On retirement of the "honorable" Judge Karen Peters, regulator of the legal profession. Happy New 2018 year to American attorneys and the public they serve.

In 2009, a judge decided a case in a weird and unlawful way in favor of an attorney.

The attorney happened to be the Vice-Chair of Commission for Judicial Conduct.

The Vice-Chair left the case, but was sending letters exerting pressure upon the judge not to release bail the way the law required the bail to be released.

The judge succumbed to the pressure and issued a bail-release order in such a way that it denied release to the person named on the receipt for the bail, despite requirement of the law to the contrary.

The decision was made by the judge after an ex parte communication of the judge with the County Attorney, the judge's former boss of nearly 30 years and a long-time friend who came to his office to discuss the issue of bail without participation of anybody else, behind closed doors.

That was clear judicial and attorney misconduct for both of the long-time friends.

The new attorney in the criminal case, who happened to be the much-younger wife of the criminal-court judge's life-long successful competitor and former law school classmate, complained about the judge's misconduct in that case (and in 9 other cases, with documentary evidence) to the Commission for Judicial Conduct, not knowing that she is complaining to the Commission about misconduct of its own Vice-Chair.

The Commission dismissed the complaint without even attempting to investigate it, despite documentary evidence attached to the complaint.  

The Vice Chair of the Commission did not recuse from dismissing the case the basis of which was his own misconduct.

The other person who did not recuse from the complaint was the judge from an appellate court of the jurisdiction where the appeal from the criminal proceedings was supposed to be heard.

Later, that judge became the Presiding Justice of that appellate court.  That appellate court is also functioning as the regulator of the legal profession and attorney law licenses in the jurisdiction where the controversy with bail was happening.

In the same 2009, the new attorney asked that same judge to recuse from a Family Court child neglect case because of a conflict of interest - presiding without a jury over a case where the party-petitioner (Commissioner Moon) was the judge's friend and client of 27 years before the judge came to the bench.

The motion caused a furor amongst the local attorneys who secretly advised the new attorney that "everybody knows it, but nobody makes motions", and that the new attorney "is a fresh breeze in the local courts", but that "she should not burn her bridges".

Within 10 days of the motion, Commission Moon, friend of the judge, brought child neglect proceedings against the attorney and her husband, also an attorney.  The judge recused from that case, but was seen advising the presiding judge in the case.

The child neglect case was litigated for 2 years, but was dismissed after the presiding judge was caught in collusion with the friend-of-Commissioner Moon (and friend-of-County Attorney and friend of Vice-Chair) judge attempting to arrest the new attorney in the courthouse in order not to let her co-chair a criminal trial together with her husband-attorney.

The friend of the criminal-court judge refused to abide by the law and release bail and instead sued the defendant and the law firm of the Vice-Chair.

In the new litigation where the Vice Chair was a party, initially the presiding judge was not the judge from the criminal proceeding who participated in a collusion with the Vice-Chair and the judge's long-time friend, the then-County attorney.

The initial judge expressed bewilderment as to what has driven the criminal-court judge to make a bail-release order the way he did it, but still ruled for the criminal-court judge's friend and for the Vice-Chair.

The attorney who complained about the criminal-court judge and the Vice-Chair to the Commission for Judicial Conduct appealed the decision.

The criminal-court judge's friend, the then-County attorney and a representative of the Vice-Chair threatened the attorney that bad things will happen to her if she proceeded with the appeal.

At the same time, the attorney's husband, also an attorney, filed an appeal of the criminal case raising there the same issues of misconduct of the criminal-court judge as his wife raised in the civil appeal.

The assistant district attorney and the undisclosed former law partner of the criminal-court district court judge approached the attorney-husband and transparently hinted to him that he should not be "burning bridges".

The attorney-husband persisted with the criminal appeal.

The attorney-wife won the appeal of the civil bail case, and the case was remanded back to the civil court.  

Then, the initial judge in the civil litigation about the bail somehow disappeared from the case, and the criminal-court judge whose misconduct and whose wrongful bail-release order was the whole reason for the litigation, got self-assigned to the case - despite his prior recusal from the case brought against the attorneys, husband and wife, for bringing a motion to recuse the judge in a child neglect case of a client.

The attorney-wife asked the criminal-court judge for recusal from the civil case because of his personal involvement with the actors of the case (County Attorney, Vice-Chair), and because of the history of dependence of his decisions on the will of the Vice-Chair.

The attorney-wife was not present at the hearing regarding her request for the judge to recuse, the attorney-husband was.

At the hearing, on record, the County Attorney admitted to the ex parte communication with this long-time friend and former subordinate, the criminal-court (and now civil-court) judge.

The judge went pale.

After being outed in the ex parte communication and fixing the order of bail the way the Vice Chair and the long-time friend, the County Attorney, wanted, the judge did not recuse from the case.

Instead, he initiated a proceeding against the attorney-wife, the complainant against him to the Commission for Judicial Conduct which was so handily dismissed by his accomplice the Vice-Chair, and the judge from the Appellate Division.

While the criminal-civil-Family court judge was deciding the frivolous-conduct proceedings against the attorney-wife for daring to point out his misconduct and conflict of interest, the attorney-husband who neglected to abide by the warning of the judge's former law partner, the assistant district attorney, was disbarred. 

The disbarment was without a hearing and based on a decision in the case where a non-existing cause of action (interference with prospective rights of inheritance) was rehashed as an existing cause of action (fraud and fraud upon the court) in order to provide a recovery consisting exclusively of legal fees for a crew of a former judge and his son who committed similar crimes of fraud in the past, but nobody dared to touch them because of their connections (a former judge + renting a building to New York State Senator James Seward + being under "protection" of Seward's former counsel administrative, and then appellate Judge Robert Mulvey).

The appellate judge who, as a member of the Commission for Judicial Conduct, helped the Commission's Vice-Chair dismiss a complaint against he judge based on the Vice-Chair's own misconduct, participated in the disbarment decision.

Meanwhile, the friend-of-the-Vice-Chair judge proceeded with a "frivolous conduct" proceeding against the attorney-wife.

In that proceeding, initiated by the judge, the judge acted as a victim (alleging that the attorney-wife is harassing him with her "frivolous" criticism), investigator, prosecutor, witness and adjudicator and, predictably, found the attorney-wife guilty of "frivolous conduct".

On appeal that the attorney-wife filed from the sanctions, the appellate judge who participated in fixing the complaint by the attorney-wife against the sanctioning judge and his friend the Vice Chair of the Judicial Conduct Commission, who had extrajudicial knowledge that attorney-wife's arguments in the motion to recuse were true, and who had a personal extrajudicial involvement in the case and was a witness in the case, instead of recusing herself and her court from the appeal, got herself assigned to the appeal from the sanctions, presided over the judicial panel and affirmed the sanctions of the judge she saved as a member of the Judicial Conduct Commission by fixing the complaint about him.

Then, the now-presiding appellate judge's court, as the regulator of the legal profession, sought to disbar the attorney-wife, as they already disbarred the attorney-husband.

The disciplinary commission of the court, "the arm of the court", appointed and regulated by the appellate judge, brought disciplinary charges against the attorney-wife based on sanctions imposed upon her by the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge, where the presiding appellate judge helped the Vice-Chair fix the complaint of the attorney against the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge.

The attorney removed the case to federal court under a removal statute used when a fair adjudication in a state court is impossible.

It was impossible, based on personal involvement of the presiding judge of the regulator court in the controversy and her fixing of three cases before the removal:

1. a complaint against the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge in 2010,
2. a disbarment after the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge's former law partner threatened the attorney's husband not to criticize the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge in a criminal appeal,
3. affirming, as a presiding judge of the panel, sanctions imposed by the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge upon the attorney for pointing out the judge's misconduct and personal involvement in two court cases - civil and criminal, and the judge's fixing the bail order in the criminal case the way the Vice-Chair wanted, even though that way was against the statutory law.

After the case was removed, the presiding appellate judge fought tooth and claw to return it back to her court, arguing that the case had to be returned because the attorney-wife is white, and thus is not entitled to remove the case based on a statute, 28 USC 1443, because supposedly, that statute could be used only in cases of racial discrimination. 

No such restriction was in the text of the statute, but the federal judge, whose own state law license was in the hands of the state appellate court judge, decided that it is safer to sacrifice the attorney than to lose his own law license and seat on the bench - and remanded the case.

After that, the attorney sued the presiding appellate judge for a declaratory judgment asking to reveal her involvement in shadow secret-membership organizations where judges and select attorneys meet behind closed doors and get to fix cases - American Inns of Court and New York State-Federal Judicial Council.

As soon as the presiding appellate judge was served with the lawsuit seeking documents of her involvement in a system of case-fixing through a shadow quasi-judicial organization (Neroni v Peebles filed in NDNY in 2014), she immediately transferred the case to another court and hid the allegedly existing motion by its "arm of the court", the disciplinary committee, asking for the transfer. 

The presiding judge refused to release that document, the motion, even though it was part of the record of a court case, to the new court or to the parties in the disciplinary case, until her retirement at the end of 2017.

After his retirement, another judge of the same disciplinary court, Judge Mercure, who participated in disbarment of attorney-husband, acknowledged that he was, for years, part of the State-Federal Judicial Council.

One single document that the attorney-wife was able to obtain about that organization was from New York State court system indicating that:

1. Such an organization exists.
2. Appointments to that organizations are made by Chief judges of the New York court system on the state side and by the Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit on the federal side;
3. the Chairperson of the organization is federal judge Mae D'Agostino who dismissed the federal lawsuit that the attorney-wife brought against the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge for a declaratory judgment that retaliatory sanctions violated for the contents of attorney's speech violated the 1st Amendment.  

The 2nd Circuit refused to provide any documents as to membership of the Council, its agenda, composition of its "attorney advisory council" or any other documents.

Attorney-wife was suspended without a hearing, the only basis for suspension being "frivolous conduct" - for sanctions imposed by friend-of-Vice-Chair judge for public criticism of that judge.  Attorney's constitutional challenges that such criticism was protected by the 1st Amendment, as well as her demand for an open public hearing was rejected by the court.  Moreover, a (failed) attempt was made to create a criminal record against attorney-wife and put her in jail for discussing misconduct in the disciplinary case in a blog.

Constitutional motions were denied without an explanation, constitutional appeal as of right to the New York Court of Appeals was denied,  certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court was denied without an explanation.

Judges do not like attorneys who criticize judges.

The bottom line of the story.

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1. The attorney-wife, Tatiana Neroni, was able to do her duty, obtain for her client the multi-thousand-dollar bail wrongfully released to the Vice-Chair of the Commission of Judicial Conduct - and was suspended for the effort, while her husband was disbarred.
2. The Vice-Chair of the Commission of Judicial Conduct - Albany attorney Stephen Coffey - was never disciplined and is still a licensed attorney.
3. The County Attorney who participated in ex parte communications and case-fixing on the issue of bail - attorney Richard Spinney, quickly retired before pending audit of the county by the New York State Comptroller and the FBI, but was never disciplined and remains a licensed attorney.
4. The friend-of-Vice-Chair judge Carl F. Becker quickly retired just 2.5 years into his 2nd judicial term during the above-mentioned investigations, under circumstances suggesting forced retirement so that not to be taken off the bench, but was never publicly disciplined and remains a licensed attorney.
5. Commissioner of Social Services of Delaware County, New  York, William Moon who helped friend-of-Vice-Chair to try to distress, discredit and harass attorneys, wife and husband, and their children, with fabricated child neglect proceedings, quickly retired, and an FBI investigation into his wrongdoing was announced, but he was never prosecuted.
6. The federal judge Norman A. Mordue who betrayed his oath by knowingly remanding a federal lawsuit into the waiting hands of a judge personally involved in the controversy for fear of losing his own law license, remains on the bench, his law license is intact and he was never disciplined - as an attorney or as a judge.
7. The former law partner of the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge, John Hubbard, was elected a District Attorney of Delaware County.  His law license is intact and he was never disciplined for trying to threaten a criminal defense attorney to withdraw criticism of a judge with whom John Hubbard had a personal (and never disclosed - until Judge Becker retired) connection.
8. The Presiding Judge of the New York's Appellate Division Third Judicial Department Karen Peters who participated in fixing cases in order to protect the friend-of-Vice-Chair judge Carl Becker from discipline since 2010 (that caught up with him still in 2015) and disbarring his critics, was retired on December 31, 2017 based on her age. 

3 months before her retirement, while Karen Peters was still hearing cases from Albany County lawyers, Albany County bar association through a party in her "honor".

Remember this woman whose efforts eliminated the only free round-the-clock legal clinic that operated in Delhi, NY for several decades, for the only reason that attorneys of that clinic dared to catch a local judge and Peters herself, red-handed in misconduct.

Much, much, much honor.