The news headline reads:
...at
the same time Joe Biden just
issued an "Executive Order" to try to protect the ESG stock
profits owned by his family and his campaign financiers. What a
bold-faced act of corruption that was! According to federal
investigators and forensic accounting experts, we are now informed
that:
A. White
House Staff, federal judges and Congress hold ESG, Valic and AIG
stocks that conduit for lobbysts and millionaire directives.
B.
Case histories are provided,
herein, from among many hundreds of thousands of examples, proving
that public officials make decisions based on bias, cronyism,
favoratism and pre-arranged bribes.
C.
Goldman Sachs, McKinsey Consulting, Deloitte, Silicon Valley Bank and
a group of insider consultants in the San Francisco Bay area and
Washington, DC sell illicit
STOCK BRIBERY CONDUITS to
White House Staff, U.S. Senators, members of Congress and Department
of Energy staff in an
organized “enterprise”.
D.
The Valic and AIG stock market accounts are arranged for politicians
to provide a beneficiary profiteering route, for those politicians,
and their family members, in exchange for favorable public policy
decisions.
E. Political and economic cronyism bias are the
controlling criteria for most judicial and public poliy decisions
since 2001.
"ESG", "VALIC" and "AIG" are code for "Insider Payola DNC Stock Bribes" that exist to benefit White House financiers.
The framers of the Fourteenth Amendment stressed that the due process and equal protection clauses created a right to fair and impartial government acts, hearings and trials. Courts have repeatedly held that an impartial judge or public official is an indispensable element of those rights. The facts, though, show both bias and prejudice in fact and in appearance, and a lack of legal qualification and temperament to preside in modern policy cases. Each alone is sufficient to require many politicians or judge's disqualification and recusal.
Due process demands a fair and impartial hearing by a neutral and detached public official or magistrate. Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U.S. 103 (1975); Ward v. Village of Monroevill, 409 U.S. 57, 62 (1972). A right to an impartial judge is so basic to due process that courts can never treat its infraction as a harmless error. Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 23 (1967). “...the tribunals of the country shall not only be impartial in the controversies submitted to them but shall give assurance that they are impartial...” Berger v. the United States, 255 U.S. 22, 35-6 (1921).
Rule 1.2 states “Promoting Confidence in the Judiciary - A judge shall act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the independence, integrity, and impartiality* of the judiciary, and shall avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety.”
Public officials have a duty to promote confidence in the judiciary and in Congress.
The citizens do not feel that the present Congress or White House will act independently, with integrity and impartiality regarding the present matters of public policy because those officials transact bribes via the stock market.
Actual improprieties include violations of law, court rules or provisions of the Codes of ethics. The test for appearance of impropriety is whether the conduct would create in reasonable minds and a perception that the public officials violated this Code or engaged in other conduct that reflects adversely on the government's honesty, impartiality, temperament, or fitness to serve the public.
Rule 1.3 provides the standard. Rule 1.3 states that “Avoiding Abuse of the Prestige of Judicial Office - A judge shall not abuse the prestige of judicial office to advance the personal or economic interests* of the judge or others or allow others to do so.” This is mirrored in other government regulations.
The current Congress and White House, as public offices, has an economic interest in all matters via stock market ownerships. It would be unfair and unreasonable if the current Congress and White House would be allowed to preside over public matters while owning stock market assets that fill their family wallets with unjust gain and the filth of corrupt gain.
https://hbr.org › 2022 › 03 › an-inconvenient-truth-about-esg-investing
As of December 2021, assets under management at global exchange-traded "sustainable" funds that publicy set environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investment objectives amounted to more than...
https://www.cnbc.com › 2021 › 08 › 24 › blackrocks-former-sustainable-investing-chief-says-esg-is-a-dangerous-placebo.html
Aug 24, 2021According to data from FactSet and published by the Wall Street Journal, ESG funds had an average fee of 0.2% at the end of 2020, whereas other more standard baskets of stocks had fees of 0.14%....
https://www.marketwatch.com › story › elon-musk-called-esg-a-scam-did-the-tesla-chief-do-investors-a-favor-11653171110
May 23, 2022"ESG is a scam. It has been weaponized by phony social justice warriors," tweeted Musk, lamenting that ExxonMobil topped Tesla. "Ridiculous," was Wood's terse response to Tesla's removal.
https://www.forbes.com › sites › qai › 2022 › 05 › 20 › tesla-is-being-booted-from-the-esg-index
May 20, 2022But Tesla CEO Elon Musk is calling the ESG index "a scam." "Exxon is rated top ten best in world for environment, social & governance (ESG) by S&P 500, while Tesla didn't make the list!" he...
https://www.newsweek.com › esg-woke-scam-infecting-our-corporations-changing-our-nation-opinion-1761408
Nov 28, 2022ESG is the latest trendy acronym designed to empower the elites at the expense of us non-elites. The letters ESG stand for environmental, social, and governance. Together they represent a...
https://medium.com › armchair-musings › esg-investing-is-the-worlds-biggest-scam-486af6ba74c9
Jun 21, 2022ESG Investing Is The World's Biggest Scam Environmental, Social, and Governance principles sound nice, but here's why the entire sector is built on pillars of false virtue. Photo by Karsten...
https://www.barrons.com › articles › elon-musk-tesla-esg-51653336436
May 24, 2022The detached observer might ask, if Tesla isn't fit for an ESG grouping of companies, then who is? The nondetached Musk just tweeted, "ESG is a scam. It has been weaponized by phony social...
https://asiatimes.com › 2022 › 05 › musk-is-right-esg-stock-ratings-are-a-scam
May 30, 2022Tesla CEO Elon Musk, shown at an electric vehicle factory, called ESG ratings 'a scam' after an index dropped Tesla. Photo: Getty Images via The Convesation / Maja Hitij A major stock index that tracks sustainable investments dropped electric vehicle-maker Tesla from its list in May 2022 - but it kept oil giant ExxonMobil.
https://www.chicoer.com › 2023 › 03 › 22 › letter-dont-fall-victim-to-esg-investment-scam
2 days agoLetter: Don't fall victim to ESG investment 'scam'. Last month I received the CalPERS Membership newsletter, in which the CEO and the board stated ESG would be a qualifier for investing in ...
https://www.washingtontimes.com › news › 2022 › may › 30 › musk-right-to-call-esg-a-scam
May 30, 2022Elon Musk took to Twitter this month to speak the truth: "ESG is a scam.". Attacks from left-wing "wacktivists" ensued, while Mr. Musk sat back and grabbed his popcorn, clearly relishing ...
WhereasWhite House executives, U.S. Senators, and Government agency
executives colludedwith Silicon Valley oligarchs, operating,
together, as an “Enterprise”,to coordinate insider stock market
‘Stimulus Scams’that involved funding blockades, blacklists,
contracted tabloid media assassinations and RICO Racketeeringlaw
violations, Anti-trustlaw violations, IP law violations,lobbying law
violations and various civil and criminal acts that harmed domestic
citizens andDemocracy. This case matter is well known to Courts,
media, federal law enforcement and innearly a million news articles.
It is not possible for this Judge, who knows many of the participants
in this case, to not have seen theconflict of interest herein, at
first blush.
Asimple cross-comparison of the ICIJ, FINCEN,
Interpol, SEC, GAO forensic accounting and XKEYSCORE, et al,
databases proves theillicit financial interactions between
Defendants. Such a check can be technically accomplished within 60
minutes, or less, according tofederal IT experts.
Almostevery
single investor of Elon Musk is also the primary financier and
beneficiary of the politicians, and their Congressional
shenanigans,that used taxpayer money and resources to give Musk's
companies all that free money. For example, Dianne Feinstein's family
run the HRservice (Herb Newman), the construction company, the
railroads, the building leases (CBRE), the China funds (Mart Bailey,
Steve Westly,Steve Spinner, et al) and swap staff members for Tesla
and Solyndra. Feinstein and Pelosi blocked funding for all Tesla
competitors forthe same State and Federal cash and tax waivers and
for the NUMMI factory. The California and Washington, DC politicians,
personally,made billions off insider trading, pump-and-dumps and
payola. Felonies? You Bet! Valic, who the Judge invests massively,
with, runspart of the Tesla and Elon Musk cash.
Reporters
and family members of California politicians, including U.S.
Senators, who Plaintiffs has a personal relationship with and knows
the staff of, have contacted Plaintiffs. Based on current
investigative information, federal finance reports on the Judge’s
sources of income from stock market investments, speakers fees and
other sources and social media postings, photographs and social
photography archives from Getty, Drew Altizer and related Washington,
DC ‘high-society’ photographers there appears t be conflicts of
interest between public officials and this case. Senators Dianne
Feinstein, Nancy Pelosi, Kamala Harris, Harry Reid (Deceased, but
records acquired), White House staff, and other related parties,
appear to have given orders to the Judge’s office to “Stop this
case no matter what..” stating that “This will cut off the stock
market income of 90% of the DNC..”. As, for example, Chief Judge
Elaine D Kaplan is a renown spokesperson and speaker for the DNC and
this case has the potential to cause the arrest, indictment, censure,
Congressional charges of Contempt, and other hardships for “90% of
the DNC”, there is a reasonable assumption, that any person of
average intelligence could make, that this Judge is overly conflicted
in this matter.
Asone of the founders of the
“Anti-corruption Party’, there are also basic conflicts of
interest between the “Anti-corruptionParty’s” : “NO Public
Official, or their family, should own stock market assets because
that is how bribes are paid” stanceand the DNC’s stance, per
Nancy Pelosi, that: “All public officials and judges should get
stock market perks”. The Plaintiffs is an active proponent of the
Expansion, FBI enforcementand application of the federal STOCK ACT,
which most of the opposition are in violation of.
Facebook,
Google, Alphabet, Tesla Motors, SpaceX and other Big Tech companies
as well as the Senators mentioned, co-partnered in the government
criminal endeavors mentioned in this case. Reporters have stated to
Plaintiffs that financial disclosures indicate that those who own
direct, or mutual funds, together, in this entities are Defendants
and ‘enemies’ of the Plaintiffs. Plaintiffs and advisors request
that the Judge Swear, Warrant and Certify that they, or their partner
own no stocks or interests in any “Big Tech” companies and that
the points in the Co-Defendant Senator’s financial disclosures (Per
https://www.openthebooks.com,
https://sunlightfoundation.com/,
and Senate Investigators) do not cross over in the Judge’s
financedisclosure in any non-coincidence manner.
Youcan
see the reports from Congress, Federal Agencies and Investigators
verifying these assertions at:
http://american-corruption.com/public/
The
federally documented reports, below, prove that the number oneway to
bribe Judges and public officials is via Dark Money stock market
transactions and covert Mutual Funds ‘packing’.
Such
conflicts cannot even have a hint of possibility in a casethis
important to every American citizen.
How can you ever
trust a single judge to rule fairly on a caseinvolving famous
politicians and notorious millionaires that the Judge knows, parties
with, co-invests with and gets political perksfrom?
There
is a pandemic of crooked, bribed, judges in America as thefollowing
evidence shows. We must not give leverage to ANY possibility that a
Judge could be influenced.
TheJudge has confirmed,
herself, extensive investments in: Valic Large Cap Investment Fund,
Valic Mid Cap Investment, Fund, ValicSmall Cap Investment Fund, Valic
Global & Internat'l Equity Fund, Valic Specialty Fund, Valic
Fixed Income whichare investment fronts for Google, Alphabet, Tesla
and the other corrupt companies who are DOE/Defendants in this case
and are underfederal criminal investigations and those companies are
regulated by the Senators and White House officials charged in these
crimes. TheUnited States Government has sued ‘Valic’, over and
over, for a variety of misdeeds and dirty financial tricks. ‘Valic’
recentlyhad to change their name in order to try to ward off more bad
press, just like crooked ‘Facebook’ changed it’s name to ‘Meta’
in order to try to ward off more bad press from Facebook being outed
as a corruption empire. Thenew name of Valic is “AIG Retirement
Serices”.
Readerswill recall that in the 2007-2008
“stimulus scam” a certain contingent of Congress people insisted
that a company called AIGshould get handed a massive load of free
taxpayer cash. As we all know by now, insurance giant AIG sparked
national outrage bypaying more than $165 million in executive bonuses
after receiving a $170 billion taxpayer bailout in the last “Stimulus
Scam”. Whatfewer people know is that AIG gave more than $9 million
in campaign contributions to Congress and the Congress People that
lobbied FORthe AIG give-away were the people who AIG gave political
resources to. Valic/AIG is suspected to be a money-laundering Dark
Money routebetween Big Tech and members of Congress.
Plaintiffs
provided information and research to Robert Simon, the Producer for
CBS News 60 Minutes TV investigative show. 60Minutes produced
segments deeply relevant to this case including: Congress Trading On
Insider Information; The Lobbyists Playbook;The Cleantech Crash; The
Data Brokers and others. The pertinent sections of those news items
can be viewed in the film: HowPolitical Corruption Works located at
http://american-corruption.com/NEWS_VIDEO_COVERAGE/
Robert
(Bob) Simon was killed in a suspiciouscar crash. Bystanders described
someone leaning into the car, at the crash, and
sprayingsomething.
This information was publicly available
to The Judge, for years,prior to this case and was publicly discussed
among the Judges peers and associates, to this day:
Washington,
D.C. is a town that runs on inside information - butshould our
elected officials be able to use that information to pad their own
pockets? As Steve Kroft, Bob Simon’s peer at 60 Minutes,reports,
members of Congress and their aides have regular access to powerful
political intelligence, and many have made well-timed stockmarket
trades in the very industries they regulate. For now, the practice is
perfectly legal, but some say it's time for the law tochange.
Even
if a Judge or Senator denies that they could be influenced bypersonal
favorites or by stocks that all of their friends own, Psychology
proves that assertion to be virtually impossible to bebelieved.
Judges, or public officials would not deny that they subconsciously
assert influence in a school to make sure their childhas the best
treatment and that kids that bully their child get the most
punishment. Why should anyone think a Judge or Senator would
notconsciously, or subconsciously, assert influence over something
that buys them mansions, trips to the Virgin Islands and sexy
parties?
Judges and Senators in this case are either
financed by, friends, with, sleeping with, dating the staff of,
holding stock market assets in, promised a revolving door job or
government service contracts from, partying with, personal friends
with, photographed at private events with, exchanging emails with,
business associates of or directed by; our business adversaries, or
the Senators and politicians that those business adversaries pay
campaign finances to, or supply political digital search manipulation
services to. Criminal U.S. Senators coordinated and profited in these
schemes. Their own family members, who Plaintiffs, and his peers know
personally, have now supplied evidence against them.
In
one published report whereSteve Kroft was the correspondent, withIra
Rosen and Gabrielle Schonder as producers,it was shown that, for
national elections, public officials, including congressmenand
senators are expending much of their time and their energy raising
the millions of dollars in campaign funds they'll need justto hold
onto a job that pays $174,000 a year.
Few of them are
doing it for the salary and all of them will saythey are doing it to
serve the public. But there are other benefits: Power, prestige, and
the opportunity to become a Washington insiderwith access to
information and connections that no one else has, in an environment
of privilege where rules that govern the rest of thecountry, don't
always apply to them.
Most former congressmen and senators
manage to leave Washington -if they ever leave Washington - with more
money in their pockets than they had when they arrived, and as you
are about to see, the biggestchallenge is often avoiding temptation.
Judges lives are set according to which Senators, and other public
officials are inoffice, Judges have even more incentive to rig
political decisions because most of them own mansions they can’t
pay for with thespeaker fees and stock perks their office
provides.
Renown anti-corruption investigative reporter:
Peter Schweizer,was asked to comment:
Peter Schweizer:
“This is a venture opportunity. This is anopportunity to leverage
your position in public service and use that position to enrich
yourself, your friends, and your family.”
Peter
Schweizer is a fellow at the Hoover Institution, aconservative think
tank at Stanford University. A year ago he began working on a book
about soft corruption in Washington with a team ofeight student
researchers, who reviewed financial disclosure records. It became a
jumping off point for our own story, and we haveindependently
verified the material we've used.
Schweizer says he wanted
to know why some congressmen and senatorsmanaged to accumulate
significant wealth beyond their salaries, and proved particularly
adept at buying and selling stocks.
Schweizer: “There
are all sorts of forms of ‘honest’grafts that congressmen engage
in that allow them to become very, very wealthy. So it's not illegal,
but I think it's highly unethical,I think it's highly offensive, and
wrong.”
Steve Kroft: “What do you mean honest
graft?”
Schweizer: “For example insider trading on the
stock market.If you are a member of Congress, those laws are deemed
not to apply.”
Kroft: “So congressman get a pass on
insider trading?”
Schweizer: “They do. The fact is, if
you sit on a healthcarecommittee and you know that Medicare, for
example, is-- is considering not reimbursing for a certain drug
that's market movinginformation. And if you can trade stock on-- off
of that information and do so legally, that's a great profit making
opportunity. And thatsort of behavior goes on.”
Kroft:
“Why does Congress get a pass on this?”
Schweizer:
“It's really the way the rules have been defined.And the people who
make the rules are the political class in Washington. And they've
conveniently written them in such a way thatthey don't apply to
themselves.”
The buying and selling of stock by
corporate insiders who haveaccess to non-public information that
could affect the stock price can be a criminal offense, just ask
hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnamwho recently got 11 years in prison
for doing it. But, congressional lawmakers have no corporate
responsibilities and have long beenconsidered exempt from insider
trading laws, even though they have daily access to non-public
information and plenty of opportunities totrade on it.
Schweizer:
“We know that during the health care debate peoplewere trading
health care stocks. We know that during the financial crisis of 2008
they were getting out of the market before the rest ofAmerica really
knew what was going on.”
In mid September 2008 with the
Dow Jones Industrial average stillabove ten thousand, Treasury
Secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke were
holding closed door briefings withcongressional leaders, and
privately warning them that a global financial meltdown could occur
within a few days. One of thoseattending was Alabama Representative
Spencer Bachus, then the ranking Republican member on the House
Financial Services Committee and nowits chairman.
Schweizer:
“These meetings were so sensitive-- that theywould actually
confiscate cell phones and Blackberries going into those meetings.
What we know is that those meetings were held one dayand literally
the next day Congressman Bachus would engage in buying stock options
based on apocalyptic briefings he had the day beforefrom the Fed
chairman and treasury secretary. I mean, talk about a stock
tip.”
While Congressman Bachus was publicly trying to
keep the economyfrom cratering, he was privately betting that it
would, buying option funds that would go up in value if the market
went down. He wouldmake a variety of trades and profited at a time
when most Americans were losing their shirts.
Congressman
Bachus declined to talk to us, so we went to hisoffice and ran into
his Press Secretary Tim Johnson.
Kroft: “Look we're not
alleging that Congressman Bachus hasviolated any laws. All...the only
thing we're interested in talking to him is about his trades. “
Tim
Johnson: “Ok...Ok that's a fair enough request.”
What
we got was a statement from Congressman Bachus' office thathe never
trades on non-public information, or financial services stock.
However, his financial disclosure forms seem to indicateotherwise.
Bachus made money trading General Electric stock during the crisis,
and a third of GE's business is in financial services.
During
the healthcare debate of 2009, members of Congress weretrading health
care stocks, including House Minority Leader John Boehner, who led
the opposition against the so-called public option,government funded
insurance that would compete with private companies. Just days before
the provision was finally killed off,Boehner bought health insurance
stocks, all of which went up. Now speaker of the House, Congressman
Boehner also declined to beinterviewed, so we tracked him down at his
weekly press conference.
Kroft: “You made a number of
trades going back to the healthcare debate. You bought some insurance
stock. Did you make those trades based on non-public information?
“
John Boehner: “I have not made any decisions on
day-to-daytrading activities in my account. And haven't for years. I
don't-- I do not do it, haven't done it and wouldn't do it.”
Later
Boehner's spokesman told us that the health care trades weremade by
the speaker's financial adviser, who he only consults with about once
a year.
Peter Schweizer: “Weneed to find out whether
they're part of a blind trust or not.”
It turns out you
CAN pay bribes,though, through Mutual Funds AND Blind Trusts.
Peter
Schweizer thinks the timing is suspicious, and believescongressional
leaders should have their stock funds in blind trusts.
Schweizer:
“Whether it's uh-- $15,000 or $150,000, theprinciple in my mind is
that it's simply wrong and it shouldn't take place.”
But
there is a long history of self-dealing in Washington. And itdoesn't
always involve stock trades.
Congressmen and senators also
seem to have a special knack forland and real estate deals. When
Illinois Congressman Dennis Hastert became speaker of the House in
1999, he was worth a few hundredthousand dollars. He left the job
eight years later a multi-millionaire.
Jan Strasma: “The
road that Hastert wants to build will gothrough these farm fields
right here.”
In 2005, Speaker Hastert got a $207 million
federal earmark tobuild the Prairie Parkway through these cornfields
near his home. What Jan Strasma and his neighbors didn't know was
that Hastert hadalso bought some land adjacent to where the highway
is supposed to go.
Strasma: “...And five months after
this earmark went throughhe sold that land and made a bundle of
money.”
Kroft: “How much?”
Strasma: “Two
million dollars.”
Kroft: “What do you think of
it?”
Strasma: “It stinks.”
We stopped by
the former speaker's farm, to ask him about the landdeal, but he was
off in Washington where he now works as a lobbyist. His office told
us that property values in the area began toappreciate even before
the earmark and that the Hastert land was several miles from the
nearest exit.
But the same good fortune befell former New
Hampshire Senator JuddGregg, who helped steer nearly $70 million
dollars in government funds towards redeveloping this defunct Air
Force base, which he andhis brother both had a commercial interest
in. Gregg has said that he violated no congressional rules.
It's
but one more example of good things happening to powerfulmembers of
Congress. Another is the access to initial public stock offerings,
the opportunity to buy a new stock at insider prices justas it goes
on the market. They can be incredibly lucrative and hard to get.
Schweizer: “If you were a senator, Steve, and I gave
you$10,000 cash, one or both of us is probably gonna go to jail. But
if I'm a corporate executive and you're a senator, and I give you
IPOshares in stock and over the course of one day that stock nets you
$100,000, that's completely legal.”
Plaintiffs had a
social relationship with the staff of former HouseSpeaker Nancy
Pelosi. She and her husband have participated in at least eight IPOs.
One of those came in 2008, from Visa, just as atroublesome piece of
legislation that would have hurt credit card companies, began making
its way through the House. Undisturbed by apotential conflict of
interest the Pelosis purchased 5,000 shares of Visa at the initial
price of $44 dollars. Two days later it wastrading at $64. The credit
card legislation never made it to the floor of the
House.
Congresswoman Pelosi also declined our request for
an interview,but agreed to call on us if we attended a news
conference.
Kroft: “Madam Leader, I wanted to ask you
why you and yourhusband back in March of 2008 accepted and
participated in a very large IPO deal from Visa at a time there was
major legislationaffecting the credit card companies making its way
through the-- through the House.”
Nancy Pelosi:
“But--”
Kroft: “And did you consider that to be a
conflict ofinterest?”
Pelosi: “The-- y—uh--, errr--
I-- I don'tknow what your point is of your question. Is there some
point that you want to make with that?”
Kroft: “Well,
err...uhm...I-- I-- I guess whatI'm asking is do you think it's all
right for a speaker to accept a very preferential, favorable stock
deal?”
Pelosi: “Well, we didn't”, she lied
Kroft:
“You participated in the IPO. And at the time you werespeaker of
the House. You don't think it was a conflict of interest or had the
appearance--”
Pelosi: “No, it was not--”
Kroft:
“--of a conflict of interest?”
Pelosi: “--it
doesn't-- it only has appearance if you decidethat you're going to
have-- elaborate on a false premise. But it-- it-- it's not true and
that's that.”
Kroft: “I don't understand what part's
not true.”
Pelosi: “Yes sir. That-- that I would act
upon aninvestment.”
Congresswoman Pelosi pointed out
that the tough credit cardlegislation eventually passed, but it was
two years later and was initiated in the Senate.
Many
believe that, even though they are older than the hills,Nancy Pelosi
and Dianne Feinstein never retire because they are they key conduits
to the West Coast controlled Big Tech stock marketpayola bribes. The
“Enterprise” won’t allow them to retire because it would break
the whole Big Tech stock market bribery cycle.While it is unlikely
that they are “drinking baby blood from Chinese labor camp work
prison babies to stay alive so long”,as activists have claimed,
these two are not allowed to retire by the “Enterprise” that
profits from the Big Tech stock market bribes.
Pelosi: “I
will hold my record in terms of fighting thecredit card companies as
speaker of the House or as a member of Congress up against
anyone.”
Corporate executives, members of the executive
branch and allfederal judges are subject to strict conflict of
interest rules. But not the people who write the laws.
Pelosi
and Feinstein put laws in the operation of America, andDemocracy,
that specifically exclude THEM from the law...only them! Everyone
knows that it is bad to rape sheep on the front steps ofCity Hall.
Imagine how you would feel if you found out that fine print had been
quietly added to The Constitution that said “Nocitizen may rape
sheep in public….Except Nancy Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein!”. That
is essentially what happened with the lawaround public officials and
stock market payola! When Google, Elon Musk and Facebook are paying
Senators off via the stock market,justice has fallen off a
cliff!
Schweizer: “If you are a member of Congress and
you sit onthe defense committee, you are free to trade defense stock
as much as you want to if you're on the Senate banking committee you
can tradebank stock as much as you want and that regularly goes on--
in-- in all these committees.”
Brian Baird: “There
should only be one thing in your mindwhen you're drafting
legislation, 'Is this good for the United States of America?' That's
it. If you're startingto say to yourself 'how's this going to affect
my investments,' you've got-- you've got a mixed agenda and a mixed
purpose for beingthere.”
Brian Baird is a former
congressman from Washington state whoserved six terms in the house
before retiring last year. He spent half of those 12 years trying to
get his colleagues to prohibitinsider trading in Congress and
establish some rules governing conflicts of interest.
Baird:
“One line in a bill in Congress can be worth millionsand millions
of dollars. There was one night, we had a late, late night caucus and
you could kind of tell how a vote was going to gothe next day. I
literally walked home and I thought, 'Man, if you-- if you went
online and made-- some significant trades, you could makea lot of
money on this.' You-- you could just see it. You could see the
potential here.”
So in 2004, Baird and Congresswoman
Louise Slaughter introducedthe Stock Act which would make it illegal
for members of Congress to trade stocks on non-public information and
require them to reporttheir stock trades every 90 days instead of
once a year.
Kroft: “How far did you get with
this?”
Baird: “We didn't get anywhere. Just flat died.
Wentnowhere.”
Kroft: “How many cosponsors did you
get?”
Baird: “I think we got six.”
Kroft:
“Six doesn't sound like a very big amount.”
Baird:
“It's not, Steve. You-- you could have-- 'NationalCherry Pie Week'
and get 100 cosponsors.”
When Baird finally managed to
get a congressional hearing on theStock Act, almost no one showed up.
It's reintroduced every session, but is buried so deep in the Capitol
we had trouble findingcongressmen who had even heard of it.
Kroft:
“Have you ever heard of the Stock Act?”
Steve Palazzo:
“The what?”
Kroft: “The Stock Act. Do you know
anything about it?”
Congressman: “No.”
Kroft:
“Congressman. Congressman. Congressman.”
Congressman
Quayle: “I haven't heard about that one yet.”
Kroft:
“Have you ever heard of something called the
StockAct?”
Congressman Watt: “No.”
Male
voice: “I've heard about, but not. I can't say it's anissue I've
spent a lot of time on.”
Male voice: “I would have no
problem with that.”
Kroft: “Okay.”
Male
voice: “But then again I am a big fan of, you know,instant
disclosure on almost everything.”
Kroft: “They're
looking for co-sponsors.”
Male voice: “And yet, I've
never heard of it.”
Baird: “When you have a bill like
this that makes so muchsense and you can't get the co-sponsorships,
you can't get the leadership to move it, it gets tremendously
frustrating. Set asidethat it's the right thing to do, it's good
politics. People want their Congress to function well. It still
baffles me.”
But what baffles Baird even more is that
the situation has gottenworse. In the past few years a whole new
totally unregulated, $100 million dollar industry has grown up in
Washington called politicalintelligence. It employs former
congressmen and former staffers to scour the halls of the Capitol
gathering valuable non-publicinformation then selling it to hedge
funds and traders on Wall Street who can trade on it.
Baird:
“Now if you're a political intel guy. And you get thatinformation.
Long before it's public. Long before somebody wakes up the next
morning and reads or watches the television or whatever,you've got
it. And you can make real-- real-time trades before anybody
else.”
Baird says “its taken what would be a criminal
enterpriseanyplace else in the country and turned it into a
profitable business model.”
Baird: “The town is all
about people saying-- what do youknow that I don't know. This is the
currency of Washington, D.C. And it's that kind of informational
currency that translates into realcurrency. Maybe it's over drinks
maybe somebody picks up a phone. And says you know just to let you
know it's in the bill. Trades happen.Can't trace 'em. If you can
trace 'em, it's not illegal. It's a pretty great system. You feel
like an idiot to not take advantage ofit.” Public figures trading
and manipulating the stock market are an “Enterprise”operating a
Racketeering scam at the expense of citizens like Plaintiffs.
The
fact remains: Judges and public officials get paidpolitical bribes,
in the modern world, not with manila envelopes under a table at a bar
but with COVERT DARK MONEY STOCK MARKETASSETS!
Recentlythe
Supreme Court’s Roberts said“Judges Must be Ethical” afterOver
100 U.S. Judges Were CaughtViolating Ethics Rules(
https://www.theepochtimes.com/supreme-courts-roberts-says-judges-must-be-ethical-after-over-100-caught-violating-rule_4188383.html
)
Thechief justice of the Supreme Court in his year-end
report called on federal judges to work hard to adhere to ethics
rules afterover 100 were caught violating a rule that requires judges
recuse in any matter in which they have a personal financial
interest.
ChiefJustice John
Roberts cited (pdf)
a Wall Street Journal investigation that uncovered violations
by131 federal judges across 685 cases between 2010 and
2018.
TheGeorge W. Bush nominee portrayed the number of
violations as small, noting that they represented less than
three-hundredths of onepercent of the 2.5 million civil cases filed
in the district courts in years studied.
“Letme be
crystal clear: the Judiciary takes this matter seriously. We expect
judges to adhere to the highest standards, and those judgesviolated
an ethics rule. But I do want to put these lapses in context,” he
said.
Thewording drew a response by James Grimaldi, one of
the Journal investigators, who said his team investigated tens of
thousands ofcases, not 2.5 million.
“TheJournal’s
initial tally was an undercount; it was impossible because of
the peculiarities of the judiciary’sfinancial-disclosure process
and incomplete information available on case litigants,” Grimaldi
wrote on Twitter, adding that Roberts’comment “is technically
accurate, the suggestion that we could review millions of cases is
misleading.”
TheJournal said Friday that subsequent
reporting raised the rally to at least 950 violations.
Robertsalso
pointed out that most of the judges involved only had one or two
identified violations, painting those instances as
likely“unintentional oversights” while singling out judges who
had more violations or said they didn’t know of the ethics rule.
Each judgeis schooled on ethical duties, Roberts noted.
“Thiscontext
is not excuse. We are duty-bound to strive for 100% compliance
because public trust is essential, not incidental, to ourfunction.
Individually, judges must be scrupulously attentive to both the
letter and spirit of our rules, as most are. Collectively,our ethics
training programs need to be more rigorous. That means more
classtime, webinars, and consultations. But it also requiresgreater
attention to promoting a culture of compliance, even when busy
dockets keep judicial calendars full,” he added.
Robertsproposed
utilizing technology to check whether stocks held by judges and
litigants would raise questions, floating the possibility ofobtaining
fresh funding from Congress for the purpose.
Healso said
that top federal legal experts are already working on addressing the
problems, including enhancing the ethics training andrefresher
courses.
Robertspens a year-end report annually. Last
year, he praised
how federal courts performed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As
an example: Many U.S.Judges Can Be Taken Out Of Office By Exposing
Their Sex Crimes!
Ahuge number of Judges have been charged
with sex crimes because “Judges think they are untouchable, but
they are not!!”
-NY Judge Bernstein Under Fire as All
DNC Judges Re-Examine Their Pasts.
-US judge steps down
after accusations of sexual misconduct
Aprominent U.S.
appeals court judge announced his retirement Monday days after women
alleged he subjected them to inappropriate sexualconduct or
comments.
JudgeAlex Kozinski of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals said in a statement that a battle over the accusations
would not be good forthe judiciary. He said he'll step down,
effective immediately.
TheWashington Post reported last
week that at least 15 women made allegations against Kozinski that go
back decades. The allegationsinclude inappropriate touching and lewd
comments.
Kozinskisaid while speaking in a "candid
way" with male and female law clerks, "I may not have been
mindful enough of the specialchallenges and pressures that women face
in the workplace," the statement said. "It grieves me to
learn that I caused any of myclerks to feel uncomfortable; this was
never my intent. For this I sincerely apologize."
LeahLitman,
a law professor at the University of California, Irvine, told the
Post that the judge talked about having just had sex and pinchedher
side and leg at a restaurant the night before they appeared together
on a panel at her school in July.
ChristineMiller, a
retired U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge, said Kozinski grabbed her
breasts during a car ride in 1986 after a legal communityfunction in
the Baltimore area. She said it came after she declined his offer to
go to a motel and have sex.
Alawyer who was not identified
said Kozinski approached her when she was alone at a legal event in
Los Angeles in 2008 and kissed her onthe lips and gave her a bear hug
with no warning.
Thenewspaper said the woman's husband
confirmed the incident and said the couple didn't think they could do
anything because of the judge'sposition.
ThePost reported
last week that six former clerks or more junior staff members accused
Kozinski of inappropriate behavior, including showingthem
pornography. Kozinski, 67, was chief judge of the 9th Circuit, the
largest federal appeals court circuit in the country, from 2007to
2014. He is known for his irreverent opinions, and his clerks often
win prestigious clerkships at the U.S. Supreme Court.
The9th
Circuit has opened a misconduct inquiry that was transferred Friday
to the Judicial Council of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court ofAppeals in
New York.
Kozinski'sretirement leaves five seats open on
the 9th Circuit, with two more judges already having announced their
intention to retire next year.That gives President Donald Trump
potentially seven seats to fill on the largest and most liberal
appeals court in the country.
Evenif all those judgeships
are filled, however, Democratic appointees still will maintain a
healthy majority on the court with 17 of the 29seats.
Robed
in secrecy: How judgesaccused of misconduct and bribes dodge public
scrutiny
Thousandsof complaints are filed against judges
every year, but very few result in discipline. Ethics experts say the
time for states totransform the judiciary is now. Judges in political
cases are very often bribed by U.S. Senators who are involved in the
case. Briberyincludes stock ownership.
Somestates
investigating judges in judicial conduct complaints do not ever
identify them publicly or the judges are later
admonishedprivately.
Erik
Ortiz reports that when litigants angeredMichael F. McGuire, the
county judge in New York state’s Catskills region, he might hit
them with “judicial contempt” and order themhandcuffed, or in
extreme cases, jailed for 30 days.
McGuire,elected in
Sullivan County in 2011, did it on several occasions over the years
without warning: to a man who asked the judge to recusehimself
because the man said McGuire knew his son; to a mother who had an
outburst when she felt ridiculed by the judge; and to agrandmother
who contested turning over her grandson to his allegedly abusive
father.
Thatwasn’t his only concerning behavior,
according to an
ethics complaint in 2018 filed by a state watchdog agency, which
accused McGuire of berating court staff; making
“undignified”comments, such as suggesting people in his court
would date a “drug dealer” or a “slut”; presiding over cases
in which hisimpartiality could be called into question; and
representing family members and friends in personal cases. The
watchdog, the New YorkState Commission on Judicial Conduct, said he
“lacked candor” during its investigation.
Forhis
pattern of “serious” judicial lapses, a state appeals court
agreed
last year that McGuire — who earned a salary of $210,161 a year
— be removed from the bench, the harshest sanction a judge canface.
The public, however, had only learned about the ethics charges months
before, in March 2020, more than a year and a half afterMcGuire was
first served with the ethics complaint and when the appeals court
said he had been notified of the commission’sunanimous
recommendation to have him punished.
McGuireended up
resigning in May 2020, but with another job already lined up — as
Sullivan County’s head attorney, a position that he currently
holds.
McGuiredid not respond to requests for comment. In
hisresignation
letter last year, he wrote that “I am quite proud of our
achievements” while on the bench and “deeply regret theissues
that brought me before this Court.”
JosephLaPiana, who
came before McGuire in a family court case last year and is unable to
see his 1-year-old daughter as a result, said that“judges work for
the public — we should know if they are being investigated for any
misconduct.”
Butif McGuire’s misconduct violations had
happened in a neighboring state like New Jersey, Pennsylvania or
Vermont, the public would havebeen alerted earlier — at the outset
of the filing of ethics charges.
WATCH:
Judge yells at prosecutor over Kyle Rittenhouse
cross-examination
Thatdifference in when the public is
allowed to know about allegations against judges can differ broadly
among states, with some allowingjudges to go months or years before
even credible complaints are in the open. With more than100
million cases filed in local and state courts every year, and
judges exerting near-absolute power in deciding whowins
custody of children towho
can get married towhether
a person goes to jail, the public’s ability to scrutinize
judicial conduct is crucial for transparency’s sake, anddeserves as
much attention as recent calls for policing
and prosecutorial
overhauls, judicial ethics experts argue.
Judicialmisconduct
“undermines confidence in our justice system,” said Susan Saab
Fortney, the director of the Program for the Advancementof Legal
Ethics at Texas A&M University School of Law.
Secretive
states
Misconductfindings are a rare outcome in the
judicial complaint process. Legal ethics experts say the minuscule
share of judges punished every yearisn’t necessarily indicative
that all is well in the judiciary, but suggests a lack of
accountability.
Eachstate has aform
of a judicial conduct commission to which the public can file
misconduct allegations against judges. Generally, it’s up tothat
body, which can be made up of fellow judges, lawyers and laypeople,
to determine if a complaint violates a state’scode
of judicial conduct — guidelines for judges to act with
independence, integrity and impartiality. A judge’s conduct
insideof a courtroom as well as outside,including
on social media, can be subject to discipline.
Judges
misusing social media spark calls for reform
Areview
by NBC News of various states’ judicial conduct commission data
from 2016 to 2020 indicates thousands of complaints are filedacross
the United States annually, but about 1 percent of them result in
judges being publicly disciplined or stepping down after
aninvestigation is opened.
Whilethese commissions maintain
that most complaints are frivolous — for instance, a litigant is
merely disgruntled over how a judge ruled —for a state to typically
record zero public sanctions against judges sounds incredulous, said
Robert Tembeckjian, the administrator andcounsel of the New York
State Commission on Judicial Conduct.
“It’shighly
unlikely that any state would have a judiciary that is so above
reproach that year after year no one gets disciplined,”Tembeckjian
said. “Even in places like New York, where we have very
sophisticated judicial education programs, there are numerous
casesevery year.”
NewYork’s commission, which oversees
about 3,500 state and local judges, has received upward of 2,000
complaints annually in the pastfive years, and each year, the state
has sanctioned a judge or had a resignation for misconduct in one to
two dozen cases. Other largestates, such as California and Texas,
sanction multiple judges every year.
Thelevel of
transparency surrounding misconduct cases varies by state. Some that
have reported no or few judges publicly sanctioned inrecent years,
such as Iowa,
Mississippi,South
Dakota andWyoming,
don’t make cases public until the court or panel that decides
discipline gets involved. And in three states — Delaware,Hawaii and
North Carolina — misconduct cases are only made public in the final
stage of an investigation when a judge is to bepunished.
Inabout
two-thirds of states, however, the public can learn much sooner, such
as when a judicial conduct commission first charges ajudge with
misconduct or when the judge responds to the
allegations.
Stateswhere information is kept under wraps
argue that confidentiality is necessary for as long as possible to
protect judges should theyultimately be cleared of wrongdoing. But it
turns out that in some cases, depending on the type of transgression,
judges can beprivately admonished by other judges or sent warning
letters, meant to jolt the offending judge into correcting their
behavior.
NBCNews found many states opt to reprimand
judges privately more often than publicly. For instance, Pennsylvania
filed formal chargesagainst judges 17 times from 2016 to 2020, but
issued private letters of warning or reprimand 172 times in that
period.
AsweepingReuters
analysis in 2020 on judicial misconduct that examined thousands
of discipline cases over a dozen years determined 9 out of10
sanctioned judges were allowed to return to the bench.
“Wehave
to recognize that oftentimes we have judges judging judges, and
they’re ultimately in control and judging their own,”
CharlesGardner Geyh, an Indiana University law professor who studies
judicial conduct, said.
Related:
‘One disaster after another’: How a family court judge
failedfamilies
Tembeckjianbelieves that states,
including New York, should be as transparent as possible once there’s
sufficient evidence to back up allegationsagainst a judge, similar to
how grand jury investigations are made public when an indictment is
unsealed.
Tembeckjiansaid he’d like to see his judicial
conduct commission have the authority to suspend a judge during an
investigation, like otherstates’ commissions can do, and continue
investigating a case even after a judge resigns. Such changes,
however, would require theapproval of the New York
Legislature.
Ultimately,ensuring that judges are being
rightfully held accountable is essential since guidance from the U.S.
Supreme Court allows them tobe largely immune from lawsuits for acts
done in their official capacity, Tembeckjian said.
“Ifthere’s
no sense that you can get a fair shake by going into a court of law
and have confidence that the judge is going to beneutral and fair and
apply the law honestly and responsibly, it’s ultimately going to
lead to anarchy,” he added. “Then, why notjust settle our
disputes in the streets rather than a court of law?”
Making
them pay
Effortsare underway to enact meaningful
judicial reforms at various levels. On Dec. 1, the U.S. House of
Representatives overwhelmingly passedbipartisan legislation aimed at
requiring federal judges to report their financial holdings in
response to aWall
Street Journal investigation that found 131 federal judges had
broken the law and violated judicial ethics by hearing cases inwhich
they had a financial interest. A similar bipartisan Senate bill is
pending.
Onthe state side, the Supreme Court of Louisiana
last month
expanded its rules against errant judges when it tacked financial
burdens onto the disciplinary process. Not only can judges be made
topay for the cost of investigations if discipline is recommended,
but they can be ordered to repay the cost of installing a
replacementjudge. And if a judge decides to retire or resign before a
formal disciplinary process concludes, they can still be required to
payinvestigatory costs.
Related:
What’s a judge’s moral standard? Allegations of racism,
sexismspotlight judicial misconduct
Thestate’s chief
justice, John Weimer, said in a statement that the updated rules
ensure that even retiring judges are “heldaccountable” and
Louisiana taxpayers aren’t on the hook for costs, which in recent
investigations have been about $2,000 to$3,000.
Abouta
dozen other states, includingArizona,
Colorado,
Florida, Kansas,
Massachusetts,New
Hampshire and
South Dakota, have similar cost recovery rules or impose fines on
judges, according to the Center for Judicial Ethics at the
NationalCenter for State Courts, a nonprofit organization that seeks
to improve the judiciary.
MarniBryson, a judge in Palm
Beach County, Florida, faces a public reprimand, an unpaid suspension
for 10 days and a fine of $37,500after the state judicial conduct
commission said she was excessively absent from her duties over a
four-year period,records
show.
“Iknew what I did was wrong ... I have a whole
year to reflect and contemplate my actions.” saida suspended ohio
judge
InNew Hampshire, former Circuit Court Judge Julie
Introcaso was ordered to pay her investigation’s cost, almost
$75,000. Introcaso
pleaded guilty last month to two counts of tampering with public
records and submitting false statements in connection to a
childcustody case in which she was friends with a
lawyer.
JanineGeske, a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice in
the 1990s, said she’d like to see her state implement similar
penalties, which might“encourage judges to take responsibility
early on” if their behavioral violations are tethered to their
finances.
Anotheroption, Geyh said, is to make the payout
of a judge’s pension contractually contingent on good
behavior.
Ethicsexperts say citizen judicial watchdog
programs known as court
watchers could be effective, but it’s also incumbent upon other
courtroom staff and officials who witness a judge’s poor
conduct,particularly lawyers, to speak up. They may be reticent to
file complaints, however, because they’re afraid of retaliation if
ajudge learns they were behind the allegations, Fortney, the legal
ethics expert at Texas A&M, said.
“Alarge percentage
of states require that the complaining party be identified,” she
added. “This clearly chills reporting.”
‘I
don’t trust any judge’
Butthere have been cases
where lawyers andcourt
staff aren’t afraid to stand up to a jurist.
Ohio’shighest
court last month suspended a 19-year municipal court judge,Mark
Repp, for one year without pay after prosecutors in Seneca County
relayed how he had ordered a 20-year-old woman who was sittingquietly
in the back of his courtroom to watch her boyfriend’s hearing get
drug tested. When she refused, he sentenced her to 10days in
jail.
Aninvestigation found that the woman was forced to
take pregnancy tests and undergo full-body scans for contraband,
although none wasdetected. And while Repp assumed the woman was under
the influence of narcotics, there was no evidence indicating she was,
and she hadnever been charged with drug-related offenses.
Ina
recent interview, Repp told NBC News that he has been concerned by
the growing rate of overdose deaths in his community, and, in
dealingwith thousands of cases before him each year, he must “come
up with some kind of decision that follows the law and also is
appropriateunder the circumstances.”
“Iknew what I did
was wrong,” Repp said. “I’ll try to make amends on that, and I
have a whole year to reflect and contemplate myactions.”
Butit
wasn’t the only time Repp, who is up for re-election in 2025, has
faced criticism.
“Imaginesomeone sitting in court for
the first time, and now they think it’s what the judicial system is
like,” said John Kahler II, a lawyerwho once accused the judge of
being biased against a client and unsuccessfully tried to get him
disqualified from the case.
Onewoman who appeared before
Repp in August did file a complaint to say he labeled her a “known
meth user” in open court, which she wrotemade her feel “very
embarrassed by Repp’s conduct and false accusations.” Repp said
the complaint process in Ohio is a “goodone” because the public
does learn about judges accused of misconduct early on.
ButAna
Petro, who was in Repp’s court for a traffic violation this year,
doesn’t believe his suspension can remedy how he made her andothers
feel: worthless. A reckoning throughout the judiciary is needed, she
said.
“Iunderstand it’s not a judge’s job to be
nice, but when he’s abusing his power to be a judge, that’s when
I have a problem,”Petro said. “And I don’t trust any judge at
all because of him.”
Inanother of thousands of points of
proof that Judges are often just as bad as the criminals before
them:
ALong Island judge who police say repeatedly broke
into his neighbor's home to steal her underwear has confessed to
snatching panties onmultiple occasions, even though he has pleaded
not guilty.
Still, Suffolk County District Judge Robert
Cicale has been removed from thebench and is facing up to 15 years in
prison.
Cicale was arrested
on burglary charges and appeared in court Friday
morning.
The judge is a married father of three young
children, and he is accused of sneaking into ahome across the street
and stealing the underwear of a 23-year-old woman who lives there
with her parents. He reportedly knew the girlfrom when she worked as
an intern at the Islip Town Attorney's Office, when he used to work
there.
In his confession, he said he stole the underwear
upon feeling "urges." Headmitted that on several occasions,
he entered the home, opened her hamper and took underwear.
Cicarle
was taken into custody after an incident that happened around 9 a.m.
Thursday, when theyoung woman was alone. Prosecutors said she was
sleeping but woke up when she heard the door open. She called out,
"Hello?" andthat's when she saw Cicale at the
doorway.
Authorities say he turned around and ran away,
and the victim closed and locked thedoor and called her mother, who
called 911. Responding officers say they saw Cicale walking up to a
different house and pretending toknock on the door.
They
approached him because he matched the description of the person the
victim described. They reportedlyfound several pairs of soiled
women's underwear on him, which the victim identified as her
own.
Cicale has written letter of apology to victim and
also provided a written confession.
Cicaleis accused of
stealing his female neighbor's underwear.
"Thisis
highly disturbing," Suffolk County District Attorney Tim Sini
said. "This is an individual who swore to uphold the law.
Heviolated it in a very serious way. The message here from both the
Suffolk County Police Department and the Suffolk County
DistrictAttorney's office is that no one is above the law, and we'll
prosecute this case to the fullest extent of the law."
A
Nassau County district judge presided over Cicale's case to prevent
aconflict of interest. Cicale is expected to receive mental health
treatment.
"His reputation throughout the court is
stellar," defense attorney William Wexler said. "Everyjudge,
every lawyer respects him, and we just have to see how the process
plays out."
Wexler went on to say that the judge's
wife is standing by her husband through this process.
Cicale
was ordered held on $50,000. Cicale was "temporarily relieved
ofhis judicial duties" and the matter was referred to the
state's Court of Appeals to determine whether to suspend the jurist,
courtsystem spokesman Lucian Chalfen said.
A judge also
issued a restraining order that prevents Cicale from contacting the
victimand, as a condition of his bail, Cicale will also be required
to wear a GPS monitor, Sini said.
Neighbors were shocked
when they learned of the judge's arrest.
"From what I
heard, it's a little perverted maybe," neighbor William Bloom
said."And that never makes sense to me."
Cicale
is a graduate of St. John's Law School, a former legal aide attorney
and aformer Islip Town Attorney elected to the District Criminal
Court in 2016.
"He's a family man, he's always
outside playing basketball with his kids," neighbor Jay Moceri
said. "He'salways jogging. He's always friendly to everybody in
the neighborhood."
(The Associated Press contributed
to this report.)
What's a judge's moral
standard?Allegations of racism, sexism spotlight judicial
misconduct
ProbateJudge Randy Jinks has mostly denied the
allegations by employees. The case spotlights how Alabama handles
ethics complaints against judges.
ProbateJudge Randy Jinks
faces more than 100 allegations in a scathing complaint. Erik
Ortiz goes on the explain:
Sincehe was sworn into
office in January 2019, Probate Judge Randy Jinks of Alabama has had
a central role in the most significant moments ofpeople's lives in
Talladega County, about 50 miles east of Birmingham. Jinks, the
county's chief election official, has overseenadoptions and
guardianships, mental health commitments and the issuing of marriage
licenses.
Behindthe scenes, employees accuse Jinks, 65, of
cultivating a toxic and hostile workplace that undermined the
integrity of his office.
Morethan 100 allegations were
outlined in a scathing 78-page
complaint issued in March by the Judicial Inquiry Commission, the
state body that reviews complaints against judges, detailing
racistand sexist conversations that employees claim Jinks initiated,
including talking about pornography and a video of a woman doing
astriptease. Some allege that he made disparaging remarks about
George Floyd, the Black Lives Matter movement, Black people who came
intothe office and the office's sole Black employee.
Someemployees
also allege that Jinks, who is white, used profane language and threw
tantrums, once going on a tirade after his sandwich wentmissing from
a refrigerator, and that he tried to use the power of his position to
get or grant favors.
Thecomplaint, which is based on
interviews with current and former employees of the Talladega County
Probate Office, accuses Jinks ofexhibiting a pattern of behavior
"that has created a difficult, unprofessional, and inappropriate
atmosphere," which has"injured respect for the
judiciary."
Jinksis accused of violating the state
Canons of Judicial Ethics, the guidelines that say judges must
uphold the honor of the judiciary, maintain decorum and
avoidimpropriety. He has denied the majority of the accusations,
saying some of the incidents have been taken out of context, and he
isfighting the allegations in the Alabama Court of the
Judiciary.
Jinkswas suspended in March and will remain
suspended until the court decides whether the claims warrant
punishment, including a longersuspension or removal from office. No
trial date has been set.
"Iam a decent person,"
Jinks said in
an interview on local television station WOTM in March. "I
am very respectful around women. I do not use racial slurs. I do
notgo on tirades in office. I do get mad if somebody steals my food."
In a 44-page
answer to the complaint filed in April, Jinks denies "any
inappropriate demeanor regarding African Americans" and said
thecomplaint "contains flagrant, false, vague and subjective
accusations."
Thecase, which continues, has put a
spotlight on how often complaints against judges in the state are
reviewed and whether the mechanism topunish judges for misconduct or
ethics violations is sufficient.
"Inthe past, there
have been individuals on the Judicial Inquiry Commission that have
had a less strict view of judges' adhering tothe rules, and they
simply were not really open to removing judges," said Sue Bell
Cobb, who retired as chief justice of the AlabamaSupreme Court in
2011 and has advocated
for reforms. "Judges should be held to a higher standard.
End of story."
'Grossly
inappropriate demeanor'
Jinkswon his probate judge
race in November 2018, defeating his Democratic opponent by more than
5,000 votes and becoming the first Republicanelected to the office in
Talladega County.
Probatejudges are elected to six-year
terms in Alabama, and nearly every county, including Talladega,
doesn't require them to have law degreesor to be lawyers, unlike
probate judges in most other states. Jinks is a former program
director for the Alabama State Parks, and he hadworked on the
campaign of Alabama Gov. Bob Riley, who left office in 2011.
"Ifelt
the time was right," Jinks told
The Daily Home newspaper of Talladega in 2018 about why he ran
for the judgeship. "The man upstairs wanted me to do
this."
Accordingto the Judicial Inquiry Commission's
complaint, which identifies employees only by their initials, Jinks'
"grossly inappropriatedemeanor" didn't begin immediately;
instead, it ramped up about six months into his
judgeship.
Theemployees say he would mouth a racial slur
"on occasions" to his deputy chief clerk when he was
referring to a Black person.One time, after a Black couple had been
in the office to fill out a marriage certificate, he said, "What
did their Black asseswant?" an employee recalled, according to
the complaint.
Heis also accused of having spoken
disparagingly about the Black Lives Matter movement and the protests
that erupted across the countryafter Floyd
was killed in police custody in Minneapolis a year ago.
Employeessay
he commented that "I don't see anything wrong with the police
killing him" and that "he pretty much got what
hedeserved."
Jinkswould also play uncensored videos
of racial justice protests that included racial slurs and profane
language loud enough that theycould be "heard by others outside
his office, including any customers at the front counter,"
according to the complaint.
Employeessay that last June,
when news reports surfaced that Bubba Wallace, the only Black driver
in NASCAR's top series, had
found a noose in his garage stall at Talladega Superspeedway,
Jinks commented that Wallace was "just playing the Black
card."
Theonly Black employee among the nine or so
people who worked under Jinks at the probate office says in the
complaint that Jinks wouldaim racist and unprofessional comments at
him.
"Hewas a wolf in sheep's clothing," the
man, Darrius Pearson, who joined the office as a clerk in 2018 under
the previous probatejudge, told NBC News. Pearson said that he had
even voted for Jinks but that after months of humiliating and
withering comments, he quitin November and wanted to come forward
publicly.
Pearsonsaid that in May 2019, Jinks saw his new
car and said that he, as a judge, couldn't afford one. "What are
you doing? Selling drugs?"Jinks said, according to
Pearson.
LastSeptember, Pearson returned to work after a
trip to the post office about the same time that students from
Talladega College, a privatehistorically Black college, were marching
in support of Black Lives Matter. He said Jinks asked him repeatedly
whether he had joined thedemonstration.
"Idon't want
nothing to have to happen to your job, you out there marching —
marching 'Black Lives Matter' during county time,"Jinks said
before he walked off laughing, according to Pearson and the
complaint.
Thecomplaint says employees felt uncomfortable
and embarrassed by Jinks' "inappropriate demeanor" toward
Pearson and other Blackpeople.
Jinks,who is married with a
daughter, is also accused of using demeaning language about women and
talking openly about sex. Pearson said thatin July, around the time
of a Republican runoff election in Alabama's U.S. Senate race, Jinks
showed him a video of a woman doing astriptease while they were in an
election room.
Pearsonsaid he told Jinks he didn't want to
look at the video.
Anothertime, Jinks told a female
employee: "I like porn. Don't you?" according to the
complaint. He is also accused of having commentedabout an employee's
breasts and stared at her body, as well as having made other female
employees uncomfortable. Employees said he alsoroutinely commented
about the physical appearance of female lawyers and spoke derisively
about women with tattoos or about their bodysize.
"Don'tever
marry a woman. She'll get fat," he said after he saw a photo of
a female employee in her wedding dress, according to thecomplaint.
Jinks' comments about the employee's weight were "so prevalent
as to give her the impression that her weight matters moreto him than
her work performance," the complaint said.
Pearson,who
had been the only male employee in the office, said Jinks gave him a
birthday card in September featuring a cartoon cow and donkeyand the
message "Thought you'd like to see some teats and ass on your
birthday!" The card, which was shared with NBC News, issigned,
"Have a Great B'day. Randy."
Otheremployees
refused to sign it, according to Pearson and the complaint. Jinks
didn't deny having given the card but said in his response tothe
commission that "office humor has been overblown."
Thecomplaint
also says Jinks' county-owned cellphone was used to look at a website
that sold sex products and to view provocative photos ofwomen. It
says he lent the phone to a felon whom he met when she was
waitressing.
Inaddition, the complaint details allegations
accusing Jinks of having abused the prestige of his judicial office
by asking a prosecutor ina neighboring county to help the felon and
release her early from her sentence on a narcotics-related
charge.
Thedistrict attorney denied the request, saying it
was inappropriate, according to the complaint, which said that Jinks
tried to solicitthe help of attorneys who appeared before his court
to get the felon an early release and that he eventually
succeeded.
AmandaHardy, Jinks' attorney, said that the
complaints were "concocted by a few disgruntled" employees
and that the commission'scomplaint "fails to mention all
exculpatory evidence and testimony." She said allegations that
Jinks is racist were"fabricated to generate antagonism with the
public, the Court of Judiciary, and the media."
'He
thought he couldn't be touched'
Inhis response to the
allegations, Jinks mostly denied what employees told the Judicial
Inquiry Commission, according to the complaint.
Hespecifically
denied the disparaging remarks about staring at women's bodies in the
office and in court, as well as talking about bodyweight, among other
accusations. He also said he couldn't remember certain actions he is
accused of, such as telling an employee that helikes porn, according
to the complaint.
Healso denied having made remarks about
Floyd.
"TheRespondent believes ... that there exists
no excuse for the killing of George Floyd, that watching the video is
sickening,unconscionable, inhumane and horrifying," Jinks said
in written answers to the complaint. In regard to Pearson's version
of eventsabout Black Lives Matter protests, Jinks "adamantly
denies any communication, implied or expressed, that Mr. Pearson
should notparticipate in any way with the Black Lives Matter march or
the like."
Jinksalso told the commission that if he
did make certain comments, they were in a personal and private
capacity, and that employees wereeavesdropping or should have asked
him to shut his door.
Hesaid that comments people say they heard may have been taken out
of context or were misunderstood jokes and that if he had been told
thatsomething was "racially or sexually insensitive and
offensive," he would have "responded in a serious manner."
Jinks didn'tdeny the interaction involving the striptease video that
Pearson said he was shown, but he told the commission that it was
played for threeseconds or less.
Inhis written response,
he said that "sharing the video amounted to a lapse in judgment,
the significance of which has beenexaggerated."
Jinksdenied
having asked for favors to help a felon, saying in his answer to the
complaint that his helping her "was purely a ministry, inwhich
no appearance of impropriety and/or expectation of judicial favor can
reasonably be inferred."
Pearsonsaid the complaints
were a collaborative effort by employees who feared retaliation for
speaking out but were fed up with Jinks.
"Heis very
arrogant, pompous, and he thought he couldn't be touched,"
Pearson said.
Thecomplaint doesn't specify any grievances
or allegations made by litigants, attorneys or members of the public,
and it doesn't say anyof Jinks' rulings were affected by his alleged
misconduct.
Still,Jenny Carroll, a professor at the
University of Alabama School of Law, said that it matters how judges
behave outside the courtroom andin front of office staff and that
comments that appear to be inappropriate can call into question how
they came to rulings.
"Whatif people coming before
you are women and Black? If they don't get the outcome they wanted,
they'll be wondering was it because theirclaim wasn't strong enough
or perhaps the judge carries explicit biases," Carroll said.
"The bottom line is it's going toraise doubts in people's
minds."
Most
complaints dismissed
Thenine-member state Judicial
Inquiry Commission, which is made up of judges, lawyers and private
citizens, gets scores of complaints aboutjudges every fiscal year,
many of which fail to rise to the level of formal charges to be filed
with the Court of the Judiciary, which isalso a mix of legal
professionals and laypeople.
Thecommission said it
reviewed 174 complaints against judges in fiscal year 2018 and
dismissed 132 of them without investigation, citingreasons such as
that there was no reasonable basis to charge, that no ethical
violation was determined or that a case wasn't within
itsjurisdiction. Of 18 investigations that were completed, all of the
related complaints were dismissed, the commission
said.
Ultimately,the commission filed no charges against
judges in the Court of the Judiciary during fiscal year 2018. Cases
are often settled withjudges before trials are held, and judges may
decide to retire or resign to avoid public scrutiny, Carroll
said.
Inrarer cases, judges are removed from the bench.
That happened to Roy
Moore, the former state chief justice, who was ousted twice for
defying federal court orders. Moore's appeals were rejected.
2014:
Roy Moore said what?
Thecommission didn't immediately
respond to requests for further information. Chairman Billy Bedsole,
a lawyer, also didn'timmediately reply to requests for
comment.
Cobb,the former state chief justice, said changes
are needed in the complaint process so people are comfortable coming
forward.Currently, she said, the commission's process is too lenient
toward judges, who are notified and kept apprised of investigations
and alsoget copies of subpoenas given to witnesses.
Cobbsaid
that gives judges the opportunity to use their influence and
potentially put pressure on people to dissuade them from
filingcomplaints for fear of retaliation.
Shesaid reforms
should include doing away with notifying judges about who filed
complaints and directing more state funding toward theJudicial
Inquiry Commission so investigations don't have to languish and all
complaints can be fully reviewed, not just the most
egregiouscases.
Carrollsaid that even after a judge who
clearly violated ethical standards is removed, other issues deserve
scrutiny, such as identifying casesin which people were the victims
of unfair and impartial rulings and offering
remediation.
"Gettingproblem judges off the bench is
only a piece of the problem," she said.
Contra Costa
Superior Court JudgeSteven Austin Aided & Abetted Real Property
Theft
….SaysWhistle Blower Architect
ContraCosta
County Superior Court Judge Steven Austin Aided & Abetted Real
Property Theft with the help of Assessor Gus Kramer & OtherPublic
Officials
Alocal vetted source has provided a complaint
filed with District Attorney Diane Becton on June 14, 2018, demanding
a criminalinvestigation of several public officials including Gus
Kramer and Martinez Superior Court Judge Steven K. Austin. This
complaintalleges that Judge Austin colluded with County officials by
rigging a trial in an effort to steal real property from an Orinda
resident.
Theverified complaint to the District Attorney
describes how County and City of Orindaofficials failed to enforce
code violations on the property of an architect whocommitted horrific
environmental crimes and zoning violations. This architect, with the
help of City of Orinda and Contra Costa Countyofficials, was able to
double the square footage of his house and also change public records
on the assessor’s record to reflect theunpermitted additions. In
early 2013, the County Assessor’s office was notified by the
whistleblower about the tampering of publicrecords, but Gus Kramer
refused to investigate.
Accordingto several forensic
engineers and experts, this Orinda architect resorted to extreme
tactics with reckless disregard for theenvironment in order to access
the whistleblower’s panoramic views and cheat on his property
taxes. The architect’s zoning violationsalso included exceeding
setback and height limits, grading massive amount of dirt, destroying
a ridge line, uprooting several landmarkoak trees, and illegally
building decking, structures, pouring concrete and piers next and on
top of utility East Bay MunicipalUtility District (EBMUD) drainage
pipes. Further, this architect built nuisances on two neighboring
properties and tampered withpublic records.
Thesubject
experts who reviewed the case documents are in agreement that
environmental and zoning violations have placed the surroundinghouses
and safety of residents in danger of flooding and created a fire
hazard in the Sleepy Hollow, Orinda neighborhood.
Newevidence
indicates that recent
press articles circulated by the Mercury News may be heavily
influenced by the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors. Suchpress
alleges that Gus Kramer engaged insexual misconduct, leading to his
private censoring. However, in view of the complaint to the District
Attorney, it is questionable as towhether the new sexual misconduct
allegations are indeed the true crux of Kramer’s wrongdoings, or
whether these accusations areintended to detract from the very
serious criminal acts that are described in the June 14, 2018
complaint to the DA Becton about theOrinda property theft.
This
article states: ”On June 18, County Administrator David
Twawrote to one of the accusers — associate appraiser Margaret
Eychner — saying an independent investigator determined it was
‘morelikely than not’ that on several occasions in 2014 and 2015,
Kramer ‘made comments that were not appropriate in a workplace
environmentand that made you feel uncomfortable.’ ”
08-05-2018
CCCounty Gus Kramer embroiled in another sex harassment probe
(Click
Here)
Itis highly suspicious that within three days
after the whistleblower’s complaint having been filed, David Twa
resurrects alleged sexualmisconduct by Kramer dating back to 2015. It
is reasonable to infer that the county officials are giving Gus
Kramer a get out of jailfree card instead of allowing DA Becton to do
her job by conducting criminal investigation of Gus Kramer, Judge
Austin and others.Strangely enough, the whistleblower’s complaint
names David Twa being involved in aiding and abetting the theft of
her property aswell.
Board
of supervisors, not former DA Mark Petersen, axed the probe into
GusKramer’s criminal investigation. (Click here for evidence)
The complaint to DA Becton states that the whistleblower
tried to facilitate thearchitect to remove the encroaching nuisance
that interfered with her privacy. The architect continuously promised
to do so, butdeliberately misled her for two (2) years. He then
swiftly ambushed her by filing a lawsuit claiming several baseless
legal assertionsincluding outright ownership and punitive damages for
accusing him of building without permit.
Beforefiling
the lawsuit, the Orinda architect threatened “either you agree to a
lot line adjustment or I will drag youthrough the court for years to
come and make you lose everything you have.”
Publicrecords show the whistle blower in 2012 involved
county deputy director, JasonCrapo, county engineer ThoamHuggett, and
former Orinda planning director, EmmanuelUrsu. However, in a meeting
both Ursu and Thoam Huggett, threatened that the countywould
retaliate and reverse everything by coming after the whistle blower
instead, if she didn’t stop complaining about thearchitect’s
violations.
Communicationsbetween the
whistleblower and the County public officials and the Assessor’s
office show a blatant refusal of public officials toinvestigate the
architect’s violations. The Orinda city officials, however, opened
a code enforcement investigation against thearchitect for encroaching
onto another neighbor’s property. Incidentally, this other neighbor
was an attorney with politicalaspirations.
Thewhistleblower’s
complaint to the District Attorney accuses the officials of
selectively applying the rules and failing to prosecutewhite collar
crime, as in this case clearly the violations didn’t apply to the
Orinda architect. Also, when it came to opening a codeenforcement the
rules only applied to an elite group of people, attorneys and others
who are politically well-connected.
Obstructedby the tax
collector, Gus Kramer, and the Building Department’s refusal to
investigate, the whistleblower sought help from the localpolice for
unlawful trespass and property damage. The police also refused
to do their job, but assured her that she had everylegal right to
defend her property by removing the encroaching nuisance from her
land. The police offered to protect the whistleblower and arrest the
architect, if he interfered with the
removal.
Documentedcommunications prove the whistle blower
went so far as to call self-proclaimed tree-hugger career-politician
Steve Glazer when hewas the mayor of City of Orinda. Steve Glazer
ignoredserious California environmental code violations, reckless
destruction of protected Oak trees, perjury and falsifying a
permitcommitted by the architect’s surveyor, Rick Humann and county
deputy director Jason Crapo.
Thearchitect was
emboldened knowing one of his many attorneys, H.
Clyde Long, had inside connections with the Martinez judiciary,
i.e.Judge Steven K. Austin. Attorney Long also serves as the chair of
city of Lafayette’s codeenforcement appeal board and advertises
on his website that he can help those with “city/county code
enforcement.” The complaint alleges that the architect
hadinside political influence with the municipal officials, the
Assessor’s Office and the Building Department to be able
tounlawfully change the public records twice by increasing the square
footage of his house, without any evidence of any permits to
increasehis house’s size.
Indisputableevidence is
provided of open judicial extortion committed by Judge Austin in
voluminous trial transcripts involving a lawsuit filed bythe
architect in violation of zoning laws who is also cheating on his
taxes, demanding an outright ownership of the whistleblower’s
landand the court preventing her free speech regarding his
violations. Judge Austin’s abuse of power and judicial misconducts
andcollusion to steal the whistleblower’s property is captured
throughout the trial transcripts:
“THECOURT:
So what they are saying is, as I understand from that side, the
evidence that's been developed would be that it's notrelevant
how big the house is even if it's more than what it's supposed to be
on the records of the city because it has nothing todo with the
property line dispute, and that it would be more prejudicial than
probative to go into that because you'd make themlook bad because
they built a house bigger than it's supposed to be,
right?”
“THECOURT: It sounds like you're just
trying to say that it looks like they must have cheated on their
property taxes so they must bebad people”
(RT.Vol.4P.168L-5-9).” ”It's a difficult case, in many
respects and exactly how this property will be used,going forward,
it's not going to matter that much as long as they don't move back,
but if they do move back, it's going to make a bigdifference I think
in terms of how the property will be used because of just the
history. Okay (RT.Vol.062414P.3301L.9-P.3302L8).”
Dewey
Wheeler (represented state farm insurance) openly made fun of
JudgeAustin’s Kangaroo trial and jury instructions at the expense
of CoCoCounty tax payers when he appropriately called the
judicialcouncil a dark hole.
However,the law is
clear in stating that: The California Judicial Canon of Ethics
prohibit a judge from ignoring indisputable evidence of thecommission
of fraud, he has an outright duty to report such fraud to law
enforcement. Not to mention that the rules of ethicsprohibit a
litigant from using the court system with “unclean hands”.
On the record Judge Austin is allowing the architectand his three
attorneys to play fast and loose with his court and helped them to
correct deficiencies in their lawsuit by coachingthem. The architect
acted as though he owned Judge Austin’s court.
Reviewof
the trial transcripts by several legal experts show in no uncertain
terms, this whistleblower’s case is a posterchild exampleof
thuggery run amok in a deeply-embedded incestuous web of municipal
officials, the judiciary, attorneys and politicians. The
whistleblower was retaliated against and thrusted into a rigged court
because she exposed the systemic corruption in the offices of
thecounty of Contra Costa and the tax collector, Gus
Kramer.
JudgeAustin on the record stated he found
attorney misconduct entertaining when presented with evidence of
witness intimidation, declarationtampering and obstruction of justice
committed by three attorneys, Clyde Long, Brandon Dooley and Dewey
Wheeler whorepresented State Farm Insurance. David Miller of
Moragawas selected by Judge Austin as the discovery referee and paid
by state Farm insurance. He too consistently ignored attorney
misconductand was actively engaged in legally abusing the whistle
blower.
Thelawsuit substantiates the architect’s initial
threats of his intent to use his political and judicial connections
to steal her propertyand ruin her financially by dragging her through
years of litigation. The court record shows that right from the
inception the case wasrigged. Judge Steven K. Austin admitted
that he personally hand-picked the case because he found it to be
interesting. Bolstering the existence of backroom dealing, Judge
Austin just also happens to be a resident of Orinda and buddies with
the architect’sattorney Clyde Long. Additionally, the architect’s
homeowner’s insurance is State Farm, Judge Austin’s former
employer.
Thecomplaint alleges that Judge Steven K.
Austinengaged in extortion by threatening that “if you do not give
up your land for $10K I will make you fall flat on your face and
makeyou pay him, instead. A lot of money.” The complaint also
states Judge Austin and public officials concocted a plan to extort
thewhistle blower in agreeing to a lot line adjustment, through
abusive litigation and wasting taxpayer’s money on allowing a white
collarcriminal to come to court with unclean hands. When she refused
to relinquish her property rights, the officials with the help of
JudgeAustin retaliated. They schemed a plan to manipulate the trial
to come up with a fake money judgement that the whistle blower could
notpay. The judgment against the whistle blower ended up to become
approximately about $300,000, including additional
fees.
Thewhistleblower demanded that local
politicians and government agencies circumvent the retaliatory
judgment, and involved the former DA MarkPetersen and other
politicians such as Mark DeSaulnier, Catharine Baker, John Garamandi,
Dianne Feinstein, KamalaHarris, and the Board of Supervisors of
Contra Costa County, specifically CandaceAndersen. None of the
officials apparently did anything to stop the commission of the
crimes by Contra Costa County officials.
Reviewingthe
emails with public officials show the whistleblower engaged legal
counsel who agreed to confront the City of Orinda officials
regardingthese officials’ failure to perform their jobs and
ignoring perjury committed by RickHumann, the architect’s surveyor.
In the meantime, the whistleblower involvedthe County chair of
planning commissioner, Duane Steele, who referred her to the Deputy
Director of County Building Department ArunaBaht. Aruna Baht, upon
reviewing the fraud documents, immediately assigned inspectorJoe
Losado to inspect the architect’s house and tag it. Joe Losado
admitted tothe attorney that the architect did not have any permits
on file.
Inexplicably,however, Joe Losado refused to
inspect the architect’s house and engaged in threatening the
attorney to back off or the countyattorney, Sharon Anderson, would
revoke his license and file a restraining order against his
client.
In2017, Mark Petersen had assigned the case to
Steve Moawad, former DA, for public corruption. However, DA Moawad
was prohibited toinvestigate Gus Kramer, Judge Austin and others at
the behest of board of supervisors.
DA
Moawad stated in writing that he was going to continue
investigatingOrinda officials for failure to open a code enforcement
against the architect. Conspicuously, Steve Moawad left the DA’s
Office tobecome California Bar Chief Trial Counsel without concluding
the case.Several series of emails prove the public officials were
complicit in committing crimes against the whistle blower. (Click
Here)
Thecourt files demonstrate that the Board
of Supervisors and Judge Steven Austin have committed egregious
violations in order to silencethe whistleblower and prevent the
whistleblower from being able to seek appropriate remedy and redress.
Judge Austin conducted anexpensive jury trial in 2013 in which the
jurors were provided with manipulated instructions that biased the
jury improperly. Inaddition, according to several jurors and the
transcripts, Judge Austin gave them a jury instruction that was not
part of the record.Sample
kangaroo trial transcripts
Further,the County appears
to have enlisted State Farm Insurance to hire a private investigator
to follow and harass the whistleblower’sdaughter in another state
for over two years. The whistleblower accuses Contra Costa County
Supervisor CandaceAndersen for failing to mitigate and offer
appropriate redress. Incidentally, herhusband Philip
Andersen works exclusively for State Farm Insurance as
defensecounsel.
Asstated in a law review
article
by Orlando J. Villalba. “Slapping Criminal Speech; how Evolution
ofthe Illegality Exception has Impacted California’s Anti-Slapp
Statute”, this type of lawsuit is deliberately brought to
financially decimate its opponent. The true desire of the
trespasseris to cause delay and distraction. And to punish his/her
opponent for standing up for him/herself. (Click
here for Villalba’s article)
CAPenal Section
SCC. 518. State and Federal Statutes show the definition of the
criminal offense of extortion as follows:
Extortionis the
obtaining of property or other consideration from another, with his
or her consent, or the obtaining of an official act of apublic
officer, induced by a wrongful use of force or fear, or under color
of official right.
Yearsof articles published by the
Mercury News show that a culture of “pay to play” is deeply
embedded in Contra Costa County municipalitiesand its court system.
At the very core of this crisis is Tax Collector and Assessor Gus
Kramer and the Board of Supervisors. As illustrated by Tom
Lochner’s article in May of 2008 “Building disputes near an
end”, falsifying and forging documents in the Contra Costa
CountyBuilding Inspection Department is apparently standard operating
procedure. (Click
here for the article)
In2011, the District
Attorney’s Office axed a probe investigating Assessor Gus Kramer
for a financial scheme involving evading transfertaxes in shady land
deals. It was just outright nixed—as if it never
existed.
Allof this was obviously known to the Board
of Supervisors. Thomas Peele, Pulitzer award winning Journalist,
exposed Gus Kramer in hisarticle titled “His
Deal Deeds and Doubts.” (Click
here for the article)
Federalprosecutors have the
authority and jurisdiction to hold judges accountable for their
unlawful conduct by charging them with afederal crime. Section
242 of Title 18 of the U.S. code ― the so-called “color of
law” statute ― is the same federal civil rights legislation
thatJustice Department prosecutors use against Law enforcement
officers who use excessive force and make false arrests. The law
applies toprosecutors and judges too. However, the feds do not use it
against judges.
Judgesare responsible to apply the law and
are held to the same standards as everyone else, and when judges
flagrantly violate the law, thereshould be consequences for them as
well. Unfortunately, when judges are caught committing a crime, they
are allowed to collect tax payerfunded retirement packages and obtain
work as mediators collecting $500 hourly rates with corporate
entities like ADR Services Inc.
OurNews Group is a
collaborative media organization with a focus on exposing public and
judicial corruption, when main stream mediafails. Please email us
(californiaexposegroup@protonmail.com)
if you have additional information about this case or your rightshave
been violated by Judge Austin or parties involved or any other judge
in the Contra Costa Superior Court in California.
In
another example one can seethat “When The Judge Works For Your
Political Adversary And Is Ordered To ‘Take You Out’ By The
WhiteHouse”, the rules of Court are abused, ie:
KYLE
CHENEY says that Roger Sone's lawyers say, inparticular, that
Judge Amy Berman Jackson's decision to assert that jurors in the case
"served with integrity" strikes at theheart of Stone's
motion for a new trial, which they indicated is largely based on
whether at least one juror was inappropriatelybiased against
him.
"Whetherthe subject juror (and perhaps others)
served with 'integrity' is one of the paramount questions presented
in the pending Motion,"Stone's lawyers argued. "The Court’s
ardent conclusion of 'integrity' indicates an inability to reserve
judgment on an issuewhich has yet been heard."
Jacksonmade
her remark during an impassioned rebuke of the arguments Stone's
legal team offered during his trial. She said that Stone and
hislawyers minimized the significance of his effort to frustrate
congressional investigators as they sought to understand
Russia'sinterference in the 2016 election, a grave national security
challenge.
"Sure,the defense is free to say: So what?
Who cares?" Jackson said. "But, I'll say this: Congress
cared. The United StatesDepartment of Justice and the United States
Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia that prosecuted the
case and is stillprosecuting the case cared. The jurors who served
with integrity under difficult circumstances cared. The American
people cared. And Icare."
Stonewas convicted last
year on multiple counts of covering up to congressional
investigators, as well as a count of witnessintimidation for
pressuring an associate to refuse to cooperate with Congress.
Lawmakers sought Stone's testimony regarding his attemptsto act as an
intermediary between Wikileaks and the Trump campaign, but he
repeatedly refused to tell House members about his multipleefforts to
contact Wikileaks head Julian Assange, denying he had communications
with certain associates that were later discovered tobe
voluminous.
Itwill also likely reach the receptive ears of
the president, who has repeatedly amplified criticism of Jackson and
repeated false claimsabout the nature of the charges against Stone.
Trump'sallies are agitating for the president to issue a
pardon or commute Stone's sentence, and though Trump is widely
expected to do soeventually, the timing is uncertain. Jackson also
used her sentencing comments to underscore that Stone's overarching
effort in impedingCongress was to protect Trump from
scrutiny.
Jacksondelivered her sentence Thursday but
delayed it until after she considers Stone's motion for a new trial.
Though the motion was filedunder seal, Stone's team indicated that it
will focus on a juror.
"Stone’sMotion for New Trial
is directly related to the integrity of a juror. It is alleged that a
juror misled the Court regarding her ability tobe unbiased and fair
and the juror attempted to cover up evidence that would directly
contradict her false claims of impartiality,"his lawyers
argued.
"Thepremature statement blessing the
“integrity of the jury” undermines the appearance of impartiality
and presents a strong biasfor recusal," they added.
Accordingto
the February 5th order issued by Judge Jackson, Roger Stone cited a
problem with a juror, however his motion was denied.
Thedetails
of the juror are unknown because the order released Wednesday was
redacted, however, Roger
Stone’s defense team in November tried to strike down several
potential jurors who were overt Trump-hating
leftists.
Severalpotential jurors in Stone’s case ended
up being Trump-hating, Obama-era officials who admittedly voted for
Hillary Clinton in 2016so Stone’s lawyer’s tried to strike them
as potential jurors.
Oneof the potential jurors actually
had a husband who worked in the DOJ and played a role in the Russian
collusion hoax that ultimately tookdown Roger Stone — and Judge
Jackson allowed her to remain as a potential juror!
Beingthat
Amy Berman Jackson denied Stone’s motion for a new trial last week,
it occurred before the DOJ backed down from the excessivesentencing
handed down by Mueller’s thugs.
Theorder is about a
potential issue with a juror and it's dated Feb. 5, so this all
occurred before the resignations and withdrawals andTrump's
intervention.
— KyleCheney (@kyledcheney) February
12, 2020
AmyBerman Jackson is a corrupt liberal Obama
judge who imposed a very strict gag order on Roger Stone even though
he did nothing wrong.
Stonewas caught up in Mueller’s
abusive Russia witch hunt simply because he helped Trump win the
White House in 2016.
FederalProsecutors on Monday
recommended Trump confidante Roger Stone serve 7-9 years in prison
for process crimes during the Mueller witchhunt.
Ina rare
move, the Department of Justice backed down from its abusive
sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone.
Allfour
prosecutors who signed Roger Stone’s sentencing memo seeking an
excessive prison term of 7 to 9 years resigned like cowards onTuesday
after AG Bill Barr stepped in and smacked them
down.
Mueller’sprosecutors and this corrupt judge made
for a very toxic and abusive case against Roger
Stone.
PresidentTrump torched Demon Judge Amy Berman
Jackson on Tuesday night.
Isthis the Judge that put Paul
Manafort in SOLITARY CONFINEMENT, something that not even mobster Al
Capone had to endure? How did shetreat Crooked Hillary Clinton? Just
asking! https://t.co/Fe7XkepJNN
—
DonaldJ. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February
12, 2020
Wereported
months ago and again
in May 2018, that Obama appointed liberal activist Judge, Amy
Berman Jackson, was assigned to the most important court case in
UShistory, the Manafort case in the Trump-Russia hoax
investigation.
Sadly,Judge Jackson has a horrible far left
record on the bench. In 2013 Judge Jackson rejected
arguments from the Catholic Church that Obamacare’s
requirements that employers provide cost free coverage
ofcontraceptive services in spite of being contrary to their
religious beliefs. This was overturned by the Supreme Court.
In2017
Judge Jackson
dismissed the wrongful death suit against Hillary Clinton filed
by two of the families who lost loved ones in Benghazi.The families
argued that Clinton had done little to help their sons and then lied
to cover it up.
Thenon January 19, 2018, Paul Manafort’s
case was reassigned
to Judge Jackson on January 19th, a few weeks after being
filed.
Itis unknown how she was assigned to the Manafort
case or by whom. What is clear is that with her atrocious and slanted
record to date,the Deep State and the Mueller team certainly wanted
Judge Jackson overseeing the Manafort case.
OnJanuary 3,
2018, we
reported that Paul Manafort filed a suit against the “Deep
State” DOJ (Jeff Sessions), Assistant AG Rod Rosenstein and
CorruptInvestigator Robert Mueller that should have shut down
Mueller’s corrupt investigation!
In another example the
report:“Immigrant Who Became Hotshot Chicago DNC Judge SentencedTo
Jail For $1.4m Mortgage Fraud” shows that Judges veer to crime
quiteoften, hen influenced:
Lukas
Mikelionis
reports that Jessica Arong O’Brien, 51, broke down into tears
after the judge sent herto prison after the federal jury convicted
her in February of two counts alleging that she took part in a scheme
in which severallenders were scammed. (Facebook)
Thefirst
Filipina judge in Cook County, Chicago, who came to the U.S. with
almost nothing and no education, was sentenced on Thursday to ayear
in prison after being found guilty to participating in a $1.4 million
mortgage fraud scheme a decade ago.
JessicaArong O’Brien,
51, broke down into tears after the judge sent her to prison
following her February conviction of two counts allegingthat she took
part in a scheme in which several lenders were scammed, the Chicago
Tribune reported.
Shewas
convicted of lying to lenders to obtain more than $1.4 million
in mortgages on two investment properties that she sold whileshe
owned a real estate company.
O’Brienreportedly made
money by selling the two homes in 2007 after paying kickbacks to a
straw purchaser. Personally, she made a profit of atleast $325,000
from the sales, prosecutors said.
Thelenders, meanwhile,
lost money as the straw purchaser defaulted on payments and
properties were foreclosed.
JessicaArong O’Brien with
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. (Facebook)
Priorto
the sentencing, O’Brien said she was “an embarrassment” and
said the scheme was a mistake. “Of course, I have remorse as to
mystupidity,” O’Brien said.
Herlawyer Steve Greenberg
argued for probation, pointing to her true American dream story,
where a Filipina immigrant, who came to theU.S. without anything,
educated herself and became a judge.
Accordingto the
Tribune, after O’Brien came to the U.S., she earned degrees in
culinary arts and restaurant management. She later went to
JohnMarshall Law School, graduating in 1998.
Witha law
degree, she went on to become the first Asian elected president of
the Women's Bar Association of Illinois and served on the board
ofgovernors for the Illinois State Bar Association. She also
co-founded a group in 2008 that gives scholarships to law students
from diversebackgrounds.
"Itis an inspirational
story. She has fallen as far as she can fall. She has lost
everything. … There is absolutely no reason to send thispoor lady
to jail."
— LawyerSteve Greenberg
“Itis
an inspirational story,” Greenberg said. “She has fallen as far
as she can fall. She has lost everything. … There is absolutelyno
reason to send this poor lady to jail.”
ButU.S. District
Judge Thomas Durkin denied the request for probation, arguing that
her fraud scheme wasn’t just a mistake but a ratherelaborate
fraudulent scheme.
“Thiswasn’t stupid,” Durkin said,
according to the newspaper. “This was a crime… You really didn’t
need to do this.”
"Thiswasn’t stupid. This was a
crime. … You really didn’t need to do this."
—
U.S.District Judge Thomas Durkin
Prosecutors,meanwhile,
used O’Brien’s story to push for a harsher sentence, saying
that she committed fraud despite not having thefinancial needs to do
it.
Aftersentencing, O’Brien blamed family issues that
prompted her to get into real estate business and reiterated that she
acted foolishly.
“Ofall those things that everyone has
told you about me, one thing was missing — stupid,” O’Brien,
according to the Tribune. “Imean, seriously. This whole process is
crazy. I can’t put my hands on it.”
“Ihope some day
when I am six feet under, they will learn from what happened here,”
she added, hoping other lawyers will learn thatthey will be held to a
higher standard.
In another example, a websitetargeting
corrupt judges, says: “...This is amovie about a disturbed
person, which happens to be exactly what occurred to me in real
life. I grew up with a psychopath
(con-artist, liar, fraud and master manipulator) who learned at
an early age how to get what she wants by guilt trips or charming
theweak. It’s just an act, a guilt trip, a con job by a immoral
beast. You see in public she pretends to be caring, kind and a good
person.But those who see through her act and con job know what she
really is. A monster that hides behind “I Care A Lot”. I grew up
withthis beast that has no business walking around in the free world.
Yet it’s obvious I’m not alone these beasts are common. Worse
theycheat and lie their way into roles of authority and power. People
today don’t care about the facts, evidence or truth they follow
afake image which is how these monsters survive. Down at the bottom
of this page is an audio file which is an example of how this
con-artistlooks for weakness by saying how much she cares and when
that does not work seconds later switches to who she really is “Don’t
makeme pull the trigger because I really do love you”. But it’s
all an act by a cold blooded psychopath. An insect who has no empathy
orheart.
Welcometo my world and how a child from birth
destroyed her father, hated her brother because he was competition
and used the court system,mail fraud, identity theft to embezzle
$200,000.00 from her own mother’s bank accounts. Then force her
mother into aconservatorship via a fraudulent petition based on
perjury. How her husband who with his background as corporate coach,
fired healthprovider CEO and CPA background helped find corrupt
lawyers and judges to ignore evidence, elder abuse, fraud,
perjury and full documentation of (2) missing bank accounts.
Allignored by a Judge
Candace J Beason
America, LYING DOES PAY and very
well. It’s no longer about a GOOD lawyer that knows law but about
finding a connected lawyer who can bribe the judge. (This one
happened to be the X President of the Pasadena Bar) and frequented
the Judges dinners (conflict of interest?). In fact this same lawyer
was found to feed cases to one of the most corrupt judges of Los
Angeles County Superior Court Probate department Judge
Aviva K. Bobb Who was exposed by a series of Probate
abuse articles by the Los Angeles Times back in early 2000.
Which the court “PRETENDED” to clean up but in fact just dug in
deeper and allowed worse corruption. Judge Bobb and Pasadena Lawyer
Philip Barbaro Jr. Would form a conspiracy to try and shut me up via
a
fraudulent Police report claiming I was terrorizing them by
posting my opinion on the internet. I spent 3 days in jail then
released stating I was only detained. Fact is police told me my
version of what took place exposing a corrupt judge and lawyers
appeared to be the truth because they could not find any other
reason. But like all other authorities FBI, DOJ, APS, LAPD, Los
Angeles Bar, California Bar no one did anything when provided with
evidence. No one wants to think a judge could be a criminal or a
lawyer who “pretends” to fight against elder abuse is a fraud.
Like “I Care A Lot” the concept is LIE, put on a fake image,
smile and pretend you’re not who they say you are.
My
version of events is “Factual, backed up by documents and court
records” I’ve even got original emails from my sister back as
far as 1995, cards, letter and audio recordings. Witness statements
as well and missing bank account numbers which she claims never
existed but in her petition wastes no time claiming “if the court
found $200K in missing bank accounts” she blames her brother “Me”
who was responsible. However never supplies one ounce of evidence or
documentation. In fact the entire petition is based on hearsay, lies
and perjured info by her and her
Glendale lawyer Christopher E. Overgaard of La Crescenta
CA who perjure his own petition in the case even going so far as to
claim his lawyer partner Michael Jay was a PI and searched for me
but could not find me. This is typical how probate courts operate.
Even the lawyer the court forces upon the person
conserved works for the court but is paid by the conservator. Meet
Pacific
Palisades PVP Violet M. Boskovich who helped the conservator
cover up her fraud, perjury and lies. Never represented her client
and worked hard to keep her silent and away from appearing in court.
Point is “It’s all about the money” Follow the money because
the participants all are paid by the person made (in charge of the
money). The actual owner has zero say, freedom, rights or control of
anything. They’re made out to be mentally incompetent (but
in reality are over medicated). The game is “Isolate, Medicate
and Liquidate” while they smile all the way to the bank.
The
Superior Court system in Los Angeles has become a joke for a city
that has so much,yet so little,California is ranked F, at present
and the Superior Court system here is next to third world as far as
fraud, corruption and justice for profit. This system is denying its
residents/Taxpayers their due process on so many levels, Banks,
Escrow companies and title companies own the courts and they are
attempting to own the land. Lawyers wont take a stand against these
courts and their judges that’s how bad it has become.Please do the
right thing and investigate and replace those who don’t want to
play fair.
Apr 4th, 2019
Someone from San Gabriel,
CA writes:
My husband was an employee at Los Angeles Department
of Warer and Power. He has a Ph.D. and has done exceptional job as a
chemist for the department by training other employees. But because
of the ongoing discriminatory and retaliatory actions against him
for filing an internal grievance about the corrupt and
discriminatory promotion process, he never got promoted even though
he is only one of the few working there with a Ph.D. degree. He was
physically assaulted by an assistant supervisor who got promoted
ahead of him despite not having as much job experience and degree
credential. Not only was he denied proper justice, he was further
retaliated against with excessive amount of work, excessive
monitoring with his supervisors’ attempts to force him to commit
errors with his work. When he was finally forced to make a mistake
which could have been easily avoided had he not been piled so much
work, he was denied the chance to correct the mistake (every
employee is allowed to correct mistakes as part of the work
protocol) and his mistake was grossly exaggerated to one that cannot
be scientifically and evidentially supported. He is terminated
because he was demoted to do the task of peeling labels and
discarding sample waste which resulted in an additional workplace
injury. When he reported this additional injury, he was immediately
terminated with that supposed “mistake” that he so wanted to
avoid and correct from a year ago. The Skelly Meeting and the city
appeals both before a supposed arbitrator (Joseph Duffy) and some
city commissioners went absolutely nowhere as they refused to
consider any scientific evidence. They only consider what LADWP
management colluded to say (a bunch of shameless and corrupt
PERJURERS), as if a lie repeated many times by enough people, it
would become the truth. LADWP went to strike our lawsuit down
recently at the Superior Court. I have been following through this
case for several years and the corruption and collusion within the
whole judicial system is astounding. They have the appearance and
facade of “due process” without the real substance. Everything
they did was only formality. Whatever LADW managers and supervisors
colluded to say (that is, to say only, WITHOUT EVIDENCE) becomes
“evidence”, but whatever real object scientific and forensic
evidence we present with my husband being also an eyewitness is
brushed aside. I guess if I bring over all of my friends and
relatives from all over the globe and say LADWP supervisors murdered
someone, it would become the truth just because there are enough
people repeating the same accusation, then by all means I can lock
all of these managers and supervisors up for murders. With the same
logic, the judicial system in Los Angeles is such that they consider
enough perjurers repeating the same false accusations or claims to
be “good evidence” and so they used such “evidence”
(whatever they collide together to defame and perjure) to wrongfully
terminate my husband and continue to deny him justice. These
“judges” and “commissioners” who hold law degrees or have
studied law should be utterly ashamed of themselves for such blatant
distortion of justice. We should call the judicial system in Los
Angeles CORRUPTION SYSTEM.
Aug 29th, 2016
Someone
from South El Monte, CA writes:
I Lost my inheritance and my
mom and our homes thanks to the court system I was never heard
didn’t have an attorney wrote letters filed forms because of how
much they have to benefit from the elderly there the ones who win
win it all them the attorney and fiduciary’s judges when I’m
reporting elder abuse and it’s ignored but my mom is being taken
for money when both conservators are passing out money and not to
caregivers
Mar 11th, 2017
Patrick M. from Los
Angeles, CA writes:
The Los Angeles Superior Court is in my
opinion a band of judicial gangsters, that are blatantly denying due
process, ignoring valid evidence, violating the Constitution and
extorting money from the people of Los Angeles all while being paid
off by whichever party has the right price. as a pro se litigant I
went up against a lawyer who claim to not be representing any of the
defendants yet drafted every Motion in the case and they were all
granted and my case was dismissed, even though the court had no
jurisdiction as the defendant had no lawyer they had defaulted. A
total joke…if you want justice stay away from these people. …you
have better luck dealing directly with the Mob.Dec 6th, 2016
Jose
H. from Alhambra, CA writes:
I totally agreed since i been
emotionally financially and even mentally affected since i got so
physical stressed knowing how this court will take my ex wife’s
side since she all the time was a step forward in our case and
always hiring a lawyer that I couldn’t afford for myself but i had
all the time to pay for her attorney since I didn’t have on
attorney the judges never pay attention to me and side by side with
her lawyer always loosing case by case i little by little lost it
all this court left me empty pocket and even my part of the divorce
was then giving wrongfully to my ex wife she stole she kicked me out
of my own house took my part of the half and half assets and
properties and all thanks to the her lawyer that was in a deal with
the judge at each case my ex even failed to report to court over
payments she fail to follow the court orders she trespass and stole
from a property she gave false testimony and i reported all this to
the court and to the judge and they ignored me cause they were no
getting profits from me as with my ex because the lawyer soplits
with the judge they move in a way that I couldn’t believe i have
another big story how the judge even moved a clerk from his desk
then sent me to talk to a person who all she did was discouraged me
from appealing the decision and only hand me the papers without
helping me when the usual clerk helps people filling up the papers
for people without attorney but this lady the judge sent one throw
the papers to me in a very rude way please i need my case to be
review as per i ended up on the streets thanks
PLEASE
SIGN THE PETITION
California is one of the most
corrupt Judicial states in America today, from the days of
1996-2011 Ronald
M. George who named his own successor Tani
Cantil-Sakauye.
Victims go into the millions with
police, government and the courts in a huge cover up protecting a
manipulated Justice system that is nothing about justice. The legal
system in California is designed to destroy family, estates,
children’s lives and freedom via dishonest judges and lawyers
controlled by a gang called the ABA
American Bar Association.
Be sure to scroll down the
page for info how to report and file complaints.
Mar
13th, 2017
Someone from Los Angeles, CA writes:
Appellate
court denies challenge to LA judges’ ‘double-dipping’ practice
Los Angeles County provides Superior Court judges more than $46,400
each in annual benefits, including supplemental health and
retirement benefits, while judges in other counties receive
substantially fewer supplemental benefits or none at all. The legal
fight began in April 2006, when Sturgeon filed suit in Los Angeles
Superior Court asking that the county be stopped from paying
benefits to judges because they were also receiving them from the
state through legislation passed in 1997. Mr. Trump is right, the
system is rigged.
Uglyjudge.com
State
of California Commission on Judicial Performance
Complaints
Against California Judges
Lawless
America Corruption Reports for Judges
Judges
as Criminals
Judges
above the Law
Center
for Judicial Excellence
How
To Deal With A Bad Judge
Citizens
for Criminal Justice
The
Black Wall of Silence
https://californiajudicialcorruption.wordpress.com
Exposing Corrupt California Judges,
Courts and more. judges Socrates Manoukian, His wife Patricia
Bamratte-Manoukian and Erica Yew, Commission on Judicial
Performance.Nepotism, Corruption and Fraud in California's
Courts.
43
California judges were reprimanded for misconduct last ...
https://www.latimes.com › local
› california › la-me-judges-discipline-20150404-story.html
Apr
4, 201543 California judges were reprimanded for misconduct last
year By Maura Dolan Staff Writer April 4, 2015 7:37 PM PT Reporting
from SAN FRANCISCO — Two judges had sex with women in their
chambers,…
Corrupt
Judges are out of control in America
https://uglyjudge.com › judges
Santa
Clara County California is a hotbed of Corruption that focuses on
one judge Socrates Peter Manoukian where several documented cases
have been sabotaged by the judge. There is even an official Judge
Socrates Manoukian web site which documents the corruption and
crimes.
5
Corrupt Judges & The Countless Lives They Tried To …
https://www.investigationdiscovery.com › crimefeed
› bad-behavior ›
5-corrupt-judges-the-countless-lives-they-tried-to-destroy
Thomas
J. Maloney was a judge in Cook County, Illinois from 1977 to 1991.
Maloney and numerous fellow Cook County judges were the focus of an
investigation named Operation Greylord. The o peration was a joint
investigation by the FBI, IRS, USPS and the Illinois State Police to
track down corrupt judges.
Corrupt
Judges - Judiciary Report
https://judiciaryreport.com › corrupt_judges.htm
The
Corrupt Visiting Judge Judge Richard Markus is openly violating the
constitutional rights of citizen Elsebeth Baumgartner for simply
exercising her right to free speech in a non-threatening, peaceful
manner. The lengths this just has gone to is sickening and appalling
and is another black
How
Corrupt Judges are Destroying Our Society
https://www.citywatchla.com › index.php
› 2016-01-01-13-17-00 › los-angeles ›
15903-how-corrupt-judges-are-destroying-our-society
To
add insult to the indignity of being preyed upon by corrupt judges,
Californians have to endure the Commission of Judicial Performance
[CJP], which is the watchdog agency where the wolves monitor the
wolves who are feasting inside the hen house.
Thousands
of U.S. judges who broke laws or oaths remained ...
https://www.reuters.com › investigates
› special-report › usa-judges-misconduct
The
country's approximately 1,700 federal judges hear 400,000 cases
annually. The nearly 30,000 state, county and municipal court judges
handle a far bigger docket: more than 100 million new …
Corrupt
justice: what happens when judges' bias taints a ...
https://www.theguardian.com › us-news
› 2015 › oct › 18 › judge-bias-corrupts-court-cases
Oct
18, 2015Corrupt justice: what happens when judges' bias taints a
case? ... California's score, 77, the highest of any state, was
seven points below the federal government's grade of 84.
Directory
of Judges - The Superior Court of California ...
www.sanmateocourt.org › general_info
› judges › directory.php
Effective September 10,
2021. Hon. Leland Davis, III, Presiding Judge Department 1,
Courtroom 2H 400 County Center Redwood City, CA 94063 (650)
261-5101
Inanother example MICHAEL
BERENS and JOHN
SHIFFMAN report that Thousands
of U.S. judges who broke laws or oaths remained on the bench
In
the past dozen years, state and local judges have repeatedly
escapedpublic accountability for misdeeds that have victimized
thousands. Nine of 10 kept their jobs, a Reuters investigation found
–including an Alabama judge who unlawfully jailed hundreds of poor
people, many of them Black, over traffic fines. Judge Les
Hayes once sentenced a single mother to 496 days behind
bars forfailing to pay traffic tickets. The sentence was so
stiff it exceeded the jail time Alabama allows for negligent
homicide. Marquita Johnson, who was locked up in April 2012,
says the impact of her time in jail endures today.Johnson’s three
children were cast into foster care while she was incarcerated. One
daughter was molested, state records show. Anotherwas physically
abused.
“Judge Hayes took away my lifeand didn’t
care how my children suffered,” said Johnson, now 36. “My
girls will never be the same.”
Fellow inmates found her
sentencehard to believe. “They had a nickname for me: The Woman
with All the Days,”Johnson said. “That’s what they called me:
The Woman with All the Days.There were people who had committed real
crimes who got out before me.”
In 2016, the state
agency thatoversees judges charged Hayes with violating Alabama’s
code of judicial conduct. According to the Judicial Inquiry
Commission, Hayes
broke state and federal laws by jailing Johnson and hundreds
of other Montgomery residents too poor to pay fines. Among
thosejailed: a plumber struggling to make rent, a mother who skipped
meals to cover the medical bills of her disabled son, and a
hotelhousekeeper working her way through college.
Hayes, a judge since 2000, admitted in court documents to violating 10 different parts of thestate’s judicial conduct code. One of the counts was a breach of a judge’s most essential duty: failing to “respect and comply withthe law.”Despite the severity of the ruling, Hayes wasn’t barred from serving as a judge. Instead, thejudicial commission and Hayes reached a deal. The former Eagle Scout would serve an 11-month unpaid suspension. Then he could return tothe bench. Until he was disciplined, Hayes said in an interview with Reuters, “I never thought I was doingsomething wrong.” This week, Hayes is set to retire after 20 years as a judge. In a statement toReuters, Hayes said he was “very remorseful” for his misdeeds. Community activists say hisdeparture is long overdue. Yet the decision to leave, they say, should never have been his to make, given his record of misconduct.
“He should have been firedyears ago,” said Willie
Knight, pastor of North Montgomery Baptist Church. “He broke the
law and wanted to get away with it. Hissudden retirement is years too
late.”
Hayes is among thousands of stateand local
judges across America who were allowed to keep positions of
extraordinary power and prestige after violating judicial ethicsrules
or breaking laws they pledged to uphold, a Reuters investigation
found.
Relatedcontent
Reuters database:
Judges who were publicly disciplined – and what they did
How to
use the searchable database to explore the disciplinary files of
judges across America
Judges have made raciststatements, lied to state officials
and forced defendants to languish in jail without a lawyer – and
then returned to the bench,sometimes with little more than a rebuke
from the state agencies overseeing their conduct.
Recent
media reports havedocumented failures in judicial oversight in South
Carolina, Louisiana and
Illinois.
Reuters went further.
In the first
comprehensiveaccounting of judicial misconduct nationally, Reuters
identified and reviewed 1,509 cases from the last dozen years –
2008 through2019 – in which judges resigned, retired or were
publicly disciplined following accusations of misconduct. In
addition,reporters identified another 3,613 cases from 2008 through
2018 in which states disciplined wayward judges but kept hidden from
thepublic key details of their offenses – including the identities
of the judges themselves.
All told, 9 of every
10judges were allowed to return to the bench after they were
sanctioned for misconduct, Reuters determined. They included
aCalifornia
judge who had sex in his courthouse chambers, once with his
former law intern and separately with an attorney; a
New York judge who berated domestic violence victims; and a
Maryland judge who, after his arrest for driving drunk, was
allowed to return to the bench provided he took a Breathalyzer
testbefore each appearance.
The news agency’s findingsreveal
an “excessively” forgiving judicial disciplinary system, said
Stephen Gillers, a law professor at New York University whowrites
about judicial ethics. Although punishment short of removal from the
bench is appropriate for most misconduct cases, Gillerssaid, the
public “would be appalled at some of the lenient treatment judges
get” for substantial transgressions.
Among the cases
from the pastyear alone:
PUBLIC WARNINGS
Jack
Robison
District
Court, Texas
Burst into a jury deliberation room,
exclaiming that God told him the defendant was innocent.
The
Herald-Zeitung/Handout via REUTERS
In Utah, a
judge texted a video of a man’s scrotum to court clerks.
He was reprimanded but remains on the bench. In
Indiana, three judges attending a conference last spring gotdrunk and
sparked a 3 a.m. brawl outside a White Castle fast-food restaurant
that ended with two of the judges shot. Althoughthe state supreme
court found the three judges had “discredited the entire Indiana
judiciary,” each returned to the bench after asuspension. In
Texas, a judge burst inon jurors deliberating the case of a
woman charged with sex trafficking and declared that God
told him the defendant was innocent. The offending judge received
a warning and returned to the bench. The defendant was convictedafter
a new judge took over the case. “There are certain things
wherethere should be a level of zero tolerance,” the jury
foreman, Mark House, told Reuters. The judge should have been fined,
Housesaid, and kicked off the bench. “There is no justice, because
he is still doing his job.”Judicial misconduct specialists say such
behavior has the potential to erode trust in America’scourts and,
absent tough consequences, could give judges license to behave with
impunity.“When you see cases like that, the public starts to wonder
about the integrity and honesty of thesystem,” said Steve
Scheckman, a lawyer who directed Louisiana’s oversight agency and
served as deputy director of New York’s. “Itlooks like a good ol’
boys club.” That’s how local lawyers viewedthe case of a longtime
Alabama judge who concurrently served on the state’s judicial
oversight commission. The judge, Cullman DistrictCourt’s Kim
Chaney, remained on the bench for three years after being accused of
violating the same nepotism rules he was tasked withenforcing on the
oversight commission. In at least 200 cases, court records show,
Judge Chaney chose his own son to serve as acourt-appointed defense
lawyer for the indigent, enabling the younger Chaney to
earn at least $105,000 in fees over two years.
In
February, months after Reutersrepeatedly asked Chaney and the state
judicial commission about those cases, he retired from the bench as
part of a deal with stateauthorities to end the investigation. Tommy
Drake, the lawyer who firstfiled a complaint against Chaney in 2016,
said he doubts the judge would have been forced from the bench if
Reuters hadn’t examinedthe case. “You know the only reason
theydid anything about Chaney is because you guys started asking
questions,” Drake said. “Otherwise, he’d still be
there.”
Broken Bedrock of American justice
State
and local judges drawlittle scrutiny even though their courtrooms are
the bedrock of the American criminal justice system, touching the
lives of millions ofpeople every year. The country’s
approximately1,700 federal judges hear 400,000 cases annually. The
nearly 30,000 state, county and municipal court judges
handle afar bigger docket: more than 100 million new cases each
year, from traffic to divorce to murder. Their titles range from
justice of thepeace to state supreme court justice. Their powers are
vast and varied – from determining whether a defendant should
be jailedto deciding who deserves custody of a child. Each U.S.
state has an oversightagency that investigates misconduct complaints
against judges. The authority of the oversight agencies is distinct
from the power heldby appellate courts, which can reverse a judge’s
legal ruling and order a new trial. Judicial commissions cannot
change verdicts.Rather, they can investigate complaints about the
behavior of judges and pursue discipline ranging from reprimand to
removal.
REPRIMANDED:
Sam
Benningfield
General
Sessions Court, Tennessee
Granted
jail credit to women who received surgical implants for birth
control and men who received vasectomies.
TNcourts.gov/Handout
via REUTERS
Few experts dispute that thegreat majority of judges behave
responsibly, respecting the law and those who appear before
them. And some contend that, when judgesdo falter, oversight agencies
are effective in identifying and addressing the behavior. “With a
few notable exceptions, thecommissions generally get it right,”
said Keith Swisher, a University of Arizona law professor who
specializes in judicialethics.
Others disagree. They note
thatthe clout of these commissions is limited, and their authority
differs from state to state. To remove a judge, all but a handful
ofstates require approval of a panel that includes other judges. And
most states seldom exercise the full extent of those
disciplinarypowers.
As a result, the system tends toerr on
the side of protecting the rights and reputations of judges while
overlooking the impact courtroom wrongdoing has on those mostaffected
by it: people like Marquita Johnson. Reuters scoured thousands of
state investigative files, disciplinary proceedings and court
recordsfrom the past dozen years to quantify the personal toll of
judicial misconduct. The examination found at least 5,206 people
who weredirectly affected by a judge’s misconduct. The victims
cited in disciplinary documents ranged from people who were illegally
jailedto those subjected to racist, sexist and other abusive comments
from judges in ways that tainted the cases. The number is a
conservativeestimate. The tally doesn’t include two previously
reported incidents that affected thousands of defendants and prompted
sweepingreviews of judicial conduct.
“If we have a
system that holdsa wrongdoer accountable but we fail to address the
victims, then we are really losing sight of what a justice system
should be allabout.”
In Pennsylvania, the stateexamined
the convictions of more than 3,500 teenagers sentenced by two judges.
The judges were convicted of taking kickbacks as part ofa scheme to
fill a private juvenile detention center. In 2009, the Pennsylvania
Supreme Court appointed senior judge Arthur Grim tolead a victim
review, and the state later expunged
criminal records for 2,251 juveniles. Grim told Reuters that
every state should adopt a way tocompensate victims of judicial
misconduct.
“If we have a system that holds a wrongdoer accountable but we fail to address the victims, then weare really losing sight of what a justice system should be all about,” Grim said. In another review underway in Ohio, state public defender Tim Young is scrutinizing 2,707 cases handled by a judge who retired in 2018 after being hospitalized for alcoholism. Mike Benza, a law professor atCase Western Reserve University whose students are helping identify victims, compared the work to current investigations into policeabuse of power. “You see one case and then you look to see if it's systemic,” he said. The review, which has been limited during the coronavirus pandemic, may take a year. But Youngsaid the time-consuming task is essential because “a fundamental injustice may have been levied against hundreds or thousands ofpeople.” ‘Special rules for judges’ Most states afford judges accused of misconduct a gentle kind of justice. Perhaps no state betterillustrates the shortcomings of America’s system for overseeing judges than Alabama.
CENSURED JUDGES:
Scott
Steiner
Superior
Court, California
Had sex in his chambers with his intern
and with an attorney practicing before his court.
Twitter/Handout
via REUTERS
As in most states, Alabama’snine-member Judicial Inquiry
Commission is a mix of lawyers, judges and laypeople. All are
appointed. Their deliberations are secret andthey operate under some
of the most judge-friendly rules in the nation.Alabama’s rules make
even filing a complaint against a judge difficult. The complaint must
benotarized, which means that in theory, anyone who makes
misstatements about the judge can be prosecuted for perjury.
Complaints aboutwrongdoing must be made in writing; those that arrive
by phone, email or without a notary stamp are not
investigated, although sendersare notified why their complaints
have been summarily rejected. Anonymous written complaints are
shredded. These rules can leave lawyers and litigants fearing
retaliation, commission director Jenny Garrettnoted in response to
written questions.
“It’s a ridiculous systemthat
protects judges and makes it easy for them to intimidate anyone with
a legitimate complaint,” said Sue Bell Cobb, chief justice ofthe
Alabama Supreme Court from 2007 to 2011. In 2009, she unsuccessfully
championed changes to the process and commissioned anAmerican Bar
Association report that offered a scathing review of Alabama's
rules. In most other states, commission staff members can start
investigating a judge upon receiving a phonecall or email, even
anonymous ones, or after learning of questionable conduct from a news
report or court filing. In Alabama, staff willnot begin an
investigation without approval from the commission itself, which
convenes about every seven weeks.By rule, the commission also
must keep a judge who is under scrutiny fully informed throughout
aninvestigation. If a subpoena is issued, the judge receives a
simultaneous copy, raising fears about witness intimidation. Ifa
witness gives investigators a statement, the judge receives
a transcript. In the U.S. justice system, such deference
toindividuals under investigation is extremely rare. “It’s a
ridiculous systemthat protects judges and makes it easy for them to
intimidate anyone with a legitimate complaint.”“Why the need for
special rules for judges?” said Michael Levy, a Washington lawyer
who hasrepresented clients in high-profile criminal, corporate,
congressional and securities investigations. “If judges think
it’sfair and appropriate to investigate others for crimes or
misconduct without providing those subjects or targets with copies of
witnessstatements and subpoenas, why don’t judges think it’s fair
to investigate judges in the same way?” Alabama judges also
are given an opportunity to resolve investigations
confidentially.Reuters interviews and a review of Alabama
commission records show the commission has met with judges
informally at least 19 timessince 2011 to offer corrective
“guidance.” The identities of those judges remain confidential,
as does the conduct that promptedthe meetings. “Not every violation
warrants discipline,” commission director Garrett said.
Since
2008, the commission hasbrought 21 public cases against judges,
including Hayes, charging two this year. 496 = Number ofdays Judge
Hayes sentenced Marquita Johnson to jail for unpaid traffic
tickets.Two of the best-known cases brought by the commission
involved Roy Moore, who was twice forcedout as chief justice of the
Alabama Supreme Court for defying federal court orders.Another
Alabama justice fared better in challenging a misconduct complaint,
however. Tom Parker,first elected to the state’s high court
in 2004, pushed back when the commission investigated him in
2015 for comments hemade on the radio criticizing the U.S.
Supreme Court's decision legalizing gay marriage. Parker sued
the commission in federal court, arguing the agency was infringing on
his FirstAmendment rights. He won. Although the commission had
dropped its investigation before the ruling, it was ordered to
cover Parker’slegal fees: $100,000, or about a fifth of the
agency’s total annual budget.
In 2018, the people of Alabama elected Parker chief justice. These days, Parker told Reuters, Alabama judges and the agency that oversees them enjoy “a muchbetter relationship” that’s less politically tinged. “How can I say it? It’s much more respectful between the commission and thejudges now.”
“Gut instinct”
Montgomery,
Alabama has a deephistory of racial conflict, as reflected in the
clashing concepts emblazoned on the city’s great seal: “Cradle of
the Confederacy”and “Birthplace of the Civil Rights Movement.”
Jefferson Davis was inauguratedhere as Confederate president after
the South seceded from the Union in 1861, and his birthday is a
state holiday. As wascommon throughout the South, the city was the
site of the lynchings of Black men, crimes now commemorated
at a nationalmemorial based here. Police arrested civil rights
icon Rosa Parks here in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a
city busto a white passenger. Today, about 60%
ofMontgomery’s 198,000 residents are Black, U.S.
census records show. Even so, Black motorists account for
about90% of those charged with unpaid traffic tickets, a Reuters
examination of court records found. Much of Judge Hayes’ work
inmunicipal court involved traffic cases and the collection of fines.
Hayes, who is white, told Reuters that “the majority of people
whocome before the court are Black.” City officials have said
thatneither race nor economics have played a role in police efforts
to enforce outstanding warrants, no matter how minor the offense.In
April 2012, Marquita Johnson was among them. Appearing before Hayes
on a Wednesday morning, the28-year-old single mother pleaded for
a break. Johnson had struggled for eightyears to pay dozens of
tickets that began with a citation for failing to show proof of
insurance. She had insurance, she said. But when shewas pulled over,
she couldn’t find the card to prove it. Even a single ticket was
aknockout blow on her minimum-wage waitress salary. In addition to
fines, the court assessed a $155 fee to every ticket. Court
recordsshow that police often issued her multiple tickets for other
infractions during every stop – a practice some residents
call“stacking.”
Under
state law, failing to pay even one ticket can result in the
suspension of a driver’s license. Johnson’s decision to
keepdriving nonetheless – taking her children to school or to
doctor visits, getting groceries, going to work – led to more
tickets anddeeper debt. “I told Judge Hayes that I hadlost my
job and needed more time to pay,” she recounted.
By Hayes’
calculation, Johnsonowed more than $12,000 in fines. He sentenced
Johnson to 496 days in jail. Hayes arrived at that sentence by
counting each day in jail as$25 toward the outstanding debt. A
different judge later determined that Johnson actually owed half the
amount calculated by Hayes, andthat Hayes had incorrectly penalized
her over fines she had already paid. To shave time off her sentence,
Johnson washed police cars andperformed other menial labor while
jailed.
Hayes told Reuters that hegenerally found
pleas of poverty hard to believe. “With my years of experience, I
can tell when someone is being truthful with me,”Hayes said. He
called it “gut instinct” -- though he added, in a statement
this week, that he also consulted “each defendant'scriminal and
traffic history as well as their history of warrants and failures to
appear in court.”
Of course, the law demands moreof a
judge than a gut call. In a 1983 landmark decision, Bearden v.
Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that state judges areobligated
to hold a hearing to determine whether a defendant has “willfully”
chosen not to pay a fine. According to the state’s judicial
oversight commission, “Judge Hayes did not make anyinquiry into Ms.
Johnson’s ability to pay, whether her non-payment was
willful.” From jail, “I prayed to return to my daughters,”
Johnson said. “I was sure that someone wouldrealize that Hayes had
made a mistake.” She said her worst day in jailwas her youngest
daughter’s 3rd birthday. From a jail telephone, she tried to
sing “Happy Birthday” but slumped to thefloor in grief. “She
was choking up andcrying,” said Johnson’s mother, Blanche, who
was on the call. “She was devastated to be away from her children
so long.”
When Johnson was freed after 10months in jail, she
learned that strangers had abused her two older children. One is now
a teenager; the other is in middle school. “Mykids will pay a
lifetime for what the court system did to me,” Johnson said. “My
daughters get frantic when I leave the house. Iknow they’ve had
nightmares that I’m going to disappear again.” Six months after
Johnson’srelease, Hayes jailed another single Black mother.
Angela McCullough, then 40, had been pulled over driving home from
FaulknerUniversity, a local community college where she carried a
3.87 grade point average. As a mother of four children, including a
disabledadult son, she had returned to college to pursue her dream of
becoming a mental health counselor. Police ticketed her for failingto
turn on her headlights. After a background check, the officer
arrested McCullough on a warrant for outstanding traffic tickets.
Shewas later brought before Hayes. “I can’t go to
jail,”McCullough recalled pleading with the judge. “I’m a
mother. I have a disabled son who needs me.”
Hayes
sentenced McCullough to 100days in jail to pay off a court debt of
$1,350, court records show. Her adult son, diagnosed with
schizophrenia, was held in aninstitution until her release.
McCullough said she cleaned jailcells in return for time off her
sentence. One day, she recalled, she had to clean a blood-soaked cell
where a female inmate had slit herwrists. She was freed after 20
days, using the money she saved for tuition to pay off her tickets,
shesaid. Jail was the darkest chapter ofher life, McCullough said, a
place where “the devil was trying to take my mind.” Today, she
has abandoned her pursuit of a degree. “Idon’t think I’ll ever
be able to afford to go back.”
SUSPENDED 6
MONTHS:
Chris
Kunza Mennemeyer
Circuit
Court, Missouri
Deliberately postponed the appointment of
public defenders in probation violation cases.
Pike
County News/Handout via REUTERS
A clear sign that something wasamiss in Montgomery courts came in
November 2013, when a federal lawsuit was filed alleging that city
judges were unlawfully jailingthe poor. A similar suit was filed
in 2014, and two more civil rights cases were filed in 2015. Johnson
and McCullough were Plaintiffs.The lawsuits detailed practices
similar to those that helped fuel protests in Ferguson,
Missouri,after a white police officer killed a Black teenager in
2014. In a scathing report on the origins of the unrest, the U.S.
Department ofJustice exposed how Ferguson had systematically used
traffic enforcement to raise revenue through excessive fines, a
practice thatfell disproportionately hard on Black residents.
“Montgomery is just like Ferguson,” said Karen Jones, a community
activist and founder of alocal educational nonprofit. Jones has
led recent protests in Montgomery in the wake of the killing of
George Floyd, the Black manwhose death under the knee of a cop
in Minneapolis set off worldwide calls for racial justice. In
Montgomery, “everybody knew that the police targeted Black
residents. And I sat in Hayes’court and watched him squeeze poor
people for more money, then toss them in jail where they had to work
off debts with free labor to thecity.” It was years before the
flurry ofcivil rights lawsuits against Hayes and his fellow judges
had much impact on the commission. The oversight agency opened its
Hayes casein summer 2015, nearly two years after Plaintiffss’
lawyers in the civil rights cases filed a complaint with the body.
Hayes spentanother year and a half on the bench before accepting
the suspension.
Under its own rules, thecommission could
have filed a complaint and told its staff to investigate Hayes
at any time. Commission director Garrett said sheis prohibited by law
from explaining why the commission didn’t investigate sooner. The
investigation went slowly, Garrett said,because it involved reviewing
thousands of pages of court records. The commission also was busy
with other cases from 2015 to early2017, Garrett said, issuing
charges against five judges, including Moore.
“Slap
in the face”
A few months after Judge
Hayes’suspension ended, his term as a municipal judge was set to
expire. So, the Montgomery City Council took up the question of the
judge’sfuture on March 6, 2018. On the agenda of its meeting:
whether to reappoint Hayes to another four-year term.
Hayes wasn’t in the audiencethat night, but powerful
supporters were. The city’s chief judge, Milton Westry, told the
council that Hayes and his colleagues havechanged how they handled
cases involving indigent defendants, “since we learned a better way
of doing things.” In the wake of the suits,Westry said, Hayes and
his peers complied with reforms that required judges to make audio
recordings of court hearings and notify lawyerswhen clients are
jailed for failing to pay fines. As part of a settlement in
thecivil case, the city judges agreed to implement changes for at
least two years. Those reforms have since been abandoned, Reuters
found.Both measures were deemed too expensive, Hayes and city
officials confirmed.Residents who addressed the council were
incredulous that the city would consider reappointingHayes. Jones,
the community activist, reminded council members that Hayes had
“pleaded guilty to violating the very laws he was swornto uphold.”
The city council voted torehire Hayes to a fifth
consecutive term.
Marquita Johnson said she
can’tunderstand why a judge whose unlawful rulings changed the
lives of hundreds has himself emerged virtually unscathed. “Hiring
Hayes back to the bench was a slap in the face to everyone,”
Johnson said. “It was amessage that we don't matter.” On
Thursday, Hayes will retirefrom the bench. In an earlier
interview with Reuters, he declined to discuss the Johnson case.
Asked whether he regrets any ofthe sentences he has handed out,
he paused. “I think, maybe, I could havebeen more sympathetic at
times,” Hayes said. “Sometimes you miss a few.”Additional
reporting by Isabella Jibilian, Andrea Januta and Blake Morrison.
Edited by Morrison. In another example reported by JOHN
SHIFFMAN , A watchdog accused, a pattern of rulings delayed, a
repeat offenderwherein Three recent cases illustrate how Alabama
judges who were cited forwrongdoing were able to remain on the bench
for years. Judge Chaney: Enforced, broke rules!What happened
when a trial judge who also served on the state’s judicial
oversight board wasaccused of misbehavior. Alex Chaney was just a
year out of law school in 2015 when he started receiving
lucrativeappointments at taxpayer expense. A district judge
began assigning him to represent people too poor to afford a
lawyer.That judge was his dad, Kim Chaney.
Judge Chaney is
a powerful figurein rural Cullman County, where he was first elected
to the bench in 1992. Chaney serves on a local bank board and
has led severalstatewide justice associations. In 2012, the governor
honoredChaney by selecting him to also serve on Alabama’s
nine-member Judicial Inquiry Commission, which investigates
misconduct by judges.While on the commission, Chaney broke its ethics
laws in his own courtroom.In 2016, local attorney Tommy Drake filed a
complaint against Chaney, alleging that the judge wasappointing his
son to represent indigent defendants, violating ethics rules that
prohibit nepotism. Alex Chaney was paid $105,000 from 2015to 2017 by
the state for such court-appointed work, accounting records
show. Because Judge Chaney served on the judicial commission,
Drake sent his complaint to a differentstate watchdog agency, the
Alabama Ethics Commission. On October 4, 2017, the Ethics Commission
found that Judge Chaney violated ethicsrules and referred the case to
the state attorney general. The following day, records
show,Judge Chaney resigned from the Judicial Inquiry Commission. But
he remained a trial judge in Cullman. Eighteen months passed.Last
summer, a Reuters reporter began asking state officials about the
status of the case. Theofficials declined to comment. In
November, Reuters sent JudgeChaney and his son queries. They did not
respond. The judge’s lawyer, John Henig Jr, wrote to Reuters:
“Judge Chaney is a personof remarkably good character and would
never knowingly do anything unethical or wrong.”Henig said that
Judge Chaney appointed his son from a rotating list of lawyers to
representindigent defendants. Henig called the appointments
“ministerial” in nature.
“If Judge Chaney’s
son’sname was the next name on the list for appointments, Judge
Chaney would call out his son’s name and thereafter immediately
recusehimself from the case,” Henig wrote. A Reuters review of
court recordsshowed otherwise: Judge Chaney participated in several
cases after appointing his son and issued substantive decisions. For
example,records show that the judge reduced bond for one of his son’s
clients, and approved another’s motion to plead guilty. Henig
didnot respond to questions about these records.
This February 7 – eight monthsafter Reuters began
inquiring about Chaney – the commission charged the judge with
appointing his son to more than 200 cases and makingrulings in some
of them. Chaney struck a deal with the commission and retired
from the bench, avoiding a trial. During a hearing to
approve the deal, commission lawyer Elizabeth Bern said Chaney
shouldhave known better than to appoint his son, especially given
that he did so while a member of the oversight agency. During
Chaney’stenure, the commission had disciplined two judges who
abused their office to benefit a relative. “The nepotism
provision is clear and unequivocal without exception,” she
said.
Chaney did not speak during thehearing. Drake, the lawyer
who filed thecomplaint in 2016, said that absent the Reuters
inquiries, he doubts Chaney would have retired from the bench because
he is sopolitically powerful. Indeed, shortly after the judgestepped
down in disgrace for steering work to his son, the local bar
association issued a resolution praising him.Of Chaney, the local
lawyers said, “He has always maintained the highest ethical and
moralstandards of the office and has been an example to all, what a
judge should represent.”
Judge Kelly: “Callous indifference”
How a judge left children in limbo by repeatedly failing to perform her most basic duty: ruling oncases. Montgomery Circuit Court Judge Anita Kelly hears time-sensitive family matters such as childcustody, adoption and divorce – cases in which a child remains in limbo until she rules. Starting in 2014, court and judicial commission records show, word of years-long delays in hercases began to emerge from foster parents, lawyers, social workers and appeals court judges. Commission officials are barred by law fromdiscussing the case, but Reuters pieced together the scope of the investigation through juvenile court records, public documents andinterviews with people involved. In May 2014, foster parents Cheri and Travis Norwood filed a complaint about Kelly with thejudicial commission. They alleged the judge’s incompetence led to a traumatic, years-long delay in which a foster child who began livingwith the Norwoods as an infant was taken away from them at age 3 ½ and returned to live with her teenage biological mother.“If Judge Kelly thought they should have been together, fine,” Travis Norwood said in aninterview. “Why didn’t this happen sooner? Because children can’t wait. You can’t freeze a child, hold her in suspended animationuntil her mother is ready.” Social workers who heard about the Norwood complaint forwarded their own concerns about Kelly’sconduct in several other cases. Nonetheless, the commission dismissed the Norwood complaint in early 2015, finding “no reasonable basisto charge the judge.”
Over the next year, more redflags emerged. State appeals court
judges raised concerns about Kelly’s “continued neglect of her
duty,” citing at least fivecases that had untenable delays. In
November 2015, a supreme court justice criticized the nearly
three years it took todetermine one child’s fate. “I refuse
to be another adultwho has totally failed this child,” Justice
Tommy Bryan wrote. Another 20 months passedbefore the
judicial commission took action. In August 2017, it charged Kelly
with delays that “manifest a callous indifference orlack of
comprehension” to children’s well-being. One child’s case, it
noted, had dragged on for five years. Kelly took her case to
trial before the Court of the Judiciary, the special tribunal
thatweighs charges against judges. Her attorney argued that the
judge worked hard and had shown no ill intent.
In 2018,
the
tribunal found Kelly failed to “maintain professional competence.”
Kelly was suspended for 90 days. Still, she kept her job. The
courtsaid it likely would have removed Kelly from the bench if not
for two factors: Voters re-elected her in 2016, and she
exhibited “goodcharacter and the lack of evidence of scandal
or corruption on her part.” Her lawyer, Henry Lewis
Gillis, applauded her reinstatement and said the delays
neveraffected the quality of her decisions. “Judge Kelly
cannot changeyesterday,” Gillis said. “Rather, she chooses to
learn from her past experiences as she continues to handle the many,
many, manycases that come before her today.”
Judge
Wiggins: Give blood or go to jail
A judge who is
a repeatoffender – four times over – remains on the bench.
Circuit Judge Marvin Wiggins hasbeen hit with misconduct charges by
Alabama’s judicial conduct commission four times over the past
decade. In 2009, he
was reprimanded and suspended for 90 days for failing to
recuse himself from a voter fraud investigation involving
hisrelatives. “The public must be able totrust that our
judges will dispense justice fairly and impartially,” the Court of
the Judiciary concluded. “Judge Wiggins, by hisactions, disregarded
that trust.” In 2016 – in a case that madeglobal headlines –
Wiggins was censured for offering defendants the option of giving
blood instead of going to jail for failing to pay fines. A
local blood drive happened to be taking place at the courthouse
thatday. “If you do not have any moneyand you don’t want to
go to jail, as an option to pay it, you can give blood today,”
Wiggins told dozens of defendants, according toa recording. “Consider
that as a discount rather than putting you in jail, if you do not
have any money.”Forty-one defendants gave blood that day, and the
commission called Wiggins’ conduct “reprehensibleand
inexcusable.” Wiggins acknowledged that his comments were
inappropriate, but noted he did not send anyone to jail that day
forfailure to pay fines.
Wiggins’lawyer, Joe Espy III,
said that the judge “has always tried to cooperate” with
authorities. Espy noted that Wiggins is a communityleader, an
ordained pastor and has been repeatedly re-elected to the bench for
more than 20 years.“He is not only a good judge but a good person,”
Espy said.Last year, Wiggins
was reprimanded for directly calling the father in a custody
dispute – a conversation that violated a rule prohibiting a
judgefrom discussing a case without both sides present. A recording
of the call became a key piece of evidence against Wiggins. In
preparation for trial in that case, the commission said it found a
“pattern and practice” ofsimilar one-sided calls. The commission
also said it found evidence that Wiggins was meeting with divorce
litigants in his chamberswithout lawyers present. In November, this
prompted a newcommission case against Wiggins – his fourth in 10
years. “At a very minimum,” thecommission alleged, his
track record indicates a “pattern of carelessness or indifferent
disregard or lack of respect for the highstandards imposed on the
judiciary.” But at a pretrial hearing inJanuary, and in a
subsequent order, Wiggins scored a victory before the Alabama
tribunal that issues final judgment on such cases, theCourt of the
Judiciary. The presiding judge raised questions about whether proper
procedures had been followed in the case againstWiggins. Three weeks
later, the commissiondropped the case. And Wiggins returned to the
bench.
Theseare only a few examples, supplied by major
investigators and public official that prove that some Judges believe
they are immune toviolations of the law in order to protect their
special interests. These, and many other reports, validates
Plaintiffs’s concerns.
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multi-page PDF report similar to an FBI report on the target. You
caneither research the subject in more detail or send copies of the
report to the FBI, GAO, OSC, SEC or other enforcement group.
The
software is an automated AI temporal matching system whichincludes
24/7 analysis of all stock trades involving politicians to its
information source, politician finances, communications andpolicy
participators. it uses some of the same software code used by the
CERN mega-research center in Switzerland.
The technology
Core Evaluation Points:
Analyst estimates - these come from what an analyst estimates that a company's quarterly or annual earnings will be. They are important because they help approximate the fair value of an entity, which basically establishes it price on the stock exchange.
Share volume - this reflects the quantity of shares that can be traded over a certain period of time. There are buyers and there are sellers, and the transactions that take place between them contribute to total volume.
One Way The AI Detects Congressional Insider
Trades
Metricized signs of illegal insider trading occur
when tradesoccur that break out of the historical pattern of share
volume traded compared to beneficiary participation's of those
connected to companyand political entity. Another clue of the illegal
insider trading is when a lot of trading goes on right before
earnings announcements.That tends to be a sign that someone already
knows what the announcement is going to indicate, and it's an obvious
violation. Onemodule of the new software hunts these trends
around-the-clock in an unmanned manner like a detective who never
needs to sleep.
The software red alerts are issued when
trades are linked closerto the actual earnings and politicians bills
instead of what the predicted earnings were. In a corruption case,
it's clear the trades- especially made by politicians close to the
company - stemmed from information that was not readily available to
the general public.
In other words, at the time an insider
makes a trade, the tradehas a stronger relationship to earnings
guidance rather than to earnings results achieved.
Part Of
The Insider Trading Detection AI Uses 'DynamicTime Warping (DTW)'
In
econometrics, which is a concept frequently used byquantitative
analysts to evaluate stock market prices, dynamic time warping (DTW)
is an algorithm that can be used for measuringsimilarity between two
data sequences by calculating an optimal match between the two. This
sequence "matching" method is oftenused in time series
classification to properly "line things up."
The
method, coupled with AI machine learning ensemble methods, canprovide
a clear path between the trades made by insiders and public data used
to make the trades.
This is a product of artificial
intelligence that has beenexpanded by Indexer, Splunk, Palantir and
other firms fast becoming experts in products that can be used to
advance the art ofmanipulating political and social trends in
business and markets by using social media, financial data and news
stories. The new softwareprocess has taken that sort of approach to
the next level and targeted every member of Congress, their staff,
family and friends.The first emphasis is on California and
Washington, DC public figures.
In a hypothetical example,
a group of executives failed to tradeby industry standards by
leveraging material non-public information and policy manipulation.
Although consensus estimates called forhigher commodity prices at the
end of 2015, it appears key executives traded for their personal
accounts as a result of the forecastprovided by a specialist system
within the firm that was adept at predicting prices alongside
lobbyist manipulations. Flash-boy tradingis now dirtier and powered
by Google-class server systems.
In the hypothetical
scenario the software aggregates executivetrades in 2014 and 2015 and
finds a strong link between buys and sells of executive stock
options, which line up with materialnon-public estimates of commodity
prices that were provided by the specialist system.
For
example, in a "Exec Sell and Exec Buys" graph, agreen line
represents sells, while a black line represents buys. In the
corresponding period, one finds a red line represents unrevisedprices
provided by the specialist system, and green line represents
consensus estimates.
During Q1-2014, there was $28M in
purchases of executive stockoptions, while in Q2-2014, there was $25M
in sales of executive stock options. The specialist system called for
Q3-2014 commodity prices tomake a precipitous decline going into the
end of 2014. Remember, under this scenario, no revisions were made to
the specialistsystems' price forecast. In this example, executives
were afforded a significant advantage using price predictions from
the specialistsystem.
In a final bullet chart, there was a
dynamic time warping distancebetween trades and consensus estimates
of 7.23, but this distance is only 2.19 when comparing specialist
system estimates and executivetrades. Please note, the closer the
distance score is to zero, the more similar the trades are to the
estimates they are measuredagainst.
We have applied this
process to companies well-known forinfluence buying like, Google,
Tesla and Facebook
It's obvious that the tech executives
involved did not followindustry standards in their actions and make
public the "insider" information they had access to prior
to the trades they made. Thelobbyists they hired promoted this rigged
trend and paid off Senators with perks. These are the kind of
violations the SEC and othergoverning bodies can look to in
attempting to protect the trading public and the integrity of
financial marketplaces. Artificialintelligence tools are a major
factor in assisting the tracking of insider trading.
"Every
facet of our everyday lives has been impacted,infiltrated and greatly
influenced by artificial intelligence technologies," says Vernon
A. McKinley, a multi-jurisdictionalattorney, based in Atlanta. "In
fact, the U.S. government and its multiple agencies have developed
specialized intelligence unitsto detect, track, analyze and prosecute
those unscrupulous individuals seeking to profit from the use of such
tools,specifically in the financial industry, and to protect the
integrity and strength of the U.S. economy and its investors."
Now thesetools are being turned against the corrupt!
The
public can now detect trading anomalies in financialsituations using
this artificial intelligence software on their desktop computers. No
public official will ever be able to do thesekinds of corruptions,
again, without getting caught.
This approach has already
had an impact on how political insiderstrade on Wall Street and in
financial markets around the world.
This technology can
end this corruption forever!
A module of the software
uses data from The Center for ResponsivePolitics, ICIJ Panama Leaks
records, Swiss Leaks records and FEC files to reveal covert routes.
Famous politicians own part of TeslaMotors, Facebook, Google,
Netflix, YouTube and other companies they helped get government money
for. All of their competing constituentshave suffered for it or been
put out of business by exclusive deals that only Tesla Motors,
Facebook, Google, Netflix and YouTube got.That is a crime and charges
have been filed with federal law enforcement.
A large
volume of forensic research proves that Silicon ValleyCartel tech
firms receive benefits from politicians and politicians,at the same
time, benefit from these firms.
This evidence on the
exchange of benefits between politicians andfirms proves an agreement
between the politicians and the companies. This agreement, however,
cannot be in the form of a written contractas writing direct
fee-for-service contracts between a politician and a firm is
considered bribery (Krozner and Stratmann 1998; 2000). Inaddition,
either party to this agreement might renege on its promise and the
other party cannot resort to the courts.
Procon.org, for
example, reports: “Less than two months afterascending to the
United States Senate, and before becoming President, one Senator
bought more than $50,000 worth of stock in twospeculative companies
whose major investors included some of his biggest political donors.
One of the companies was a biotech concernthat was starting to
develop a drug to treat avian flu. In March 2005, two weeks after
buying thousands of dollars of its shares, thisSenator took the lead
in a legislative push for more federal spending to battle the
disease. The most recent financial disclosure form thisSenator . . .
shows that he bought more than $50,000 in stock in a satellite
communications businesswhose principal backers . . . hadraised more
than $150,000 for his political committees.” See more examples from
the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics inWashington (CREW) report
(2009).)
The literature and eye-witness experience proves
that politically-connected SiliconValley tech firms monthly obtain
economic favors, such as securing favorable legislation, special tax
exemptions, having preferentialaccess to finance, receiving
government contracts, or help in dealing with regulatory agencies.
The evidence proves that Google's support,for example, can help in
winning elections. For example, firms can vary the number of people
they employ, coordinate the opening andclosing of plants, and
increase their lending activity in election years in order to help
incumbent politicians get re-elected.(SeeRoberts 1990; Snyder 1990;
Langbein and Lotwis 1990; Durden, Shorgen, and Silberman 1991;
Stratmann 1991, 1995, and 1998; Fisman2001;Johnson and Mitton 2003;
Ansolabehere, Snyder, and Ueda 2004; Sapienza 2004, Dinç 2005;
Khwaja and Mian 2005; Bertrand,Kramarz,Schoar, and Thesmar 2006;
Faccio 2006; Faccio, Masulis, and McConnell 2006; Jayachandran 2006;
Leuz and Oberholzer-Gee 2006;Claessens,Feijen, Laeven 2008; Desai and
Olofsgard 2008; Ramanna 2008;Goldman, Rocholl, and So 2008, 2009;
Cole 2009; Cooper, Gulen,and Ovtchinnikov 2009; Correia 2009; Ramanna
and Roychowdhury 2010;Benmelech and Moskowitz 2010.)
The
software can see that the share ownership of politiciansserves as a
mechanism to quid-pro-quo their relationships with big tech firms, is
as follows: The ownership of politicians playsmultiple distinct (but
not necessarily independent) roles; one that relies upon the amount
of ownership and one that does not. First, asinvestors in firms,
politicians tie their own interests to those of the firm. Thus,
harming (benefiting) the firm means harming(benefiting) the
politician and vice versa. By owning a firm's stock, politicians
commit their personal wealth to the firm and reduce afirm’s
uncertainty with regard to their actions toward the firm. This
will,in turn, enhance the firm's incentive to support
thepolitician-owner during both current and future elections in order
to prolong the incumbency period for as long as possible. Firms
havetheir lobbyists push to be able to know the amount of ownership
likely to be material to politicians. This knowledge, in turn,enables
them to judge whether the politician’s interest is aligned with the
firm’s interest and optimize quid-pro-quo.
The Political
Action Committee (PAC) contribution of firms (whichis a direct
measure of benefits flowing from firms to politicians) is a
significant determinant of ownership allocations by members
ofCongress. The ownership of Congress members in firms that
contribute to their election campaigns is roughly 32.8% higher than
theirownership in noncontributing firms even after accounting for
factors that are associated with both ownership and contribution
(such asfamiliarity, proximity and investor recognition).
The
committee assignments of politicians is a proxy for whethertheir
relations with firms are enforced (Krozner and Stratmann 1998).
Silicon Valley tech firms like Facebook, Tesla and Google
obtainprivate benefits out of their mutual relations with
politicians. When the strength of the association between ownership
and contributionsat the firm level increases, the provision of
government contracts to those firms increases.
Members of
Congress, candidates for federal office, seniorcongressional staff,
nominees for executive branch positions, Cabinet members, the
President and Vice President, and Supreme Court justicesare required
by the Ethics in Government Act of 1978 to file annual reports
disclosing their income, assets, liabilities, and otherrelevant
details about their personal finances.
Personal financial
disclosure forms are filed annually by May 15and cover the preceding
calendar year. The Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) collected the
2004–2007 reports for Congress membersfrom the Senate Office of
Public Records and the Office of the Clerkof the House. The Center
then scanned the reports as digitalimages, classified the
politicians’ investments into categories including stocks, bonds,
and mutual funds, and built a databaseaccessible via a web
query.
Using CRP's data, you can use the software to
collect the sharesin S&P 500 firms held by members of Congress
between 2004 and 2007, for example.You can collect the stock
ownership data for everyfirm that joined the S&P 500 Index any
time between January 2004 and April 2009;regardless of when it joined
the index, and thesoftware can obtain all the available stock
ownership data for that firm between 2004 and 2007. Likewise, if a
firm dropped out of theindex at any time during 2004–2008, the
software, nevertheless, will retain the firm in a sample for the
target period. As such, thesample would include stocks in hundreds of
unique firms owned by politicians between 2004 and 2007, for
example.
Politicians are required to report only those
stocks whose valueexceeds $1,000 at the end of the calendar year or
that produce more than $200 in income. They are CURRENTLY not
required to report theexact value of the holding, but instead must
simply check a box corresponding to the value range into which the
asset falls. The CRPthen undertakes additional research to determine
the exact values of these stocks. When the Center makes these
determinations, it reportsthem instead of the ranges and I use these
values in my study. When only the range is available, you should use
its midpoint as theholding's value. You would, thus have data on the
stock holdings of hundreds politicians for that time period.
Using
the software, you can search for all Political ActionCommittees
(PACs) associated with tech firms. It then collects data on each
contribution these PACs made to candidates (both the winnersand
losers) running for the Senate and House elections. Tricky corrupt
Silicon Valley firms establish several PACs, each in adifferent
location, and each of these PACs can contribute to the same
candidate. In such cases, the software would total, for
eachcandidate, every contribution he or she received from PACs
affiliated with the same firm. To parallel the investment data sample
period,for example, the software collects every contribution made
from the 2003–2004 cycle up to and including the 2007–2008 cycle.
ManySilicon Valley tech firms use deeply covert Fusion GPS, Perkins
Coie, BlackCube, Psyops-type service to make very hidden additional
payolapayments to California politicians.
For sources, for
example, the software collects governmentcontract data from Eagle Eye
Publishers, Inc., one of the leading commercial providers of Federal
procurement and grant businessintelligence and
http://www.usaspending.org.
Eagle Eye collects its contract data from Federal Procurement Data
System–Next Generation(FPDS-NG), the contract data collection and
dissemination system administered by the U.S. General Services
Administration (GSA).FPDS-NG provides data on procurement contracts
awarded by the U.S. Government. When these contracts are awarded to
company subsidiaries,Eagle Eye searches for the names of their parent
companies and assigns each subsidiary to its appropriate parent. The
softwarecollects both the number and aggregate value of government
contracts that were awarded to sample firms between 2004 and 2007 in
thisexample time-frame..
The software reveals, for
example, that one Representative is aten-term member of Congress and
a senior member of the House Financial Services Committee. They
arranged a meeting between theDepartment of Treasury and One United
Bank, a company with close financial ties to themselves, involving
both investments andcontributions.
“In September 2008,
the Representative asked then-Secretaryof the Treasury Henry Paulson
to hold a meeting for their friends in banks that had suffered from
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac losses.
The Treasury Department
complied and held a session with approximately adozen senior banking
regulators, representatives from those banks, and their trade
association. Officials of One United Bank have closeties to the
Representative and attended the meeting along with the
Representative's chief of staff. Kevin Cohee, chief executive
officerof One United, used the meeting as an opportunity to ask for
bailout funds.
. . . Former White House officials stated
they were surprisedwhen One United Officials asked for bailout funds.
. . . In December 2008, the Representative intervened again, asking
Treasury to hostanother meeting to ensure their banks received part
of the $700 billion allocated under the Troubled Asset Relief
Program. . . .Within two weeks, on December 19, 2008, One United
secured $12.1million in bailout funds. . . . This was not the first
time theRepresentative used their position to advance the interests
of the bank. the Representative's spouse became a shareholder in
OneUnited in 2001, when it was known as the Boston Bank of Commerce.
In 2002, Boston Bank of Commerce tried to purchase Family Savings,
afriend of the Representative in Los Angeles. Instead, Family
Savings turned to a bank in Illinois. The Representative tried
toblock the merger by contacting regulators at the FDIC. The
Representative publicly stated they did not want a major bank
toacquire a bank that the Representative was friends with.
When
the Representative's efforts with the FDIC provedfruitless, the
Representative began a public pressure campaign with other community
leaders. Ultimately,when Family Savings changeddirection and allowed
Boston Bank of Commerce to submit a winning bid, the Representative
received credit for the merger. The combinedbanks were renamed One
United. . . . In March 2004, the Representative acquired One United
stock worth between $250,001 and$500,000, and the Representative's
spouse purchased two sets of stock, each worth between $250,001 and
$500,000. In September 2004,the Representative sold their stock in
One United and their husband sold a portion of his. That same year,
the husband joined the bank’sboard. . . . One United Chief
Executive Kevin Cohee and President Teri Williams Cohee have donated
a total of $8,000 to theRepresentative's campaign committee. . . .On
October 27, 2009, less than two months before One United received a
$12 million bailout, thebank received a cease-and-desist order from
the FDIC and bank regulatory officials in Massachusetts for poor
lending practices andexcessive executive compensation . . . the bank
provided excessive perks to its executives, including paying for Mr.
Cohee’s use of a$6.4 million mansion . . .” (Ref: CREW report
2009,pp. 123–125)
Thanks to Crony quid-pro-quo
revelations by an earlier version ofthe software, you can also see
that Fisker Automotive, Inc.'s $529 Million U.S. Taxpayer Loan
Approval by the Department of Energy wasdirty. Fisker Automotive's
Chief Operating Officer Bernhard Koehler pleaded with the Department
of Energy in a panicked Saturday midnighthour email to receive a $529
million loan as the company was 2 weeks from Chapter 7 liquidation,
that it was laying off most of itsemployees, that no private sector
investors would fund the company without DOE guarantees, and that
Fisker was unable to raise anyfurther equity funding from independent
private-sector investors given the company's financial
condition.These statements were made toa Loan Officer at the DOE . No
private sector Loan underwriting (approval) committee would ever
grant a low interest loan to adesperate buyer that had just confessed
it was in a state of insolvency and was about to layoff most of its
staff. Yet within afew weeks the DOE would approve a $529 Million
Credit Facility to Fisker. Despite the DOE Loan Officer official's
sworn testimony atApril 24th's House Oversight Committee that the DOE
used "same private sector underwriting standards when approving
Fisker and otherapproved Taxpayer Funded Loans" - likely perjury
based in documents.
In a 'U.S. GOVERNMENT CONFIDENTIAL
EMAIL': FISKER AUTOMOTIVE:August 2009: Co-Founder Bernhard Koehler
emails U.S. Dept. of Energy Loan Officer in Sat. midnight Panic
admitting VC Firms all declinedto invest, and company is out of cash.
Weeks later the U.S.Department of Energy approves $529M U.S. Taxpayer
Funded Loans to FISKER. NOPRIVATE SECTOR Lender would every authorize
a Loan for even $5 Million let alone $529 Million after receiving
this email statingprivate sector investors had examined the company
and declined equity investments, that they might loan money as more
secure Debt, and theChief Operating Officer of the company further
stating that the borrower is totally insolvent. (Weeks after this
email the U.S.Federal Government Dept. of Energy Loan Committee
Approves Fisker Automotive as a credit-worthy borrow for $529 Million
in U.S.Taxpayer Funded Loans). Fisker got the cash because President
Obama said to "give it to them" in order to please his
campaignfinanciers.
The same thing happened with Tesla
Motors. Elon Musk and TeslaMotors were broke when DOE gave them the
money.
PrivCo CEO Sam Hamadeh stated in an official
statement: “Thedocuments obtained by PrivCo paint a picture of how
an insolvent,unproven automaker received $192 million in
taxpayerfunding. The Department of Energy made a loan that no
rational lender would have made. This loan was the equivalent of
staying execution ona company that was terminally ill to begin with."
Tesla and Fisker could not have been taxpayer funded unless bribes
and criminalquid-pro-quo was underway by President Obama and the U.S.
Senator insider traders.
Since its ruling in Buckley v.
Valeo, the U.S. Supreme Court hasexpressed concern regarding
corruption or the appearance of corruption stemming from political
quid pro quo arrangements and thedeleterious consequences it may have
on citizens’ democratic behavior. However, no standard has been set
as to what constitutes“the appearance of corruption,” as the
Court was and continues to be vague in its definition. As a result,
campaign finance cases afterBuckley have relied on public opinion
polls as evidence of perceptions of corruption, and these polls
indicate that the publicgenerally perceives high levels of corruption
in government. The present study investigates the actual impact that
perceptions ofcorruption have on individuals’ levels of political
participation. Adapting the standard socioeconomic status model
developed most fullyby Verba and Nie (1972), an extended
beta-binomial regression estimated using maximum likelihood is
performed, utilizing uniquedata from the 2009 University of Texas’
Money and Politics survey. The results of this study indicate that
individuals who perceivehigher levels of quid pro quo corruption
participate more in politics, on average, than those who perceive
lower levels ofcorruption.
Quid pro quo is not a difficult
concept to understand. Too bad themedia doesn’t endeavor to
investigate and explain it. Your politicians don't work for you, they
work for their own insidertrading stock market holdings for
themselves!
Corruption-finding software, such as that
described above, will beused by Plaintiffs, and Plaintiffs’s
investigative news reporter associates, law enforcement contacts,
intelligence agency contactsand regulatory agency contacts on all
opposition parties associated with this case.
The facts
imply that most public officials arebiased towards their friends,
business partners and political associates who are sometimes
Defendants in these cases and under investigation inactive federal
criminal cases that have been reported to law enforcement and
regulatory agencies.
DOES1 through 20, as additional
Defendants in this case, are thought, by investigators, to include
persons friendly with the Judge, infinancial investments with the
Judge and the leadership of organizations for which the Judge is a
spokesperson. If those personsare also under active investigations by
SEC, FTC, OGE, OSC, FEC, DOJ, FBI, and other organizations that
Plaintiffs reports to, then thepotential conflicts of interest are
compounded.