Reporting on Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire: Tim Buckley confirms there was no police investigation of the circumstances of the fire

The case of Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire gets more and more interesting.

Tim Buckley of Delaware County Sheriff's Department 

finally wrote back to Barbara O'Sullivan (after she was told on Monday, April 25, 2016, by the Delaware County Sheriff's Department that he is preparing the report about investigation of her house fire and will call her back that same day).

Tim Buckley reportedly claimed to Barbara that "he was unable to locate a police agency who was at the scene", so the report cannot be made.

So, nearly a week after the fire - not only no reports, but the Delaware County Sheriff's Department pretends it does not know who even was on the site and who even was investigating that fire - if at all.

That is the department that 

• buys horses for "crowd control" in the County with disappearing population, 
• buys untrained imported pups for $7,000 to allegedly control the allegedly increased drug traffic, and 
• does nothing to control an unlawfully hired police officer with a history of violence against women and animals, because that particular police officer is related to the District Attorney's similarly unlawfully hired investigator.

Instead, according to deposition of Officer Bowie, the Department "backs him up 100%" in both cases of assault on women, one of them was a vehicular assault on Barbara O'Sullivan, and even gives him free legal defense against Barbara's lawsuit.

Now, that very same particular Sheriff's Department pretends it does not know what police agency and who - if at all - investigated a house fire that suddenly consumed the entire house of a person who is suing that police officer.

As if there is a myriad hard-to-find police agencies in the area.

A perfect "sergeant Schultz" defense - "I did not see anything, I do not know anything".

Not good enough.

There were eyewitnesses claiming that they saw various police officers from various police agencies hovering around the site of the fire - and now nobody claims they were there?

Was the lack of investigation due to the fact that the Sheriff's Department was afraid to look, fearing what or rather who they might find as a result of that investigation?

There are only two suspects that I know who had the motive, opportunity, training, skill, rage and lack of integrity to commit the arson-by-explosion at Barbara's house.

Delaware County Sheriff's Department knows those names, too.

And knows who and how would have benefited by the deaths of Barbara O'Sullivan and/or Alecia Bracci.

And doesn't investigate.

As I said before, the case stinks, and it stinks more and more by the minute.

I will continue reporting on this case.

Stay tuned.

Coverage of Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire continues: the Fire Department's reporting gaps, hysterics, disclaimers and intimidation by a firefighter's girlfriend, anonymous comments of alleged firefighters

I wrote on this blog extensively about Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire that happened during the night from Friday to Saturday last week and that nobody but me wants to report.

The fire was not mentioned in the blotters listing other fires.

The fire was not mentioned on Delhi FD's Facebook page - see that there is a gap in posting the last post before today's was April 17, 2016, Barbara's house fire occurred on the night of April 22 to April 23, 2016 - and could be posted simply as that there was a house fire, and that investigation as to causes is pending.

Yet, there is nothing.  As if that fire did not even happen.

A brush fire is reported.

A house fire of a critic of misconduct of the local government whose fabricated criminal case was just dismissed, is not reported.

And there is no investigation.

And, official reports are not issued.

And, local press is mum about the fire.

Interesting choices in reporting DFD has.


So, the clear intention was to keep that particular fire not reported.

And that wish was thwarted - by a mere blogger, a citizen journalist.

The fire was reported, on this blog, as well as misconduct of local firefighters who refused to help extinguish the fire or save the dog trapped in the basement in the fire, and misconduct of law enforcement and the District Attorney's office that are unwilling to investigate this obvious arson, to the point of not taking written statements from witnesses.

I also wrote about the smear tactics used against me by a group of anonymous individuals claiming to be firefighters (see here), and three women, one semi-anonymous, her posted name is Brigitte (her last name is Berry), so it is #BrigitteBerry, who pretended to be Barbara O'Sullivan's friend while posting comments hurting Barbara, and two other women who provided their full real names - a firefighter's wife #SharonReichert-Morgan and an alleged former firefighter/firefighter's girlfriend #ColleenChurch.

Sharon Reichert-Morgan, an employee of the Delaware County Department of Social Services, first spewed hatred against me, the victims of the fire and even my husband who had nothing to do with reporting of this story or with the case of the house fire, see my blogs here and here.

Then, Sharon Reichert-Morgan, possibly reprimanded at work for contacting me and giving me information, recanted her initial claim that she was getting information about the fire from her firefighter husband - while there is no official report issued about that fire, and claimed she is an "independent thinker" who just happened to think up her theories, without ever being at the fire site, while at the same time accusing me of lies in reporting based on eyewitness accounts, see my blogs here and here.

Meanwhile, Delaware County insurance policy, coincidentally disclosed to me following my Freedom of Information request two days ago, indicated that law enforcement personnel of Delaware County is not allowed, without consent of the insurance carrier, to "accept liability" or "assume obligation" - or, in other words, to tell anybody the truth of what happened at that fire.

Yet, when I posted that intriguing piece of information, #ColleenChurch may have lost her last bearings and posted something completely bizarre, which told me, once again, that I am on the right track in reporting this story.

I must point out that #ColleenChurch first insisted in several posts that she is leaving, and leaving, and leaving, and leaving, and leaving my blog, but with maniacal persistence comes back with increasingly bizarre comments, the last one calling me a "stupid mail order bride bitch".

In that latest bizarre post, Colleen Church was also pretending at some humor claiming that it is impossible to have a "battle of whits" (her spelling) "with someone unarmed".  

Of course, it is impossible, because there is no such word as "whits" in the language which is, I understand, native to Colleen Church, but which she apparently had no time to master past the swear words - she made no spelling mistakes in the words "shit", "bitch" and such like in her comments.

I guess, to each, her own vocabulary.  Colleen Church is familiar with the spelling of words she uses the most.  From that, it is easy to arrive at a conclusion that Colleen Church does not have many battles of wits at all.

And, Colleen Church appears to be "armed" only with that particular strata of vocabulary - which, to her, obviously equates with intellect.

Well, as I said, to each her own.

Now, as to some substantive lies, some threats and some directives to me from Colleen Church which indicate that my reporting is on the right track.

In her earlier post today - made at 5:38 AM plus 3 hours (the time stamp on this blog is California time) - Colleen Church claimed that:

1) she never said she knew what happened at the fire (she did claim that I was lying as to what happened at the fire, based on reports of eyewitnesses, which is the equivalent of stating that she knew what REALLY happened at that fire, otherwise how does she know I am lying?)

2) her boyfriend is (currently) a firefighter;

3) her boyfriend has a pager;

4) Colleen Church "owns a scanner" (a police scanner);

5) that "most people that have lived here for ant /sic/ length of time know the Braccis and how they operate";  "the Braccis" is a very large extended family

Colleen Church said in that post that it would be her last post.

Several posts later, she is still on my blog, her last, very irate, comment posted at 6:50 pm + 3 hours.

She now claims that she listened to the scanner "in her house" and that she allegedly stated before that her boyfriend "has not been a part of the [Delhi Fire Department] for some time".  And that she has allegedly stated that "he is a member of the FD in the town that we now live in and that FD was not dispatched to help with the fire".

She did not state that in her comments before.  

Apparently, somebody had a talk with her, and made her state such a disclaimer, trying to absolve her boyfriend of not having to come to Barbara's rescue.  

That is already good - people are running like rats from a sinking ship, which means, my reports are actually being read by a lot of people.

What is also interesting is that Colleen Church did not disclose the town where she is living - and which allegedly did not dispatch her firefighter boyfriend to fight the fire at Barbara's house, and I wonder, why is that.

Nor did Colleen Church agree to come "face to face" with me in a live-streamed recorded video-chat, along with her firefighter boyfriend, Sharon Reichert-Morgan with whom she was apparently acting in concert, Sharon Reichert-Morgan's firefighter husband, and all other members of the investigative and fire-fighting team that were involved with the case of Barbara's house fire.

And that is also very illustrative of wrongdoing, along with the pressure put on Barbara's siblings, their businesses and even their employees who are getting an earful from the Delhi firefighters about my blogs, while their bosses continue to stall release of fire reports that should have been ready long time ago.

And, such reluctance to meet me on video-chat with the whole investigative crew and give me "their side of the story" is especially telling, as Colleen Church accuses me, as Sharon Reichert-Morgan and Brigitte Berry, and "Archer" and "LifeSaver" commentators did before - of knowing "nothing about" the firefighters' job, and reporting only wide side of the story, from what the victims told me.

When people refuse to give me "the other side of the story", despite several invitations to do that, but still accuse me, in increasingly personal slurs, of one-sided reporting, and no one else is reporting it - I am definitely not to blame that the "other side of the story" is not given to me.

It is also illustrative - and quite funny - how Colleen Church questions my "right" to investigate anything in Delaware County.

The woman who can spell "shit" and "bitch", but cannot spell words denoting her own pretense at "intellectual humor", apparently, does not realize that I can investigate what is happening in the local government where my husband and I pay property taxes, the same way as every other taxpayer, citizen or journalist can, no permission needed.

Colleen Church also gives me a directive to "keep my crap down there" in South Carolina and "keep my nose out of business here".

I understand that the local establishment in Delaware County really wanted to have my husband and I disappear from the area, with our inconvenient pro bono and low-rate services to the local poor and uneducated criminal defendants and parents pursued by social services,  and it is a bitter disappointment that, with all the efforts to get my husband and I out of the area, all that Delaware County got is an unintimidated journalist with legal and linguistic training, time, and a determination to report specifically about what is going on in the government in that particular area.

By the way, the bitter disappointment, I predict, will get even more bitter when my first book comes out, it will happen soon.

Intimidation of journalists who are reporting on misconduct of governments is not such an unusual thing around the world.

Nor it is a legal thing, and Colleen Church, even with her shrunk gray matter, should have realized that when she was giving me her directives not to get "my nose" into Delaware County's "business".

When somebody is eagerly trying to hush reporting on a mere blog, and especially on a blog of a person who Colleen Church claims to be crazy (but who, at the same time, knows local people and local little dirty patterns in the local government well), it shows that something really rotten IS happening over there that Delaware County residents close to the local establishment would not want to be known to the wider world.

Colleen Church also backtracked as to her claims that all long-time residents of the Delhi, NY area know how "the Braccis operate" - now she claims she has not "bashed Mr. Pete Bracci or anyone else in the Bracci family except [my] alleged friends".  

Well, let's see if that is the truth.  Once again, this is the earlier comment of Colleen Church posted today:

It is clearly bashing "the Braccis", without any exception, so Colleen Church was, in fact, bashing all the extended Bracci family - without thinking.  Again, one cannot expect complex intellectual endeavors from a woman with Colleen Church's limited vocabulary.

I wrote a story based on eyewitness accounts.

I was the only reporter who wrote about that story.  The local press and the local public officials are hushing it up.

The only people who responded to the story are people who have no personal knowledge about what happened, but who are still trying to protect something they know nothing about, which leads to a conclusion that something must really be wrong.

These people, the commentators, repeatedly accuse me of one-sided reporting, but repeatedly refuse to give the "other side of the story" through a video conference.

They are obviously afraid to say something stupid to the allegedly stupid me.  So, they are waiting until their attorney will coach their loved ones to put all ducks in a row to help the County, the DFD and all other entities and personnel involved in the monumental blunder of how Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire was handled, to escape liability.

When I was finishing this blog, another comment was posted - by an alleged anonymous firefighter "LifeSaver".

Here is the comment, with my reply.

I appreciate that the tone of the comment by "LifeSaver" was nothing close to the ravings of Colleen Church.  It was respectful, and I understand that the person wanted to provide some valuable information to me. Once again, I appreciate the tone of LifeSaver's comment, and I mean no disrespect whatsoever to firefighters or police officers in general.

Yet, when there is an eyewitness report of misconduct of police and firefighters, especially under the general circumstances of this particular case, and public officials refuse to investigate or provide official reports that must be provided in this case, it is not disrespectful to try investigate what really happened, by means available to me as a journalist.

Unfortunately, as I stated to "LifeSaver" in my response, his (I presume from the style of the comment that "LifeSaver" is a man, and apologize if I am incorrect) information would have been valuable only if I knew the identity of the source.

Without knowing the identity of the source, information provided to me is useless.

I understand that people may be afraid to come forward and discuss the case, and that is also what troubles me as a reporter of this case - because by now the fire report and the investigative report of what happened must be complete, and the names of investigators and of the members of firefighting team known.

There is nothing secret about those names.  

And, if the "LifeSaver" and "Archer" prefer to remain anonymous, as well as Colleen Church and the "LifeSaver" prefer not to disclose the name of Colleen Church's boyfriend or the fire department where he works and which allegedly was not called to duty to Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire, there is a problem there.

I will continue my investigation, and will report my results on this blog.

Stay tuned.

The fired-up firemen and the fireman's wife in trouble

According to reports from Delhi, NY, today, here is the status of police/fire incident report as to the fire at Barbara O'Sullivan's house:

• no report still;
• no promised call from Tim Buckley still, as was promised to Barbara O'Sullivan, along with the report, yesterday (probably, the lawyers are talking to the insurance company and the insurance company does not allow the law enforcement to tell the truth in the report, see my previous blog here);
• members of the Delhi Fire Department are expressing displeasure to employees of Barbara's brother (of all people) about them not being paid for their firefighting "jobs", and being upset at being "put down like that";
• the firefighter's wife Sharon Reichert-Morgan is in some kind of trouble because of my blogs posting her messages to me.

The rank-and-file members of the Delhi Fire Department can discuss the fire to their heart's desire - but the report is not there from their bosses, and that is very damaging.

Yet, they blame not their bosses, and certainly not themselves, for not doing their jobs properly (because that admission may be prohibited by insurance).

They blame my blogs, the mirror of their conduct.

By the way, the report was supposed to be made immediately, according to my prior conversation - couple of years ago - with a firefighter who was my client.

And - an interesting development.

The firefighter's wife Sharon Reichert-Morgan who claims she does not use her work time for personal business, sent me a message on Messenger (I wonder if it was on her county-issued cell phone or County computer) begging me for a telephone conversation.

This was my first reply.

Sharon Reichert-Morgan insisted that:

I asked what I asked for yesterday when Sharon Reichert-Morgan was promising a smear campaign, to hide her firefighter husband's key if my own husband is burning (hint, hint), calling me, my husband, the victims and their families various bad names.

Just a video hangout, livestreamed, videotaped, with Sharon Reichert-Morgan and her husband participating

I did not hear back from Sharon Reichert-Morgan yet as to that counter-offer.

Saying that she was only trying to "persuade me" - I will let my readers be judges of the sincerity of those particulars methods of "persuasion", see messages of Sharon Reichert-Morgan published here and here.

Sharon Reichert-Morgan was very cavalier yesterday on Facebook claiming that I am crazy.

Now she is begging for a phone conversation with a crazy person?

Interesting - what could have happened to sober her up so quickly?

Very likely, Sharon Reichert-Morgan had a good conversation with attorneys Amy Merklen, or Porter Kirkwood, and/or her boss or bosses, who, probably, explained to her that, even though my license is temporarily suspended, my brains and training as a trial lawyer are not, only I am using these skills for journalism now.

I am still skilled to exact information from people, especially from social services and law enforcement, and I did extract information that I needed from Sharon Reichert-Morgan's statements and statements of her friends and commentators which was exposing untruths and potential misconduct of Sharon Reichert-Morgan, her husband, her husband's employer the Delhi Fire Department and her own employer the Delaware County Department of Social Services.

Sharon Reichert-Morgan also must have forgotten that she gets her money funded by my taxes and subject to my scrutiny through FOIL requests, and for that reason, insulting me, at the very least, was not advisable.

Sharon Reichert-Morgan also must have forgotten that nobody prevents me, license or no license, from making FOIL requests, obtaining documents and reporting on documents and stories reported to me from Delaware County.

In fact, now I have more free time to do that.

That's called journalism, for which this country did not invent licenses yet.

Sharon Reichert-Morgan implied in her today's messages to me that I incorrectly got "her" children (two children and one stepchild) "involved in this", and that she would never involve mine.

Yet, it is not me who got "her" children involved in this discussion, it was Sharon Riechert-Morgan herself, in her messages to me, which I simply verified against certain sources from the area, and commented on her truthfulness and her potential abuse of power in regards of the child or children, as a social services department employee.

Knowing that 

• other social services employees use their influence to affect custody proceedings and even adoption proceedings (I have names of particular social workers in mind, and the Department of Social Services knows who and in what cases), and knowing 
• behavior of local judges in relation to all social workers, and especially female young social workers, and 
• taking into consideration the semi-nude picture Sharon Reichert-Morgan has sent me with a request to publish it, 

I could reasonably conclude that it was not beyond Sharon Reichert-Morgan to abuse the power of her government employment, as well as her feminine charms (you do not need much charms for an ageing judge) to get custody of her husband's child with a little help.

Now apparently Sharon Reichert-Morgan is in trouble, and is begging me for an opportunity to entrap me with a phone conversation into a charge of unauthorized practice of law.

As I showed above, I counter-offered what I offered from the very beginning - a videotaped and livestreamed chat on Google Hangouts, with Reichert, her husband firefighter, and with other members of the firefighting team and law enforcement who participated in 

1. the alleged extinguishing of the fire and 
2. who hovered around Barbara O'Sullivan's property in police uniform pretending they are on government business.

No answer so far.

Well, I am patient and I can wait.

I will report any developments of this story.

Stay tuned.
 

Honesty of the local law enforcement personnel in Delaware County, New York, is governed by insurance policy

Now that all the foaming accusations against me subsided for alleging the unthinkable - that local law enforcement personnel and firefighters may be committing misconduct in non-extinguishing and non-investigation of the house of a local critic of governmental misconduct Barbara O'Sullivan, I will publish a portion of a document that I actually received on April 26, 2016 from Delaware County in response to my FOIL request.

That's a portion of Delaware County liability insurance policy for actions of its law enforcement personnel.

The policy is pretty standard and, I am sure, a similar policy covers actions of firefighters.

Here is the interesting portion that I would like to share (I will analyze the policy in a separate blog, probably, tomorrow):

There were a lot of people who, based on their emotional attachments to individuals working in the local law enforcement and the Delhi Fire Department, defended their loved ones to the point of casting ugly allegations against the victims in Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire, as well as against her daughter, her extended family, me who reported the case, misconduct of the law enforcement and firefighters included, and even against my husband who has nothing to do with reporting of Barbara O'Sullivan's house fire story.  

Those relatives , driven by their emotional attachment to their loved ones, were telling me that "they know", even though they were never at the scene of the fire, because "they know" their husbands, or boyfriends, or former comrades-in-arms, and "they know" that those loved ones or comrades "can never" and "they are not liars", and because of that, I am the liar, and I need to have my head checked out, and to relearn the law (why I need to relearn the law in journalism, I don't know), and all other nice things that I need to do, including apologize to the Fire Department.

I won't apologize.

Read the liability policy of Delaware County regarding its law enforcement personnel.

It is pretty standard policy, I am sure.

Just read it.

The insurance policy says, in black and white, that "the insured" "shall not" (that is a prohibition) "admit any liability" or "assume any obligation".

Do you know what that means?

It means that Delaware County law enforcement personnel is PROHIBITED to tell the truth and "admit a liability" or "assume an obligation" - in other words, they are PROHIBITED to say - YES, I caused a bodily injury of this person, or "I neglected my duties and caused injury to a person or property".

They are prohibited to say that.

You can read the full text of the insurance policy here.

And, even though I will be requesting a separate policy as to firefighters, I am pretty sure that it will say the same.

So much for the claimed honesty.

Just saying...

The demographics of the rural Otsego and Delaware County, New York - people are leaving, while the government is growing

Yes, yes, yes, I know, there is small lies, big lies and statistics.

Statistics may be manipulated, may be forged and fabricated, that's true.

But, when many business decisions are independently made by various businesses and local governments based on demographic statistics, such statistics must be true.

People who want to make money will not turn money down based on fake statistics - they will research.

And Fox Hospital from Oneonta, NY did its research of demographics in the area.

And is closing its maternity services that were serving Otsego and Delaware Counties.

Not enough babies being born is cited as the reason.

To cut costs, the hospital now "consolidated" its "labor and delivery" services with Basset Hospital in Cooperstown, NY.

Oneonta, NY, by the way, is located right on Interstate-88, while Cooperstown, NY is reachable only by one-lane county roads that can be tough to navigate in winter.

This is the second maternity hospital that closed in the area within the last 10 years - after the maternity wing in Delaware Valley Hospital in Walton, New York.

Delaware Valley maternity hospital (where my teenage son was born) served rural community in Delaware County for years - and served it well.  

Delaware Valley had only two labor rooms in the entire hospital.  When I was giving birth there, it was the only birth for 2 days.

Finally, Delaware Valley considered it not cost-efficient to continue to run its "labor and delivery" services in an area with dwindling population - where an entire elementary school building, the Abraham Kellogg Elementary School, had to be closed in 2008 and sold by the Delaware County School District because there were no children left to fill that building.

The Abraham Kellogg Elementary School that closed in 2008 reportedly served 46 children in grades 1 through 4.

Fox is not the business or entity taking notice of dwindling population in the area.

This year, Delhi, NY, the seat of Delaware County, announced it is now "reconsidering" the much promoted project to build a swimming pool in the Legion Field.

Which is quite an extraordinary event, considering that just this past November the so-called "Pool Committee" has decided to "go forward" with construction, and was soliciting bids - and donations for such a construction, and that donations are being solicited to this day.

By the way, even though the pool is not going to be built, at least in the original scale, at least at this time (looks like ever), and even though the decision that bids are not approved has already been announced on January 16, 2016, that announcement did not appear on the "Pool Committee"'s website, and the website still has the "Donate" button as of today.

So, I wonder where all of those donations already collected are going.

Once again - on November 4, 2015 (the day of elections, by the way), there was a "go ahead" press release soliciting written bids and donations from the public.  It was like a plea - RE-ELECT ME NOW!  We brought this great project about.

On November 15, 2015 the Town of Delhi, NY published the invitation for bidding for construction of the pool (issued, curiously, 6 days prior, but for some reason not immediately published - why? "the near and dear" to the Town officials' hearts were first notified in a private setting?).

On December 11, 2015 there was an announcement on the Facebook page of the Pool Committee - but not on its main webpage - that "a legal snafu has caused a delay in the bidding process".

The latest "news" on the Delhi Pool Committee's main webpage remain this - those who know the location will see the playground in the back dwarfed by the "project" that was to be built in the area usually flooded by the West Branch of the Delaware River (I lived in Delhi, NY for 17 years, experienced such floods and saw this particular spot as a lake with ducks instead of people swimming all over it):

If you click the "read more" little red words, this opens:

In early January of 2016, bids for construction of the pool (two) came "too high", and the Pool Committee together with the Town of Delhi and the State of New York (that participated with a grant) is now considering a "scale-down" of the project - without notifying its readers on either their main webpage or on the Facebook page, and while continuing to invite donations, even though there is no assurance that the pool-building project will ever go ahead.

The interesting part is that there are no suggestions to collect more donations - only to "scale down" the project.  No people to "serve", it's starting to dawn, right?

And boy do they have to "consider" a scale-down - with the schools having to close and maternity hospitals in the area having to close - because people are leaving the area, with children in tow - who would come to use this "project"?

It will be an "attractive nuisance" and a liability for the remaining Delhi Town taxpayers, it will require a lot of funds for upkeep and garbage removal, it can be overrun by recurrent floods in the area, but it is doubtful that it will be "serving" a lot of people.

It is very obvious that, based on the facts of 

• schools that are closing for lack of children,
• maternity hospitals, even in a relatively large college towns, are closing;
• "scalings-down" of major "community projects"

population in Otesgo and Delaware County is flying out.

In droves.

Which brings me to the question:

what will happen to the budgets of:

• The school districts - when there are less children to teach;
• Social Services - where there are less families to supervise;
• Police and District Attorney's offices - where there are less people to commit crimes;
• the Court system - where there are less cases to be brought voluntarily by local residents, and by social services and the District Attorney?

So far, the process was in reverse to the population dynamics.

There is a huge inflated budget of Delaware County Department of Social services - that, of course, has to feed: 

• all the clans illegally employed by the County, the "hiring process" is described here, and 
• the tumor on the budget of Delaware County, the Delaware Opportunities Inc.  (and the like organizations fed out of the County's budget) where the local governmental officials that command the budget sit on the Board and where, reportedly, a ton of relatives and friends of county officials are employed.

In July of 2015, a new, fourth prosecutor, was authorized for the Delaware County District Attorney's Office, see here and here.

In other words - while people are leaving the State of New York, and the rural counties, which is shown by business decisions to close schools, maternity hospitals and ditch the much-promoted swimming pool project, the "demographics" of the local government goes in reverse - it grows, salaries of officials grow, numbers of officials (judges, prosecutors) grow.

Why? 

Because these people will not survive outside of the government, in an honest self-made business?

They need taxpayers as captive cash cows to subsidize them?

Watch out, Delaware County taxpayers, as well as Delhi Village and Town taxpayers, for any increases of levies or taxes.

The parasites in the local government need the money of the remaining captive cash cows, the taxpayers, to survive, thrive and feed their clans.

Say "no" to the growing local budgets.

They have no basis to ask for growth.

And - I will run a separate blog on the unfunded increase of the salaries of local County District Attorneys, as well as a separate blog about the alleged "budget savings" recently reported by the Delaware County Department of Social Services.

Stay tuned.

Attorney misconduct of the Florida Bar in prosecuting attorney misconduct - what else is new

I've just submitted (two days ago) a motion for rehearing of my constitutional appeal as of right in my disciplinary case, the last step before going to the U.S. Supreme Court.

I will publish the entire motion and comment on it in a separate blog, today or tomorrow.

One of the prominent issues in my case was misconduct of New York State disciplinary authority in prosecuting me for alleged attorney misconduct - where New York State disciplinary authorities actually refused to prosecute themselves for multiple disciplinary violations and dismissed complaints against themselves.

A similar situation of misconduct is currently unfolding in Florida.

There, an attorney who was consulted about a disciplinary case by the subjects of the disciplinary investigation and prosecution, then switched sides and ghost-wrote an affidavit for the prosecutors, while reportedly making false claims in that affidavit into the bargain.

The lawyers - same as I did in my case - requested dismissal of the disciplinary proceedings based on prosecutorial misconduct, because it goes without saying that an attorney misconduct proceeding cannot be prosecuted with the help of attorney misconduct.

Here, attorney misconduct was apparent.

1) There was a conflict of interest in the attorney initially contacted about representing the defense side to switch to the prosecution side;

2) There was misconduct of the prosecution side to accept such help and allow the former defense attorney in the same case to ghost-write a pleading for the prosecution;

3) There is misconduct on the side of the former defense attorney and the disciplinary prosecutors to submit such a pleading to the court, and to submit a false affidavit to the court.

Definitely, means by which the government acts, matter.

And definitely, the attorneys who were and still are subjects of investigation and prosecution in Florida, irrespective of whether they actually did or did not do anything wrong, were deprived of their due process right of an impartial prosecutor, and to have elementary honesty in proceedings.

A disciplinary prosecutor should be squeaky clean and practice what he preaches, first and foremost.

Shouldn't he?

A new U.S. Supreme Court 1st Amendment case - factual mistake in sanctioning an employee for protected conduct is not a defense in a civil rights lawsuit

Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court has issued an interesting opinion where it protected, in a majority opinion, the right of governmental employees not to be punished for conduct protected by the 1st Amendment. 

Here is the opinion in full.

The case is decidedly weird, on many levels.

The gist of it is that a police officer was demoted because somebody saw him (and reported him to his supervisor) standing with a sign supporting a certain official in his election campaign and talking to that person's campaign workers.

The supervisor perceived that reported conduct of the police officer as participating in a political activity - which is not allowed to police officers and other government employees.

It was actually a misunderstanding.  The police officer held a sign he was bringing home to his bed-ridden disabled mother at her request, he did not support the campaign of that individual personally.

The big fight was that the officer was demoted and sued for discrimination on 1st Amendment grounds, among other grounds.

The dissent said that, since it was a misunderstanding and the officer did not ACTUALLY engage in political conduct, 1st Amendment cannot be invoked in his lawsuit.  In the opinion of the dissent, what was done to the police officer (demoting from investigator to patrol) was "callous, but not unconstitutional".

Whether the 1st Amendment could or could not be invoked by the officer in a discrimination lawsuit made a difference between whether the officer's civil rights case would be dismissed or allowed to proceed.

The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the lower courts' decisions and allowed the officer's case to proceed, stating that factual mistake is no defense.  If the officer's employer believed that the officer is demoted because of his participation in a political campaign, that was activity protected by the 1st Amendment, and the lawsuit could proceed.

The issue though is not that simple.

In fact, if the officer's employer believed that the officer did participate in a political campaign, and did that openly, so that his holding of the sign while talking to the campaign workers of a certain political candidate could send a message to the public that the local police endorses that political candidate, and where such political activity was prohibited as a condition of employment, the government was justified to demote or fire the officer, 1st Amendment or no 1st Amendment.

Such firing would definitely have met the required strict scrutiny test, because on the other side of the balancing test as to whether the 1st Amendment rights were violated and whether such a demotion or even firing would be permissible under the 1st Amendment, is the requirement of government neutrality and non-endorsement by the government of political candidates, to preserve integrity of democratic elections.

So, I am afraid, we did not see the last of that case, it can return to the U.S. Supreme Court after its round through the lower courts on remand, and, of course, I will report it if it does return.

Stay tuned.