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.

Saturday, May 23, 2015

When a clerk of the court gives you a directive, it is not "really" a court order - and that is an opinion from the lips of the clerk of an Appellate Court


My disciplinary prosecutor Mary Gasparini charged me, as a prosecutor, witness and alleged victim (it all fits nicely into Gasparini's personal concept of impartial and ethical prosecution), with disobeying orders of court, where several orders of court were letters from a court clerk and a court attorney relating to me what they were allegedly "directed" to tell me by the "court".

I requested, pursuant to Judiciary Law 255, to provide me certified copies of court orders/decisions, with names of judges who made those orders/decisions, with the "directives" to the clerk and court attorney, respectively, to transmit those directives to me or to Gasparini.

The particular letter that was the subject of my Judiciary Law 255 was a directive by Christopher Lindquist, Appellate Court Attorney giving Mary Gasparini how to defeat my request to open court proceedings to the public - which has been done many times, for months and even years, and the law in the state of New York is that attorney disciplinary proceedings MUST be open to the public if the attorney asks for that and waives her privacy, which I did.

Instead, Linquist taught Gasparini that she may simply file an "Affidavit of Opposition", instead of making a motion to close proceedings which are presumed open as soon as I made my request.

So, Lindquist issued an order on behalf of the court that changed rules in favor of Gasparini, and indicated that he was directed by the court to direct Gasparini to file the "Affidavit in Opposition".

I filed a request, pursuant to Judiciary Law 255 (because Freedom of Information Law does not apply to court proceedings) for a certified copy of the order from the court directing Gasparini to do what Lindquist said the court directed  him to direct Gasparini to do.

Here is the response of the clerk of the court to my request for a copy of that order, and for copies of other orders, reflected in other letters of the clerk and the court attorney Lindquist (member of a recently created with much fanfare statewide commission to improve efficiency and fairness of attorney disciplinary proceedings - good luck with that, with Christopher Lindquist on board):



Ladies and gentlemen:

The clerk says by this letter that, even though what she or court attorney express in their letters are "written directions from the Court" (of course, she mischaracterizes blatantly giving legal advice to a party as "directives concerning calendaring and filing deadlines"), those same "written directions from the Court" "do not constitute deliberative 'decisions' or 'orders' of the Court".

So written directives of the court are not orders of the court, to make sure you understand.

So, when you are given a "written directive" by a clerk or a court attorney, it is a directive by the court - but not an order by the court.

I failed to find a legal term "directive by the court" in New York State law.  New York State law only deals with orders, decisions and judgments of the court - and those are made not by court clerks, not by court attorneys, but by judges, elected public officials.

I guess, Ms. Carafell needs re-training - along with the entire Appellate Division 4th Department allowing clerks and court attorneys to run lose, give legal advise under the guise of "court directives" and, when caught red-handed and when the actual court orders as to those "directives" are requested from him, try to clumsily cover their backsides by claiming that "written directives" are not "deliberative decisions or orders" and thus are not really court orders that I am entitled to a copy of.

Good job, Appellate Division, in further messing up.

One more reason why public servants, including the judiciary and its personnel, should be most rigorously subjected to supervision by members of the public - to prevent this circus at public expense from continuing.
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