THE EVOLUTION OF JUDICIAL TYRANNY IN THE UNITED STATES:

"If the judges interpret the laws themselves, and suffer none else to interpret, they may easily make, of the laws, [a shredded] shipman's hose!" - King James I of England, around 1616.

“No class of the community ought to be allowed freer scope in the expression or publication of opinions as to the capacity, impartiality or integrity of judges than members of the bar. They have the best opportunities of observing and forming a correct judgment. They are in constant attendance on the courts. Hundreds of those who are called on to vote never enter a court-house, or if they do, it is only at intervals as jurors, witnesses or parties. To say that an attorney can only act or speak on this subject under liability to be called to account and to be deprived of his profession and livelihood by the very judge or judges whom he may consider it his duty to attack and expose, is a position too monstrous to be entertained for a moment under our present system,” Justice Sharwood in Ex Parte Steinman and Hensel, 95 Pa 220, 238-39 (1880).

“This case illustrates to me the serious consequences to the Bar itself of not affording the full protections of the First Amendment to its applicants for admission. For this record shows that [the rejected attorney candidate] has many of the qualities that are needed in the American Bar. It shows not only that [the rejected attorney candidate] has followed a high moral, ethical and patriotic course in all of the activities of his life, but also that he combines these more common virtues with the uncommon virtue of courage to stand by his principles at any cost.

It is such men as these who have most greatly honored the profession of the law. The legal profession will lose much of its nobility and its glory if it is not constantly replenished with lawyers like these. To force the Bar to become a group of thoroughly orthodox, time-serving, government-fearing individuals is to humiliate and degrade it.” In Re Anastaplo, 18 Ill. 2d 182, 163 N.E.2d 429 (1959), cert. granted, 362 U.S. 968 (1960), affirmed over strong dissent, 366 U.S. 82 (1961), Justice Black, Chief Justice Douglas and Justice Brennan, dissenting.

" I do not believe that the practice of law is a "privilege" which empowers Government to deny lawyers their constitutional rights. The mere fact that a lawyer has important responsibilities in society does not require or even permit the State to deprive him of those protections of freedom set out in the Bill of Rights for the precise purpose of insuring the independence of the individual against the Government and those acting for the Government”. Lathrop v Donohue, 367 US 820 (1961), Justice Black, dissenting.

"The legal profession must take great care not to emulate the many occupational groups that have managed to convert licensure from a sharp weapon of public defense into blunt instrument of self-enrichment". Walter Gellhorn, "The Abuse of Occupational Licensing", University of Chicago Law Review, Volume 44 Issue 1, September of 1976.

“Because the law requires that judges no matter how corrupt, who do not act in the clear absence of jurisdiction while performing a judicial act, are immune from suit, former Judge Ciavarella will escape liability for the vast majority of his conduct in this action. This is, to be sure, against the popular will, but it is the very oath which he is alleged to have so indecently, cavalierly, baselessly and willfully violated for personal gain that requires this Court to find him immune from suit”, District Judge A. Richard Caputo in H.T., et al, v. Ciavarella, Jr, et al, Case No. 3:09-cv-00286-ARC in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, Document 336, page 18, November 20, 2009. This is about judges who were sentencing kids to juvenile detention for kickbacks.

Monday, January 12, 2015

Referee Sirkin admits in a recording that his duties were to "hear and report" to the court, but instead grants the motion to the prosecution without any hearing


Here is the audio recording of my conference with Referee Sirkin today.

 See my previous posts today for the details of what was supposed to occur today in my scheduling conference and what instead occurred.

 See also that I posted on Facebook and on this blog an invitation to the public to come to my proceedings that Referee Sirkin cut off by denying me a hearing that the court ordered him to do (without any authority, but he does not seem to care).


Apparently, the 4th Department was alerted of the invitation and reacted the following day by a letter that the court alleged it has faxed to my unplugged fax machine that gets switched on only when I am SENDING something myself.

 I say the disciplinary referee Sirkin once in my life - in October of 2014 when he invited me for another "scheduling conference", to wake up at 5:00 am and get to Syracuse, NY by 9:00 am only to hear that Referee Sirkin adjourned the proceedings because of the motion that I filed with the court 2 weeks prior, while he knew about the motion ahead of time.

 Apparently, Referee Sirkin had a pleasure of having the power to bring me before him to tell me that he cannot proceed, instead of sending ahead a letter or having his assistant call me and notify of the adjournment.

 The same, only worse, trick Referee Sirkin played on me today.

 Today, in the view of Referee Sirkin, I had to risk my life and travel over icy and yet uncleared morning mountain roads, under "winter weather advisory" conditions to get in time from Delhi, NY to the conference in Syracuse NY by 9:00 am, so that Referee Sirkin would have an opportunity to tell me that he will not give me a hearing that the court ordered him to conduct.

 I was ready to actually come to that conference, and the only thing that interfered with my plans is inclement weather this morning.

 Below is the letter I sent to Referee Sirkin early in the morning when we could not get out of Delaware County because of inclement weather and bad weather advisory.

  I sent to Referee Sirkin this morning a letter advising him that I cannot get through the local roads because of the inclement weather and provided as proof of bad weather (because I suspected that Referee Sirkin will not believe anything I say) two things:

 (1) the inclement weather warning;
(2) the school delays warning



Yet, when I called at 9:00 am to appear by phone, Referee Sirkin stated in our conversation that he allegedly drove 60 miles from Rochester, that the roads are clear, the temperature is above freezing, and thus hinted that I was not telling him the truth about the weather in Delaware County.

 The logic of the Referee is staggering - because the weather is above freezing 100 miles from Delaware County, there cannot be snow or ice on the roads in Delaware County, even if the weather advisory and a witness who is the resident in the area says the opposite.

 The Referee also acknowledged on the recording that his duty was to "hear and report" to the court the factual findings, yet, failed to explain why, instead of scheduling a hearing, as the court ordered him to do, the Referee instead made a finding in favor of the prosecution without any hearing.

 There will be a long pause in the recording while the secretary is calling the judge to the phone.  The length of the recording is 21 minutes 29 seconds.

 Close to the end of the recording, around the end of the 20th minute and further on, you can hear that Referee Sirkin ended the conference with me, but did not disconnect the phone and continued to discuss me, behind my back, in an ex parte manner, with the prosecutors.

 Unfortunately, my dogs who came back from their walk and where exuberant, apparently alerted Referee Sirkin and Mary Gasparini that they still did not disconnect the phone and that I can still listen to what they are discussing, and disconnected the call.

 Yet, what was recorded was enough to be used as an evidence of an ex parte communication between Referee Sirkin and Mary Gasparini, and who knows how many of those ex partes occurred in the past, without any opportunity for me to prove them.

 Here is my conversation with Referee Sirkin (with Mary Gasparini present in Syracuse and me appearing by phone).  When you click the link, it will bring you to the web page where the voice file is uploaded.  You can either download the file to your computer and listen to it this way, or click the "play" button (it does not say "play", it shows a symbol "play" - a triangle in the middle of the bottom of the page) and you can play the voice file this way right there on the webpage.

 For the information of those who would like to complain about me to various authorities for "surreptitiously" recording my conversation with Referee Sirkin, I would like to disappoint you by stating that:

 (1) it is legal to record a conversation by the party to the conversation without seeking permission from other parties;

 (2) it is not illegal to make an audio recording of court proceedings, only a video recording, and I did not and could not do a video recording on the phone today.

 I had absolutely no faith that the stenographer will take the record correctly, and my own previous experience with this stenographer, as well as People v. Walker and Walker v. Sirkin that I described in my earlier posts confirm my fears, that Referee Sirkin and stenographers he hires is not to be trusted with preserving the record correctly.
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