Part 23. The select committee shall adopt 141 procedures concerning the receipt, maintenance, security and 142 dissemination of such criminal intelligence information that is 143 consistent with federal regulations. Any member of the select 144 committee who discloses confidential information received by the 145 select committee pursuant to this section shall be subject to the same 146 penalties a law enforcement official would be subject to for such 147 unauthorized disclosure.
This act shall take effect as follows and shall amend the following sections:
Section 1 October 1, 2008 New section Sec. 2 October 1, 2008 1-215 Sec. 3 October 1, 2008 New section
Statement of Purpose:
To provide legislative oversight of criminal intelligence gathering activities of law enforcement agencies.
[Proposed deletions are enclosed in brackets. Proposed additions are indicated by underline, except that when the entire text of a bill or resolution or a section of a bill or resolution is new, it is not underlined.]
* * * * * * * *
The Connecticut State Police partnered with drug dealers, vandals, theives, prostitutes and other criminals to terrorize me and my then 14 year old National Honor Society Student daughter out of our Connecticut home:
TESTIMONY OF Francis C. P. Knize. 203 544 9603 Public comment on RULES GOVERNING JUDICIAL CONDUCT AND DISABILITY PROCEEDINGS UNDERTAKEN PURSUANT TO 28 U.S.C. §§ 351-364 Presented Pursuant [FR Doc. E7-14268 Filed 7-20-07; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 2210-55-P
DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE United States Parole Commission Public Announcement, Pursuant to the Government in the Sunshine Act (Pub. L. 94-409) [5 U.S.C. Section 552b] Dear Honorable Judicial Conference, First, a definition: CONSTRUCTIVE FRAUD "Constructive fraud: A contract or act, which, not originating in evil design and contrivance to perpetuate a positive fraud or injury upon other persons, yet, by its necessary tendency to deceive or mislead them, or to violate a public or private confidence, or to impair or injure public interest, is deemed equally reprehensible with positive fraud, and therefore is prohibited by law, ... " Bovier's Law Dictionary - 1856 Edition Next the STANDARD OF REVEIW: In Bulloch v. United States, 763 F.2d 1115, 1121 (10th Cir. 1985), the court stated "Fraud upon the court is fraud which is directed to the judicial machinery itself and is not fraud between the parties or fraudulent documents, false statements or perjury. ... It is where the court or a member is corrupted or influenced or influence is attempted or where the judge has not performed his judicial function --- thus where the impartial functions of the court have been directly corrupted." In sum, the Ninth Amendment simply lends strong support to the view that the 'liberty' protected by the Fifth And Fourteenth Amendments from infringement by the Federal Government or the States is not restricted to rights specifically mentioned in the first eight amendments." Similarly, in Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319, 325, 326 (1937), it was said "that this category of fundamental rights includes those fundamental liberties that are “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,” such that “neither liberty nor justice would exist if [they] were sacrificed.” These hearings on judicial conduct stem from the 1980 Judicial Act which originally wasn't intended for, but did manage to immorally and by definition, fraudulently put judges above the law. For 27 years now, those who look to this branch of government for relief have been disappointed time after time again, they have been exacerbated in many instances by judges who threaten the very lives of those who petition their courts for relief. Our own former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft condemned the judicial branch of government by characterizing this branch as "organized crime". He writes: "Bankruptcy court corruption is not just a matter of bankruptcy trustees in collusion with corrupt bankruptcy judges. The corruption is supported, and justice hindered by high ranking officials in the United States Trustee Program. The corruption has advanced to punishing any and all who mention the criminal acts of trustees and organized crime operating through the United States Bankruptcy Courts. As though greed is not enough, the trustees, in collusion with others, intentionally go forth to destroy lives. Exemptions provided by law are denied debtors. Cases are intentionally, and unreasonably kept open for years. Parties in cases are sanctioned to discourage them from pursuing justice. Contempt of court powers are misused to coerce litigants into agreeing with extortion demands. This does not ensure integrity and restore public confidence. The American public, victimized and held hostage by bankruptcy court corruption, have no where to turn." This is just the tip of a very large iceberg which each day gets worse, not better. Americans simply want the Judicial Conference to do something positive, act responsibly, to remedy the harsh criticisms the Judiciary has weathered. The Judicial Conference may have interest that not only has John Ashcroft opined on such judicial crime, but other judicial officials have as well, including but not limited to Chief Judge Edith Jones at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals as follows: "Corruption in the agencies charged with enforcing our laws not only threatens communities by allowing dangerous criminals to roam free, it also undermines the confidence of our citizens in law enforcement and the criminal justice system. The same is true with respect to judicial corruption. We must all, in our own countries, lead the fight to ensure integrity within our police and judicial systems." Concerning the publication "RULES GOVERNING JUDICIAL CONDUCT AND DISABILITY PROCEEDINGS UNDERTAKEN PURSUANT TO 28 U.S.C. §§ 351-36" many in the public have expressed to me on behalf of my television series "In The Interest Of Justice ", that this document in itself, shows an appearance of impropriety. Canon 2 implies judges: Shall Avoid Impropriety and the Appearance of Impropriety in All Activities. That would include Judicial Conference activities concerning complaints against judges. The impropriety exists when judges are judging the judges. People perceive a lack of true oversight when men are the judges of their own causes, and seem to form an illegal nobility. The recommendation from the general public is that a fair and impartial tribunal of citizens should be the judges of misconduct accused of a judicial officer. "In order for democracy to be effective or meaningful as 'rule by the people,' there must be constitutional limits on government and, guarantees of civil and political rights of citizens. This will ensure, or at least encourage freedom of _expression, opinions, and publications, and the free and frequent and informed elections which are necessary for democracy to be other than a formal title. " ( "Liberal Democracy'' David Held Model of Democracy, Oxford '87' p. 310.) "Shocking to the universal sense of Justice.": Judges should not adjudicate hearings on complaints against a judge because it creates a quid pro quo situation whereby judges would tend to keep other judges off the hook for accountability. The Judicial Conference must incorporate "the doctrine of judicial restraint" and therefore accept restrictions on their conduct that might be viewed as burdensome by ordinary citizens and should do so freely and willingly (Cannon 2). Having the gumption to produce a document as the one above shows the willingness of the Judicial Conference to forego the black letter of judicial ethics in order to maintain control over the rules and keep involvement by the public out of the process. The Constitution, in Article 1, Section 9, Paragraph 3, states, "No Bill Of Attainder or Ex-post Facto Law, shall be passed." The fact is that it is perceivable that the RULES GOVERNING JUDICIAL CONDUCT are, in all practical effect, a Bill Of Attainder or Ex-post Facto Law, by assigning a commission of partial parties to decide in favor of their peers. Due Process rights concerning complaints against governmental agents MUST be fairly decided by an impartial jury of citzens because that is secured by the Constitution. "Where rights as secured by the Constitution are involved, there can be no rule making or legislation which will abrogate them." Miranda v. Ariz., 384 U.S. 436 at 491 (1966). A substantive Due Process violation occurs when government conduct violates "fundamental fairness" and is "shocking to the universal sense of Justice." Kinsella v. United States ex rel. Singleton, 361 U.S. 234, 246, 4 L. Ed. 2d 268 , 80 S. Ct. 297 (1960) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). In so holding, that court relied on Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165, 96 L. Ed. 183, 72 S. Ct. 205 (1952), where the Supreme Court applied the Due Process clause, to the "the whole course of the proceedings in order to ascertain whether they offend those canons of decency and fairness which express the notions of justice of English-speaking peoples even toward those charged with the most heinous offences." Id. at 169 (citations omitted). See also United States v. Russell, 411 U.S. 423, 36 L. Ed. 2d 366, 93 S. Ct. 1637 (1973). The aforementioned prosecutorial misconduct and official crime certainly offends the “canons of decency and fairness” spoken of by the Second Circuit. Given that we are philosophically a trickle-up government, whereby the government is by the people, Rules 11 onward accomplish just the opposite, a nobility. "Sovereignty itself is, of course, not subject to law, for it is the author and source of law; but, in our system, while sovereign powers are delegated to the agencies of government, sovereignty itself remains with the people, by whom and for whom all government exists and acts. " Justice Mathews of the US Supreme Court in the case of Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 US 356, 370* The problem is obvious when 99 percent of all complaints against judges are summarily dismissed. The public perceives a 99 percent dismissal of all complaints as a system that is broken. The report: "Implementation of the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act of 1980; A Report to the Chief Justice" by the Breyer Commission concluding that the system works well... is perceived as nothing more than a farce by the American public in light of such a high statistic for dismissal of complaints or ruling against complaints. The American Bar Association has shown through its polls that public confidence in trust is at an all-time low (less than 30%) for the judicial branch of government. There is a problem with the Judiciary in acknowledging its imperfections. Sooner or later a blow-back effect will occur against the Judiciary for suppressing the problem of judicial misconduct. America is demanding constitutionality by all three branches of government. The Judiciary Act of 1801, Section 31 , 6th congress session 2 chapter 4 is a a pre-emptive Congressional Act section that prevents the judiciary from undue rulemaking. It is a legislative Act which PROHIBITS making regulations that are REPUGNANT. “Provided always that they are not repugnant to the laws of the Untied States”. The Draft Rules of the 1980 Act are repugnant in that they don't afford an impartial hearing concerning complaints against judges. Citizens ask the Judicial Conference to show them the law and authority which grants them the right to place judges above ordinary men in the application of American justice. There is nothing in the Constitution that puts the misconduct of a judge as something less than the misconduct of any other citizen. The integrity of the judicial system is not benefited by a breed of "Judicial independence" which seeks only to protect judges from the scrutiny of the public. Only a panel of Citizens will make the process fair and impartial. It is clear to the public that the Judiciary abuses the process of oversight. The Report: JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE, INTERDEPENDENCE, AND JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY: Management Of The Courts From The Judges. Perspective; Institute for Court Management; Court Executive Development Program Phase III Project, May 2006. says on Pg 11: A review of the separation of powers doctrine and the interbranch conflicts created will enhance the understanding of judicial independence. Separation of powers does not specifically mean creation of a barrier that positively prevents any connection or contact between the branches. Preferably, it finds expression mainly in the existence of a balance among the branches. powers, in theory and in practice that makes possible independence in the context of specific reciprocal supervision.17 Although the judiciary is an independent coequal branch of government, the constitutional doctrine of separation of powers allows some overlap in the exercise of governmental functions.18 This overlap is sometimes referred to as the doctrine of overlapping functions...* This means Congressional Oversight must play a role in the continued process by the Judicial Conference, and the Judiciary Committees in the Senate and House must be informed of all Public comments. When a judge makes a void order and uses fraud to procure it, it becomes an both ethical and legal question for charges of misconduct, and if found guilty a judge's ruling should immediately effect the original case by a ruling from the Judicial Council. Breaking the law must be perceived as unethical and subject to discipline and charges, and never an act of judicial discretion. That is the right way to look at it. In RE: "A void judgment which includes judgment entered by a court which lacks jurisdiction over the parties or the subject matter, or lacks inherent power to enter the particular judgment, or an order procured by fraud, can be attacked at any time, in any court, either directly or collaterally, provided that the party is properly before the court", Long v. Shorebank Development Corp., 182 F.3d 548 ( C.A. 7 Ill. 1999). ADD TO THE RILES: Complaints are too often ignored by the Judicial Conference and it hardly ever gives notice to the movant. The citizens demand that once a complaint is filed, an index number must immediately be issued by the ruling authorty, and that an official hearing must be granted within 30 days. The finding must address each of the specific allegations and be released publically and put on the record. Canon 2: Public confidence in the judiciary is eroded by irresponsible or improper conduct by judges. A judge must avoid all impropriety and appearance of impropriety. A judge must expect to be the subject of constant public scrutiny. Rewritten to apply to the Judicial Conference: "Public confidence in the Judicial Conference is eroded by irresponsible or improper sealing, and dismissals of complaints against judges, and that gives the appearance of NOT avoiding all impropriety and appearance of impropriety. the Judicial Conference must expect to be the subject of constant public scrutiny. EXCERPTS By Geraldine Hawkins; REPORTER: Chief Judge Edith Jones of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals spoke at a Harvard Law School seminar advising attendees that the AMERICAN LEGAL SYSTEM IS CORRUPT BEYOND RECOGNITION March 7, 2003 The American legal system has been corrupted almost beyond recognition, Judge Edith Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, told the Federalist Society of Harvard Law School on February 28. she said that the question of what is morally right is routinely sacrificed to what is politically expedient. The change has come because legal philosophy has descended to nihilism. Judge Edith H. Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit talks to members of Harvard Law School's Federalist Society. Jones said that the question of what is morally right is routinely sacrificed to what is politically expedient. "The integrity of law, its religious roots, its transcendent quality are disappearing. I saw the movie 'Chicago' with Richard Gere the other day. That's the way the public thinks about lawyers," she told the students."The first 100 years of American lawyers were trained on Blackstone, who wrote that: 'The law of nature . dictated by God himself . is binding . in all counties and at all times; no human laws are of any validity if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all force and all their authority . from this original.' The Framers created a government of limited power with this understanding of the rule of law - that it was dependent on transcendent religious obligation," said Jones. She said that the business about all of the Founding Fathers being deists is "just wrong," or "way overblown." She says they believed in "faith and reason," and this did not lead to intolerance. "This is not a prescription for intolerance or narrow sectarianism," she continued, "for unalienable rights were given by God to all our fellow citizens. Having lost sight of the moral and religious foundations of the rule of law, we are vulnerable to the destruction of our freedom, our equality before the law and our self-respect. It is my fervent hope that this new century will experience a revival of the original understanding of the rule of law and its roots."The answer is a recovery of moral principle, the sine qua non of an orderly society. Post 9/11, many events have been clarified. It is hard to remain a moral relativist when your own people are being killed."According to the judge, the first contemporary threat to the rule of law comes from within the legal system itself. Alexis de Tocqueville, author of Democracy in America and one of the first writers to observe the United States from the outside looking-in, "described lawyers as a natural aristocracy in America," Jones told the students. "The intellectual basis of their profession and the study of law based on venerable precedents bred in them habits of order and a taste for formalities and predictability." As Tocqueville saw it, "These qualities enabled attorneys to stand apart from the passions of the majority. Lawyers were respected by the citizens and able to guide them and moderate the public's whims. Lawyers were essential to tempering the potential tyranny of the majority."Some lawyers may still perceive our profession in this flattering light, but to judge from polls and the tenor of lawyer jokes, I doubt the public shares Tocqueville's view anymore, and it is hard for us to do so."The legal aristocracy have shed their professional independence for the temptations and materialism associated with becoming businessmen. Because law has become a self-avowed business, pressure mounts to give clients the advice they want to hear, to pander to the clients' goal through deft manipulation of the law. . While the business mentality produces certain benefits, like occasional competition to charge clients lower fees, other adverse effects include advertising and shameless self-promotion. The legal system has also been wounded by lawyers who themselves no longer respect the rule of law," The judge quoted Kenneth Starr as saying, "It is decidedly unchristian to win at any cost," and added that most lawyers agree with him.However, "An increasingly visible and vocal number apparently believe that the strategic use of anger and incivility will achieve their aims. Others seem uninhibited about making misstatements to the court or their opponents or destroying or falsifying evidence," she claimed. "When lawyers cannot be trusted to observe the fair processes essential to maintaining the rule of law, how can we expect the public to respect the process?"Lawsuits Do Not Bring 'Social Justice' Another pernicious development within the legal system is the misuse of lawsuits, according to her."We see lawsuits wielded as weapons of revenge," she says. "Lawsuits are brought that ultimately line the pockets of lawyers rather than their clients. . The lawsuit is not the best way to achieve social justice, and to think it is, is a seriously flawed hypothesis. There are better ways to achieve social goals than by going into court." Jones said that employment litigation is a particularly fertile field for this kind of abuse. "Seldom are employment discrimination suits in our court supported by direct evidence of race or sex-based animosity. Instead, the courts are asked to revisit petty interoffice disputes and to infer invidious motives from trivial comments or work-performance criticism. Recrimination, second-guessing and suspicion plague the workplace when tenuous discrimination suits are filed . creating an atmosphere in which many corporate defendants are forced into costly settlements because they simply cannot afford to vindicate their positions."While the historical purpose of the common law was to compensate for individual injuries, this new litigation instead purports to achieve redistributive social justice. Scratch the surface of the attorneys' self-serving press releases, however, and one finds how enormously profitable social redistribution is for those lawyers who call themselves 'agents of change.'"Jones wonders, "What social goal is achieved by transferring millions of dollars to the lawyers, while their clients obtain coupons or token rebates. "The judge quoted George Washington who asked in his Farewell Address, "Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths . in courts of justice? "Similarly, asked Jones, how can a system founded on law survive if the administrators of the law daily display their contempt for it?"Lawyers' private morality has definite public consequences," she said. "Their misbehavior feeds on itself, encouraging disrespect and debasement of the rule of law as the public become encouraged to press their own advantage in a system they perceive as manipulatable. "The second threat to the rule of law comes from government, which is encumbered with agencies that have made the law so complicated that it is difficult to decipher and often contradicts itself."Agencies have an inherent tendency to expand their mandate," says Jones. "At the same time, their decision-making often becomes parochial and short-sighted. They may be captured by the entities that are ostensibly being regulated, or they may pursue agency self-interest at the expense of the public welfare. Citizens left at the mercy of selective and unpredictable agency action have little recourse."Jones recommends three books by Philip Howard: The Death of Common Sense, The Collapse of the Common Good and The Lost Art of Drawing the Line, which further delineate this problem. The third and most comprehensive threat to the rule of law arises from contemporary legal philosophy."Throughout my professional life, American legal education has been ruled by theories like positivism, the residue of legal realism, critical legal studies, post-modernism and other philosophical fashions," said Jones. "Each of these theories has a lot to say about the 'is' of law, but none of them addresses the 'ought,' the moral foundation or direction of law."Jones quoted Roger C. Cramton, a law professor at Cornell University, who wrote in the 1970s that "the ordinary religion of the law school classroom" is "a moral relativism tending toward nihilism, a pragmatism tending toward an amoral instrumentalism, a realism tending toward cynicism, an individualism tending toward atomism, and a faith in reason and democratic processes tending toward mere credulity and idolatry." No 'Great Awakening' In Law School ClassroomsThe judge said ruefully, "There has been no Great Awakening in the law school classroom since those words were written." She maintained that now it is even worse because faith and democratic processes are breaking down."The problem with legal philosophy today is that it reflects all too well the broader post-Enlightenment problem of philosophy," Jones said. **************************************
Francis C. P. Knize testifies at a hearing on this subject, one national hearing, only 3 citizens for the entire country are allowed to speak, addressing 27 years of judges breaking the law, gross judicial misconduct:
Always looking to learn something new, new places to travel to, and contacts for business, import/export, traveling, and forwarding my screenwriting interests and projects.
