One in every four adults in the United States is not entitled to a vigorous legal defense?

Every attorney in the State of New York, at the time of receiving his or her license, takes an oath of office as an officer of the court.


As part of that oath, the attorney swears to uphold the Constitutions of the State of New York and of the United States of America.


Both Constitutions have equal protection clauses prohibiting the government to engage in discrimination.


Attorneys have been disciplined, quite severely, for discriminating against potential clients based on their gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity or social status.


America is a country with the highest prison population among civilized countries.


As recently as on July 15, 2014, less than a month ago, a lawyer testified in front of the House Committee on the Judiciary Over-Criminalization Task Force and provided numbers, that 68 million Americans, more than the population of France, have criminal records.


20 million Americans, according to the numbers quoted in the same article, have felony convictions.


It is reported that the population of the United States reached 317 people in 2014.


In other words, 21% of the US population, or approximately every fourth adult, have a criminal record.


Americans with criminal records are, as everybody else, in need of court representation for everyday things like representations in consumer debts cases, foreclosure proceedings, divorce, custody proceedings - you name it.


When a client with a criminal record is hiring an attorney for a civil case or an attorney is assigned to them, the client has every right to expect that he will not be provided a substandard representation simply because they have a criminal record.


An attorney is not allowed to discriminate against litigants simply on the basis of their status as a convicted felon.


The maximum that an attorney can do with the conviction, if the attorney represents a party opposing a convicted felon is to bring out their conviction at trial and hope that the court will take that conviction as proof of their lessened credibility.


Yet, an attorney will be crossing the line if he or she claims that because a person is a convicted felon, he or she is not worthy of any consideration of the court.


That would amount to an attorney breaking his or her oath of office and, in fact, arguing to the court that a convicted felon, by virtue of his or her conviction, is not allowed to:


(1) have access to court guaranteed by the Petitions Clause of the 1st Amendment of the U.S. Constitution;


(2) have a right to due process of law, both substantively (fairness in resolving facts of the case) and procedurally (where the court must follow set rules of procedure applicable to the case, notwithstanding the party's status);


(3) have a right to equal protection of laws - meaning, if a certain rule applies to A litigant, that rule must apply to THE litigant, no matter what his or her status is, if he is a convicted felon or not.


Moreover, all attorneys understand that if an attorney pledged to undertake representation of a person who happens to be a convicted felon, that attorney may not claim his client's diminished social status to provide a substandard representation.


I was astonished to find out recently that a seasoned attorney may allow all of those principles to go out the door - and the court would not either report the attorney to the disciplinary authorities, nor sanction her, nor caution her that her behavior is unacceptable and, in fact, constitutes a breach of her oath of office.


In her pleading to the court, attorney Delice Seligman of Kingston, NY claimed that my pleadings on behalf of a convicted felon, in a civil proceedings, are not worthy of consideration and theatrically asked, who that great client is on whose behalf I am expending myself so much - a convicted felon?


It might surprise Ms. Seligman to learn that I do not make a distinction as to status of my clients in the level of representation that I am providing.  Moreover, Ms. Seligman might learn a lot if she re-reads the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment that she was sworn to uphold many decades ago, as well as disciplinary rules prohibiting attorneys to engage in discriminatory behavior.


In our situation, attorney Seligman openly asked the court to, basically, shut the door of the courthouse and the possibility of fair judicial review in my client's face because (1) she is a convicted felon and (2) because she is represented by an attorney who criticizes judicial misconduct in this blog.


In other words, because of my political activity outside of the courtroom, and because of my client's criminal record, my client is not "worthy of consideration", no matter how well supported by documents, legal authorities and reasoning our arguments are.


The judge who Attorney Seligman pled this atrocious and discriminatory claim in front of neither sanctioned her nor turned her into disciplinary authorities, which I can assess by the fact that the judge still remains on the case.  By disciplinary rules for judges, a judge who refers an attorney to authorities must recuse from all cases where such an attorney appears.


Attorney Seligman is a seasoned local attorney for the court where she has made her atrocious discriminatory statements, under oath, by the way.  


If you are "a local" and obey the courts no matter what you are ordered to do, including engaging in an ex parte communication with a judge, called in there before multiple witnesses, as attorney Seligman did - in other words, being "a good girl" for the judges absolves you of any sanctions for misconduct.


Is this protection of the public which attorney regulation is supposed to achieve?