On owners of public courtrooms

Here is what a public worm, oh, oops, the sworn public servant, the DisHonorable Patrick J O'Sullivan of Madison County Supreme Court has done on today:

The chief court clerk Nicole Olvera confirmed to me on the phone that this piece of art is her handiwork at the order of O'Sullivan,  and tgat she is as a "middle person doing what she is told".

The order was not made on prior notice to us as parties in the action, and was not e-filed into the docket of the case by the DisHonorable Patrick J O'Sullivan, remaining a secret, ex parte, sua sponte,  illegal directive blocking public access to a public court proceeding in violation of the public's and the parties' 1st Amendment, due process rights and state Judiciary Law Section 4 requiring unrestricted and invested access of the public to public court proceedings.

As it was the culmination of many shenannigans of O'Sullivan in this case, I requested the toothless tiger of the NYS Commission for Judicial Conduct to find some conscience and take O'Sullivan off the bench already, as a jeopardy to the public. 

Now, imagine yourself coming to a public courtroom to watch a public oral motion term.  

You come to the courthouse, you go through a metal detector, you come to the courtroom, and you are stopped by a court attendant who says - nope, fella, doesn't work this way.

Since today, our new procedure is that you write a personal plea to the judge requesting his kind permission to attend that public oral motion term in question, and state the reason why you want to do so.

Why the judge wants it - we don't know, says the attendant.  

But he wants it anyway, and we are little people, we are middle people, and we simply do what we are told.

And, you are simply turned away.  

And, if you even apply in writing, as the judge unlawfully orders you to do, the judge did not tell you what criteria he applies, did he?  Nope.  He acts like an absolute petty tyrant who owns that public courtroom as his own personal fiefdom and can do whatever the hell he likes to do with your access to court guaranteed by the pesky US Constitution and the pesky New York State statutory laws, and the pesky precedents of the US Supreme Court and the New York State Court of Appeals.  

This petty tyrant might not like your application to be present at a supposedly public court proceedings.

Why?  

That is an impertinent question, you lowlife questioning your betters.

BECAUSE.  

And the courtroom door is closed into your face.

Well.

For you, personally, it may make a difference or it might not make a difference.  After all, you may simply have leisurely come into the courthouse to watch a court proceeding because you simply wanted to out of curiosity.

Yes, it is your right, constitutional (1st Amendment) and statutory (Judiciary Law 4 in the State of New York).

But - well, if you are not a hard core journalist or a hard core court watcher, or a hard core family member or friend of parties who are doing the oral argument or participate in a court hearing, you might let it go.  

It is not so for the parties though who are entitled to a public hearing, but are denied such a public hearing by the judge, sua sponte, without an explanation, arbitrarily, on a BECAUSE basis.

The directives in the scans up above are precisely the same as shutting the door in your face in a physical courtroom.

The secret illegal directive were reported to me by members of the public who wanted to attend a "conference" scheduled to be held as an "open court proceeding", on record, in a highly contested "right of way" dispute, and a public motion hearing in the same case, to be held online on TEAMs.

In the case, the Plaintiff, a corporation, only has an admittedly unreadable supposedly 19th century something that supposedly has in its unreadable depths Plaintiff's "right of way" through our property in Delhi, NY.

The Plaintiff is helpfully complementing this inadmissible "evidence" with its attorney's running his mouth on and on and on about whether the owner of the real estate (my husband and I) does or does not have a law license.  It must be very relevant to whether Plaintiff does or does not have a right of way based on anadmittedly unreadable something.

Unfortunately,  the DisHonorable Patrick J O'Sullivan has bought into this "argument" (or was, simply, bought) line, hook and sinker.

The judge, sorry for the leisurely portray, let's call him Exhibit 1 for brevity, ardently prohibits being photographed or videotaped in the place of performing of his duties of a public servant, that is, in a public courtroom.

So, I had to borrow his photograph from his wife's public Facebook page.

Here goes our Exhibit 1:

Full of self-confidence without competence - that's why he was reversed three times in 2023 alone by the Appellate Division 3rd Department, a record for any judge.  I may run a separate article on these hilarious reversals.

Here is what Exhibit 1 has said in a hearing in the case Berrian, Inc. v. Neroni, EF2023-943 in Delaware County Supreme Court, State of New York.  

The case is "e-filed", which means members of the public can download all documents from the website of NYSCEF, just go to Google, enter "NYSCEF guest search" and enter my name there, Tatiana Neroni, then enter the case number EF2023-943, and you can download all documents for free, you won't be disappointed.

But, back to Exhibit 1.  

On June 6, 2024, Exhibit 1, at the beginning fot the second day of a so-called "Traverse Hearing" where Exhibit 1 was trying to determine whether he had jurisdiction over me and my husband, out-of-state defendants now from South Carolina, in other words, whether service of process was proper, he said the following - spontaneously, nobody made him do it, or asked him to address this issue at that hearing.  

And, please, take into account that he said that addressing court watchers, that was a public hearing:

 

Now, I am writing about access to justice, as a blogger for over 11 years, and for many years as a constitutional legal scholar on Academia.edu. 

I have lost my law license in 2015 for two years (but without the right of automatic reinstatement, so, I am still without it now and let it go) because, as a civil rights attorney, I was too much of a thorn in the side of the State of New York and its various corrupt government officials, including and predominantly judges, both through my lawsuits and through my blog articles in this very blog.

When I heard what Exhibit 1 spontaneously spurted out in the transcript above, boy... He instantly made himself (in)famous and a new antihero of this blog.

Based on his statement to the watching public, who does Exhibit 1 think he is?  

The owner of a public courtroom?  

Does he remember that he is an elected public SERVANT?  

Elected to SERVE the public, specifically, within the boundaries of the law and not for his own private purposes?

And that he has no expectation of privacy while discharging his duties as a public servant in a public court proceeding?

And,  there is specific law (not that Exhibit 1 may be aware of any such laws or care that they exists) making New York State courtrooms presumptively open to the public.  Presumptively.  

What kind of salad is in the head of this elected public servant who is on the judicial bench for many years, by the way, that he claims as he did in the transcript above that he holds the keys from the courtroom and may lock the public out?  

As he is doing now, for undisclosed reasons?

He would "allow" people into the courtroom or "not allow" on his own whim? 

Simply because he would  "learn" something about someone in unknown ways, from unknown and unverified sources, he would block ALL public from every attending future public hearings in the same case? 

How do such worms worm their ways into black robes and materialize in our public courtrooms? 

Think what he said in the transcript above.

 Simply because, let's say, he learns from an unknown source that a certain court watcher on a certain date has recorded a certain public hearing (a big crime, indeed!), he threatened that he will not allow other court watchers to watch other public hearings, and deny to the parties in the court case their right to a public proceeding.

Did he even go to law school, this judge?

So, Exhibit 1 believes he OWNS our public courtroom that we support with our taxpayer money.

And, he just went and did it. 

Blocked public access to a hearing on, so far, 7 motions.

For a completely unknown reason, I checked with the court clerk, she claims the reasons were not given to her.  Just BECAUSE.  Submit written applications directly to the punk - oh, sorry - to the DisHonorable Patrick J. O'Sullivan, explain yourself, why you want to be present at a public court hearing, and yourself better satisfy with your explanation the unknown requirements existing only in the DisHonorable 's head.

So, what is it so scary for the DisHonorable Exhibit 1 in the things scheduled for the motion hearing that he has blocked public access to it?  

Here is what has been scheduled so far in my case:

The scheduling is already a mess, as the scan shows, as different motions in the same case are scheduled for the same date and time for physical presentation in the courtroom and for remote presentation online.

Relief in Motion # 12 above is designated as "Other" because NYSCEF did not have the proper choice to enter when e-filing the motion.  

Motion #12 is a motion to disqualify Plaintiff's counsel because he constantly runs his mouth as a witness and injected himself and continues to inject himself as a witness throughout the proceeding, while it is evident - and he acknowledged as much in a cynical e-mail to me - that he had no personal knowledge of what he claimed to Exhibit 1 he did have, under the penalty of perjury.  Nothing too crooked.

By the way, you can read the great story of the Plaintiff's counsel's life here.  

Let's call this one Exhibit 2.

Now compare Exhibit 1 and Exhibit 2:

Don't you think they have found one another?

The same Napoleonic poses that usually only very, very stupid and self-complacent people strike for photographs.

And, as to Exhibit 2, really, really, read his story, following the link above.  It is just sugared sugar, how good he is there.

After that, look through the same person's affirmations e-filed in two Berrian, Inc. v. Neroni cases, ## EF2023-322 and EF2023-943.  

It is like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.  

Or, as one of my friends' mother said, a "street angel, a house devil".   

This "life lessons" cherub has a vile, vulgar, cynical, filthy tongue towards us, two elderly and disabled individuals who he has never seen in person in his life.  

Hope people remember that when they consider donations for his claimed hypocritical self-serving "causes".

By the way, Exhibit 1 was under obligation mandated by the very recent Joint Appellate Divisions' to control uncivilized vulgar outbursts of Exhibit 2 - but how can a kindred spirit control one's own?  Impossible.  

As long as Exhibit 2 attacked yours truly and her 77-year-old disabled husband, Exhibit 1 kept mum. 

He only got agitated and protective - of Exhibit 2 - if a proper, civilized, professional language of yours truly and her husband ruffled the tender sensibilities of that kindred nitwit.

Then all the claws of Exhibit 1 came out to the rescue the baby.

Now let's see about those claws.

As stated and shown by scans above, what is scheduled by Exhibit 1 so far is 

(1) a wholly unnecessary "conference" - where motions to dismiss and for a summary judgment are already pending, that wonder is to be held tomorrow at 11:00 A.M., and 

(2) an oral argument on many motions held for February 7, 2025.  

By the way, the motions were made from October 2024 to this week, and we did not need oral argument on them.  

Exhibit 1, always to the rescue of Exhibit 2, simply extended and extended and extended time so that Exhibit 2 would find time and gray matter to answer the motions.

Note that what is going to happen tomorrow, behind closed doors, as ordered by Exhibit 1 in protection of himself and his buddy Exhibit 2, is called a "preliminary conference".  

Rule 22 NYCRR 202.12 (available on the Internet for free) that regulates such "conferences" does not allow such "conferences" to be held behind closed doors.

Next, Rule 22 NYCRR 202.12 requires that at the end of such a "conference" a court order is issued.

I have sent a letter to Exhibit 1 saying - please, put 2 and 2 together and figure that you may only make orders in official court "sittings" within the meaning of Judiciary Law Section 4, and all official court "sittings" are presumptively open to the public, hence - hello, court watchers must be able to attend the "conference". 

That proverbial rose by any name... It is a court sitting, no matter how Exhibit 1 wants to name it.

What did Exhibit 1 do?

Not one, not two, but three things.

# 1 sent me and other parties a notification that a court reporter (stenographer) has been hired to record "the conference"

Did it help Exhibit 1's cause rebutting my letter request to open the "conference" to public court watchers?

Of course, not.  On the opposite.  It has only proven, especially when reading this wonder together with the conference scheduling "in chambers" (judge's room) and with the applicable court cases that presence of a court reporter MAKES the conference a presumptive "open-court" proceeding, REQUIRING presence of the public.

But no, logic is not Exhibit 1's big friend.

Thing # 2 that Exhibit 1 did in answer to my letter request to let the public into the "conference" tomorrow: TWO prohibitions.

According to multiple prospective court watchers who have filled out an official application provided by the New York State court system to attend the "conference" (a hearing under another name seeking to result in some kind of an unknown order), here is what they received from the court:

Think about it - the court believes that the "conference", with a court reporter already hired and waiting to take the record, at the end of which Exhibit 1 will issue some unknown court order, as required by 22 NYCRR 202.12 is "distinct from any proceedings", even though it is held in a definite public case and is about to address its core issues.

That was not the end of stupidity though.

Multiple court watchers notified me today that Exhibit 1 prohibited members of the public to attend even oral arguments in multiple motions, unless Exhibit 1's Majesty personally approves a written application of each one of them based on his own unknown personal subjective made up criteria.  A royal snap.

This so-called "directive" of The Right Honorable - or, rather, let's call a spade a spade, The Wrong Dishonorable Patrick J. O'Sullivan, is in reality called a sua sponte (spontaneous, on the court's own initiative) EX PARTE (without notice or opportunity to be heard to us) court order that has TAKEN AWAY our right to a public hearing, a PRESUMPTIVELY UNCONSTITUTIONAL action of the court.

Why such a snap at court watchers that may likely cost Exhibit 1 (it should) some explaining with the Judicial Conduct Commission?

Because last time, at the Traverse Hearing, the court watchers saw something they were not supposed to see - Exhibit 1 ordering us to relocate to another room under a pretext (it was an internet, TEAMS hearing), in order to give Exhibit 2 some more time to coach his witness on the stand.

At the same time, court watchers heard from the court clerk herself that Exhibit 1, for an unknown reason, disregarded an e-mail from that same long-suffering Nicole Olvera (see scan above), court clerk, who notified Exhibit 1 that Exhibit 2 was to blame for interference with the proceedings and not us, but he was not ordered to relocate.

The court system has stonewalled my Judiciary Law 255 request for a copy of that e-mail.  I directed it to Nicole Olvera.  Again, she is doing what she is told.  Including hiding evidence of judicial misconduct.

And, the court watchers also saw that the court reporter did not report exactly everything that she was supposed to, she skipped reporting of what could raise issues of misconduct of Exhibit 1 and 2.

What is worse, a court watcher provided an Affirmation about that to the court - and Exhibit 1 deliberately refused to review it.  Simply skipped it and made a decision without it.  But, obviously, held a grudge in store, to use it now.

So now, when more applications from more prospective court watchers came for new hearings, Exhibit 1 has regurgitated his grudge and snapped.

It was HIS courtroom, and it was HIS rules, and he wants to SCREAM - oh, no - to SCREEN the prospective court watchers and to demand answers from them, first 

(1) who they are - even though New York court form to apply for a virtual attendance of a court proceeding (why do they need such a form, I don't know, the court proceedings should simply be streamed to whoever wants to watch them, don't you think? as other states and countries do), 

(2) they must absolutely spill their guts to Exhibit 1 as to why exactly do they want to attend a public hearing - do they by any chance want to provide affirmations in the future to yours truly catching Exhibits 1 and 2 in more misconduct?

Because then they will not be allowed in.

And in that glorious vein Exhibit 1 very bluntly did not allow ANY court watchers to attend a public hearing on February 7, 2025 UNLESS they apply to him in writing and diligently explain why the F-k do they want to attend the F-king public hearing. 

A preventive measure, just in case.

And he will then decide if their reasoning are good enough to get entry into a public hearing.

So.

Nothing too crooked here either.

Not that I am surprised.  Came across a lot of similar nitwits in black robes before.

Will see what will happen today - if I am even able to attend.  

We have bad weather in South Carolina, you see.  I have freezing rain raging behind my window.  

With a thick veil of snow covering the ground in all the coastal South Carolina, in the absence of snow plows in our subtropical state, nobody drove for 4 days so far, with black ice all over the local roads.

The forecast is that tomorrow morning it will get warmer fast, and a flood is supposed to start, and we may lose, as it usually happens with floods in this area, both our Internet and our phone connection.

And then - I do not know what Exhibit 1 will do in our absence at the "conference", without the public watching, but with the hand-picked loyal court reporter - the same one who the court watcher in her affirmation caught in not reporting misconduct of Exhibits 1 and 2.  A proven professional.

Exhibit 1 is desperate to let Exhibit 2 win this case, where the e-filed discovery and the e-filed motions showed that Exhibit 2 has no case. 

How else does one win when one can't the lawful way?

A no brainer.  Exhibit 1 to the rescue. 

Of course, I have turned Exhibit 1 into the Judicial Conduct Commission and asked the Commission politely to finally take this 9-day-wonder off the bench as a jeopardy to public justice for his little shenannigans with blocking public access to public hearings in order to screen the public based on his whims.

Will they hear me?  I don't know.

And, by the way, a cherry on this mud-cake: Exhibit 1 is a 3rd Party DEFENDANT in the same case where he presides, sued by my husband months ago for violation of his rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act -  and Exhibit 1 nevertheless continues presiding over a case where every single confirmation notice for every single e-filed document names him as a 3rd party Defendant.

A perfect reason to snap against us, don't you think?

As this saga unfolds, stay tuned.  I am sure there will be more to come from where this mudslide of "honorable" exhibits came from. 

But you know what is very, very sad about all of this crap, in addition to us and the public being deprived of our rights without any care of this supposed "Honorable" public official as to what the hell he is doing?

Exhibit 1 coerced court personnel, at the threat of their own job security, to engage in unlawful conduct such as closing the courtroom from the public on the whim of this punk in a black robe.

Clerk Nicole Olvera was extremely embarrassed when speaking to me on the phone today, and mumbled that "she is the middle person" and "is doing what she is told to do", and that "she does not know whether it is lawful or not" for a judge to close a public oral argument on multiple motions, ex parte and sua sponte, on an undisclosed whim.

That is the same Nicole Olvera who discussed in front of the court watcher listening as to why Exhibit 1 disregarded her e-mail sent to him that it was Exhibit 2 and not us responsible for interference at Traverse Hearing?  Where Exhibit 1 ordered us, two disabled individuals, to relocate to another room in a rush in order to give time to Exhibit 2 to coach his witness on the stand.

I truly believe that Nicole Olvera is not a bad person, she simply wants to keep her job, with benefits.

The main blame for subversion of court personnel to his unlawful whims lays, of course, on this prime exhibit:

Remember his smiling face, especially when he runs next time for re-election.

Do not allow this king of the hill to play "I own this court" with your life and property again.

Your vote MATTERS.  Make sure he loses the next election.  

An update on January 24, 2025: a lawsuit was filed by me today, Neroni v O'Sullivan, requesting a declaratory judgment that attempting to summarily and arbitrarily pre-screen attendance in public court hearings is unconstitutional,  and seeking to mandate training of Justice O'Sullivan on this issue and put his regulation of public access to court cases under supervision.

Within hours of the filing of the lawsuit, the conference was rescheduled from January 24 with a stenographer to February 7, half an hour prior to the motion hearing, without a stenographer, our requests for reasonable accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act continue to be denied, in violation of federal law, and the public, including our family members, are blocked from attending the scheduled "public" proceeding.

Update as of January 29, 2025:  Justice O'Sullivan continues to illegally block the public, including new applicants, from attending the virtual February 7 court hearing, and continues to deny our ADA accommodation requests.

Apparently, the DisHonorable InJustice Patrick J O'Sullivan is preparing to do something during that hearing that he does not want the public to be the witness of. 

 Far from being faithful to his oath if office, this judge, very obviously, has no conscience and no shame.