State and local governments across the United States fight efforts of transparency with sanctions, including murder, arrests, censorship and blacklisting of investigative reporters and whistleblowers

There were three arrests of journalists in the United States since March of 2016 for seeking open records and a significant increase of censorship and backlash of the government against individuals who seek open records to prove government corruption, or who create their own records (by videotaping or audiotaping) of government corruption.

Such retaliation is nothing new to me.

I was  criminally charged for exposing corruption in this blog - with criminal charges dismissed sua sponte, but those who orchestrated them promoted instead of sanctioned.

I was also sanctioned multiple for making FOIL (New York open records) requests:

1. in 2011, by the now-quickly-retired Judge Carl F. Becker,
2. in January 2012, by the same Carl F. Becker;
3. in May 2015 based on sanctions of the same Carl F. Becker; and
4. in November of 2015 when I was summarily suspended (without a hearing) based on sanctions of the same Carl F. Becker.

Carl Becker got upset (among other things - I also filed complaint about him and sued him) that I was filing FOIL requests about his financial statements - by the way, the NYS Court Administration NEVER complied with ANY of my FOIL requests regarding semi-annual financial statements of any judge, including Carl Becker, but instead sent notifications to judges that I made FOIL requests, for further retaliation.

Carl Becker actually mentioned in two orders - the sua sponte (on the court's own motion) order to show cause why I shouldn't be sanctioned in May of 2011 and in order of sanctions of January 2012, that sanctions are imposed for:

(1) making FOIL requests - Becker said that it was inappropriate for an attorney to make FOIL requests about the judge the attorney is appearing in front of and for - I was sanctioned by Becker $1,500 for that;

(2) using open records obtained through FOIL requests, because such use "invades privacy" - my client (husband) and I were sanctioned together $11,000 for that by Becker.

Of course, one cannot possibly, factually or legally, "invade privacy" of any other individual by obtaining and using PUBLIC records, but in New York courts, if a judge said the sun is raising in the West, that's it, any crazy thing a judge says is approved and supported as "judicial discretion".

Yet, that simple concept did not stop judge Becker, or judge Ferris Lebous, of Binghamton, NY, who reviewed a motion to vacate those sanctions (after he engaged in several ex parte communications with my opponents, for which ex parte communications my opponents charged me a legal fee, and Judge Lebous approved it against me and my husband).

In November of 2015 my law license was suspended for two years - without a hearing, since I wanted an open public hearing and since such a hearing would have exposed too much - based on Becker's sanction for FOIL requests.

My sanction was not the worst, though.

On June 26, 2010, Sunny Shue, of New York City, was bludgeoned to death after he investigated, including through FOIL requests to New York State Court Administration, foreclosure fraud involving a judge and reported the case to the FBI.

After Sunny Shue was murdered, evidence of the murder was reportedly covered up, and nobody was charged.

Sunny Shue predicted his own murder and published a video before the murder.

There is no statute of limitations on murder in the State of New York or under federal law - so, Sunny Shue's murder may be investigated at any time, we only need honest prosecutors to take up the case.

On April 9, 2016 I covered the story about the suspicious death of a whistleblower Adam Rupeka and his girlfriend, who was conveniently charged with a sexual crime against a child while exposing police misconduct, had to run for his life with his girlfriend, and was still apprehended and likely murdered in Mexico.

In April of 2016, there was an arson and murder attempt where the house of my friend Barbara O'Sullivan, her daughter and her unborn grandchild who was born in May and became the immediate target of social services; social services quickly backed out of their desire to snatch the child after the coverage of their misconduct on this blog, the child was released from hospital and the report was "unfounded".  Upon my information, the former Delaware County Commissioner Bill Moon, decades-long friend of Barbara's hater, former Judge Carl F. Becker, was involved in influencing the "investigation" by social services.

Barbara's house was burnt down completely under the circumstances indicating that it was a retaliation for Barbara's activities in seeking open public records and exposing misconduct of the police and local prosecutors joined at the hip with local corrupt judges.

No investigation and no fire or police reports were produced, the investigation is hushed up, the remains of the house was destroyed by much more than the fire, the police never secured the crime scene, the house continues to be stripped of the remaining valuables (copper pipes), shady individuals show up on the property and make vague threatening statements, and the police refuses to protect Barbara.

It is interesting to mention that the Delaware County Sheriff's Department and the Delaware County DA's office was quite a bit more vigorous in investigating and prosecuting the theft of copper pipes after the flood in Sidney - I know because I represented one of the individuals charged with that crime.

When the same crime concerns Barbara, the Delaware County authorities "would not pee on the fire", in the aristocratic language of their social worker Sharon Reichert-Morgan, who volunteered communication with me to criticize me for the coverage of the fire at Barbara's house. 

In fact, a firefighter's wife, a local social workers, claimed on my blog that if MY house burns down, her husband will not even pee on it to extinguish the fire - and other niceties of the same order.  I was also told to sit back in South Carolina and not put my nose into the Delaware County business.

That was an open threat, even more transparent that there already was an arson attempt in my home in Delhi, NY that, similarly with Barbara's actual arson, nobody wants to investigate or prosecute.

Barbara and Alecia both endured criminal prosecutions, both terminated in their favor, see here and here, and both started by Judge Becker's former law partner John Hubbard, who did not disclose the fact that he was Judge Becker's law partner until Judge Becker retired and John Hubbard announced his still continued run for the seat of the Delaware County District Attorney.

#ActingDelawareCountyDistrictAttorneyJohnHubbard did not consider it beneath him to prosecute Barbara and Alecia based on fabricated warrants, as Barbara's case revealed, in collusion with Delhi Town Justice (who still remains on the bench) Richard Gumo.

John Hubbard did not consider it beneath him to stress out by criminal prosecution on fabricated charges Barbara's visibly pregnant daughter Alecia Bracci, simply out of retaliation on behalf of his former law partner Judge Becker.

Hubbard had to see in February of 2016, when he put Alecia Bracci through a jury trial on those fabricated charges, that Alecia is very pregnant (her child was born within less than 3 months, in early May).

That did not stop Hubbard from not only proceeding on false charges, and stress the expectant mother, but also to waste taxpayers' money and jurors' time on false prosecution and jury trial - only to please his former law partner, the quickly-retired Judge Carl F. Becker.  John Hubbard, who is running for the DA's position now, is a prime candidate for the District Attorney's office in Delaware County - honest and fair.

Barbara was the victim of one more attempted murder attempt in 2014, by the Delaware County fake deputy Sheriff Derek Bowie  (he did not satisfy the residency requirement, as revealed in yet another lawsuit, and was thus not a legitimate Deputy Sheriff), who had a history of violence, and whose violence against Barbara could have been also triggered by Barbara's facial likeness to Bowie's former girlfriend who sued him. 

I wrote that Barbara's life was in danger back in September of 2014 when she was put in jail and my access to her, as her attorney, was blocked because it was conditioned on allowing the Sheriff's Department (employer of Derek Bowie) to search my attorney files.

But, Derek Bowie was never prosecuted for his assault upon his girlfriend Kylie Smith, or for the attempted murder of Barbara O'Sullivan.

Instead, Derek Bowie's victim Kylie Smith was prosecuted by the Broome County DA (the assault of Bowie upon Ms. Smith occurred in Broome County).

And, in Delaware County, Derek Bowie's victim Barbara O'Sullivan and her daughter Alecia Bracci were prosecuted by the employer of Derek Bowie's uncle, the Delaware County DA - because Derek Bowie's uncle Jeff Bowie works as a longtime investigator for the Delaware County District Attorney's office where Judge Becker's former law partner John Hubbard has been a Chief Assistant District Attorney for years, and is now the Acting District Attorney.

People who want to find out about governmental misconduct, as shown in this post, are exposed to a powerful backlash where the government uses its authority, given to it by the taxpayer to protect, in order to suppress exposure of its own misconduct.

Yet, there are more and more people like Barbara, who courageously continue to document corruption in the government by seeking open records through FOIL requests.

At this time, in the era of the Internet, when evidence of governmental corruption obtained through FOIL requests can be posted within seconds on the Internet (I do that all the time on my blog) and when the public is increasingly opposed to corruption, the government, and the mainstream media depending on handouts from wealthy advertisers who are connected with the government, continue to clamp down on "sensitive" topics - and on people who try to raise them, or to even seek materials for such publications, through open records requests.

In New York, Mayor Blasio and NYPD continue to fight to keep disciplinary records of police officers closed to the public - even though the law Mayor Blasio and NYPD are relying upon is facially unconstitutional because Civil Rights Law 50a was created with a specific purpose to undermine criminal defendants' efforts to effectively cross-examine police officers in criminal proceedings, impeaching them with evidence of their disciplinary record and misconduct, a violation of Confrontation Clause of the 6th Amendment of the U.S. Constituion.

I challenged constitutionality of that law in multiple criminal cases, in omnibus motions, always with the same result - the challenge was rejected without an explanation or reasoning as being "without merit".

Recently, under public pressure and civil unrest over a number of police abusing or killings of civilians without justification caught on witness's video, there appeared a trend of equipping police officers with body cameras.

Such body cameras, of course, are no substitute for witness videos since compromising videos in possession of the police can conveniently disappear or be redacted.

And, of course, body cameras can be conveniently shut off during an event they are supposed to record.  In fact, turning off body cameras when dealing with a situation where shooting was involved was reportedly an instruction of dispatchers to the police in Tennessee.

And, even if the footage is obtained from such body cameras, the public may be blocked from seeing it, as it happened, for example, in North Carolina where the State Legislature just approved a bill removing police body cam videos from public access, so the public cannot obtain footage of police body cams on open access request.

So, witness videos remain the most reliable information about police misconduct nowadays.

But, that may change in the near future, too, at least for users of iPhones - where Apple is introducing in the near future an app that would allow the police to disable the cameras of telephones.  Of course, then people may - and should - carry an additional device with software that cannot be disabled, a "conceal carry" camera.

Yet,  OUR government, taxpayer-supported government, must conduct its affairs in the open, and there is a presumption of access to government records in state open-access laws and, as of June 30, 2016, in federal law, too.

The government fights those efforts, with increasing vigor and viciousness, in a variety of ways.

In New York, methods employed were:

1. stalling responses to records;
2. inventing ways of making access to records too expensive, like insisting on releasing only paper copies - for payment only - when the request is for e-mailed scanned or printed-to-pdf copies of documents that can be produced for free;
3. sanctioning people who make FOIL requests (as I described above, my law license was suspended based on a sanction imposed by a judge, among other things, for making FOIL requests about financial disclosures of that same judge);
4. murder of those who obtain incriminating records through FOIL and then turn them into prosecuting authorities - see the case of Sunny Shue above.

In other states, quite recently, and in rapid succession, investigative journalists are being arrested for seeking access and coverage at public meetings and for making open records requests.

I will run separate blogs for stories about each arrest, but here is a brief summary:

No	State	Date of arrest	Names, professions of people arrested	Real reason for arrest;  criminal charges	Names, professions of people who sought the arrest
1	Louisiana	March 23, 2016	Reporter Chris Nakamoto	Reporting on the pay raise of the mayor of White Castle, Louisiana Trespass – in a City Hall	Sergeant Green of White Castle (LA) City Police, on behalf of the mayor #JermarrWilliams
2	Georgia	June 24, 2016	Mark Thomason, publisher; Russel Stookey, Mark Thomason’s attorney in a lawsuit seeking audio records of court proceedings, both white males	Identity fraud, attempted identity fraud – attorney filed supboenas for public records not signed by a judge. Seeking the records of court proceedings where a now-retired white judge Roger Bradley (a white male) reportedly used a racist slur against a criminal defendant, and seeking records that the attorney fees for stenographer who brought a $1.6 million counterclaim for defamation were financed out of court expense account of Judge Bradley	Chief Judge of Appalachian Circuit courts #BrendaWeaver; judge Weaver’s former law clerk #DistrictAttorneyAlisonSosebe, white females
3	Missouri	June 29, 2016	Chris Hayes	Disorderly conduct, failure to comply Reporter sought to cover a public meeting regarding uninsured and improperly registered police cars (registered to individuals and businesses, not the police) Reporter was arrested, criminally charged, handcuffed and chained to the holding bench	Town of Kinlock police captain

In addition to direct action by the government, in retaliation for seeking or using open court records such as:

1) law license suspension - that would be me in New York in 2015 and attorney Christine Mire of Louisiana in 2016;

2) arrests of reporters - Chris Nakamoto in Louisiana in March of 2016, Mark Thomeson in June of 2016, Chris Hayes in June of 2016,

there is also "indirect" retaliation:

• the murder of Sunny Shue in 2010 in New York;

• counter-claims for defamation by judge-inspired (and, likely, financed) court stenographers - in Georgia, against Mark Thomeson and in Louisiana, against attorney Chrisine Mire and her client;
• lawsuits for defamation - like the one pursued by a Nashville, Tennessee, #DistrictAttorneyGlennFunk against reporter Chris Phillips for coverage of his election campaign;

There are also instances of censure that I noted recently:

1. a couple of days ago Bill O'Reilly of "O'Reilly factor" noted that he would not invite a person as a guest into his studio if he would know ahead of time that the person is going to say certain bad things about a public official - indicating that Bill O'Reilly (and, possibly, other mainstream TV stations) censure the content of whoever is "invited" as a guest speaker;
2. State University of California, Davis reportedly used $175,000 in public money "to scrub the Internet of negative online postings following the November 2011 pepper-spraying of student protesters";
3. decisions in April of 2016 of government authorities in removing the documentary "Vaxxed" from  screening in New York and Texas film festivals questioning integrity of how safety and efficiency of vaccines are studied, tested and how vaccines are promoted by the pharmaceutical industries - removal of "Vaxxed" from the film festivals met with vigorous public protests
4. Huffington Post's removal of its long-time reporter Lance Simmens for reporting on issues of government corruption raised in "Vaxxed";
5. silence of the mainstream media as to the mass protests and mass arrests of protesters in Washington, D.C. demonstrating against government corruption, when 400 arrests were made, see also here.

All in all,  TWO vigorous trends appear to exist:

1) that the public increasingly need, want, and seek public records of governmental corruption;
2) that the government resists efforts of the public to ensure transparency of the government and fights back, directly and indirectly, through:

• stalling of release of records;
• legislative acts making certain most sought public records unavailable to the public - like laws regarding police misconduct in New York and North Carolina;
• making open records requests prohibitively expensive;
• retaliating against those seeking the records by
• criminal charges,
• loss of occupational licenses,
• multi-million defamation lawsuits,
• spoliation or destruction of evidence,
• blocking documentaries about government corruption from public airing at large events,
• censure in the mainstream media and
• firing investigative journalists who cover governmental corruptoin (Huffington post's Lance Simmens, see above).

I will not be surpised if Apple's interesting app to block videocameras on smartphones was produced at the request of the government - to block people from creating their own record of government misconduct, not believing that the government will do a good or honest job in doing the same.

I do not believe that what I described in this blog is anything new.

Government corruption existed for as long as any types of government existed.

Yet, instant reporting on such government corruption became available only with proliferation of the Internet and social media. 

Such reporting is absolutely necessary to keep our government clean and efficient, and to have at least a hope of a democracy alive.

This blog will certainly continue to report on corruption, and specifically on the corruption in the judiciary and among prosecutors, the most powerful branches of the government in the U.S. who retaliate in the worst ways and thus get most mainstream media sources intimidated.

Bloggers, social media reports and documentaries are now the main outlets for exposure of corruption in the government, especially judicial and prosecutorial corruption, and we must continue to do that if we do not want to sink into the dark ages.

If robots are already used to resolve disputes, why not humans of litigants' choice?

If the Ebay customers resolve their disputes through an online dispute-resolution website, that's ok.

If the same people engage a human to help them resolve the dispute or advise about it, that would be a crime of unauthorized practice of law.

Now, if robots are allowed to practice law, why not humans, ALL humans, without license restrictions? 

Even though it is now recognized that regulation of the legal profession drives prices for legal services out of reach for most customers, and not only in the U.S., to the point that in Holland people are now allowed to be advised in divorces by robots - which improves access to justice.

Isn't it silly, not to mention unfair to those who are in need of advice and assistance with access to courts that robots are allowed to improve access to justice, but unlicensed individuals of people's choice are not?

Ins't it silly not to allow unlicensed humans to do what unlicensed robots are already doing - in the U.S., too?

It is the beginning of the robot v human discrimination, isn't it?

I wonder who will be the first human who will file such a lawsuit, to invalidate unauthorized practice of law (UPL) statutes on grounds that UPL is allowed to robots.

The U.S. Supreme Court reduces the 4th of July to a joke while the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit tries to take the dignity of the U.S. Constitution back - a little bit, somewhat

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8 provides for a "claim-pleading", not factual pleading.

In fact, factual pleadings were, since long ago, deemed implausible, because such rules require people to plead enough facts to survive the lawsuit before discovery, and often under the circumstances when the proof is within exclusive possession of the defendants.

That is even more true when the parity of power between the plaintiffs and the defendants is squarely with the defendants, when the defendants are the government and the plaintiffs are lay individuals.

Yet, the U.S. Supreme Court chose to actually re-create the factual pleadings, FRCP 8 be damned, in two cases: 

1) Bell Atlantic Corp. v Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), and
2) Aschcroft v Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009),

prompting a cartoonist to describe civil rights cases dismissed because they did not satisfy the court-invented factual pleading amendment to the FRCP 8 and FRCP 9 as "twomblied in the iqbals".

After these two cases, the majority of civil rights cases are dismissed, and only a very small fraction of civil rights cases reach beyond discovery and to trial.  The courts, this way, obtained a result, reduction of their overloaded docket - but at the sake of fairness and with the help of violating the law and blocking real victims of constitutional violations from having any remedy for those violations against the government perpetrators.

In Bell Atlantic Corp. v Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), see description of the case also here, the court changed a decades-old rule, which was in compliance with FRCP 8, the claim-pleading standard, that a civil (and a civil rights) case in federal court will not be dismissed unless there may be NO set of facts under which the claim could be valid - a difficult standard for the defendants to meet before discovery, and the intention of FRCP 8 to adjudicate claims on the merits and not on pleadings.

Twombly was an antitrust case alleging anti-competitive behavior of telecommunications companies.

The court in Twombly indicated that certain pled facts, while being admissible circumstantial evidence of a conspiracy, are not enough, per se, to carry the claim of violation of the antitrust, Sherman Act.

In other words, the U.S. Supreme Court usurped the function of the jury, in violation of hte 7th Amendment, and claimed that a civil rights plaintiff must plead enough admissible facts for a jury to find for the Plaintiff, at the outset of the case and before discovery, including discovery of evidence in exclusive possession of the defendants,

When Twombly was decided, legal scholars already said that it rendered a motion to dismiss unconstitutional.

In Aschcroft v Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009), see description of the case also here, the U.S. Supreme Court has added insult to injury and allowed judges to consider their own experience and

Aschcroft v Iqbal was a politically charged case where the U.S. Supreme Court held that governmental officials cannot be charged for failure to supervise their subordinates engaging in racial and religious discrimination of suspects detained after September 11, 2001 attacks.

The court in Iqbal dismissed the case for conspiracy among governmental officials, defendants in the action, to engage in a conspiracy to discriminate because the plaintiffs could not provide facts in the pleadings that would allow the court to "draw inferences" of such discrimination. 

Since a federal court would not draw inferences against the government until proof of conspiracy is provided, and proof cannot be provided until discovery, and even then, the evidence may be circumstantial and subject to a jury determination whether, on such facts, conspiracy should be found, after Iqbal, no conspiracy can be proven until plaintiffs, using their limited or, often, non-existent resources, wrangle from the government some kind of a confession of a conspiracy to violate their constitutiona rights - which, as any reasonable person would understand, is an unrealistic possibility.

Moreover, FRCP 9(b) specifically states that it does not require to show meetings of the mind at the pleading stage:

"[m]alice, intent, knowledge, and other conditions of a person's mind may be alleged generally".

Yet, the court in Iqbal, and federal courts throughout the country after Iqbal universally violate this rule in civil rights actions by demanding that the civil rights plaintiffs put into pleadings facts showing "malice, intent, knowledge, and other conditions of the mind" of governmental defendants.

In Iqbal, the U.S. Supreme Court also allowed judges to become unsworn witnesses, and thus, advocates in the proceedings on behalf of defendants by allowing judges, in considering a motion to dismiss a case, to draw and rely upon the judge's own experiences (unknown to the plaintiffs).

It is irrefutable that Iqbal and Twombly was protective of the government and was aiming to undermine, and did effectively undermine, the civil rights litigation based on existing statutes and rules.

The U.S. Supreme Court in Iqbal and Twombly acted like a crook helping crooks - let's call a spade a spade - in telling the injured victims of constitutional violations:  "haha, you cannot prove it - because we hold the evidence you need that you can get only through discovery? - tough, case tossed before discovery because you cannot prove it".

After Iqbal,  some practicing attorneys cautiously stated that while the pleading rules did not change (only technically, FRCP 8 and 9 did not change), "the game" changed:

But, practicing attorneys, in their dual rope-balancing act of pleasing the court while advertising their knowledge to gain more paying clients, sometimes do not pay attention how crass their comments may be.

The author of the above quoted article, Robert L. Rothman, an attorney from Georgia, didn't notice, apparently, when putting his "game changing" comment in the very first, "catch", paragraph, of his article, that equating adjudication of human rights violations with a "game" being played is (1) inappropiate, and (2) revealing - because that is EXACTLY what the government, and the courts turned the promise given to people in the Civil Rights Act, of providing a remedy for constitutional violations: and that is a game, and a rigged game.

Let's note that in both cases, Twombly and Iqbal, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the action based on a new "rule" that it JUST CREATED, which means - when the plaintiffs were pleading their case, those new rules did not exist, and the plaintiffs, or their attorneys, did not have notice of those rules.

And, of course, such a drastic change of rules as occurred in Iqbal and Twombly, severely restricting civil rights plaintiffs' access to court, guaranteed by the 1st Amendment, and barring victims of unconstitutional conduct by government officials to have effective legal remedies for their injuries, is a matter of POLICY, of LEGISLATIVE POLICY, which is NOT within the Article III authority of federal courts to adjudicate, but is within the EXCLUSIVE authority of the U.S. Congress to deal with.

The U.S. Supreme Court cannot change rules by interpretation, it has no such authority under Article III of the U.S. Constitution which describes authority of federal courts.

Yet, the U.S. Supreme Court treated Twombly, its own interpretation of Rule 8, and an ultra vires interpretation, unlawfully changing the Rule, and not the original text of Rule 8, as controlling itself in deciding Iqbal,  a further amendment through interpretation of Rule 8.

Consider the possibilities of this game-rigging strategy.

You have a rule you do not want to comply with.

You know that the highest court of the country acts mostly like a political body, picking and choosing cases for its limited docket only when it wants to either issue some sensationalized case and garner some political capital for further perks, speeches, trips and books from the legal establishment, or to help the government escape liability under existing statutes.

With that in mind, you pitch at that body a catch they cannot miss, so they take the case and decide it your way (for how much in bribes I can only imagine - what?  U.S. Supreme Court judges were never caught in conflicts of interest?  They did not just decide U.S. v McDonnell, practically legitimizing and thus encouraging the bribing of government officials in the United States?).

You have a rule.

You rig the rule once.

The next time you are requested to rig the rule, in reviewing of the rule, you use in rigging the rule not the text of the rule itself, but your previous - rigged - interpretation of that rule, to rig it further.

That's the logic of Rule 8 and 9 turned into civil rights lawsuits "twomblied in the iqbals" en masse.

Legal scholars were not as forgiving to the change of rules as practicing attorneys whose livelihood depends on "may we please the court", no matter what kind of misconduct the court may be committing on the attorneys' watch.  (The best example of that cowardly behavior is the Kids for Cash scandal in Pennsylvania where a judge was selling kids for money into juvenile detention facilities FOR YEARS, while many attorneys knew about it, but kept mum, and that starts from the prosecutor or prosecutors of such cases who KNEW that juveniles' rights were violated and built their careers on it.)

After Iqbal, U.S. Senator Arlen Specter from Pennsylvania introduced a "Notice Pleading Restoration Act", but, Senator Specter was voted out of office in 2011 (when he was already critically ill with cancer), and the bill was not enacted.  Senator Specter, who tried to make a difference for us all and to restore to Americans their right to a jury trial in civil rights cases, guaranteed by the 7th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, died in 2012.

Senator Specter's memory should be honored this coming July 4, 2016 for what he was trying to do for all of us.

While attorneys matter-of-factly claimed "game change", and Senator Specter introduced a bill to kill the Twombly/Iqbal rigging of the 7th Amendment, legal scholars squarely called Iqbal (which was based on Twombly) unconstitutional.

So, before rigging Rule 8 and Rule 9, the U.S. Supreme Court and lower federal courts - sworn to uphold the U.S. Constitution, and every provision and Amendment to it - actually rigged the 7th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, claiming that the way to interpret it is

• to pin constitutional rights of present-day U.S. citizens to a jury trial in federal court,
• guaranteed to people in the U.S. by the U.S. Constitution, the 7th Amendment that was ratified in 1791, 15 years AFTER the U.S. was created as a country separate and distinct from the British monarchy with which Americans went to war and laid down their lives to gain their country's independence
• to how the right to a jury trial was understood in that monarchy, England, in 1791.

There was no logic or LEGALITY in that "historic test", but, with the help of that "test", the right of Americans, under their own U.S. Constitution, to the jury trial in civil rights cases was rigged - and is continued to be rigged every day by courts applywing Twombly and Iqbal, which cuts off the 7th Amendment right to a jury trial allowing judges to make factual considerations, drawing on judges' own experience and "common sense" - as judges understand it.

So, while we are about to celebrate the 240th anniversary of this country's Declaration of Independence from Britain, the absolute monarchy AND FROM ITS LAWS, our celebration is rigged and dampened by our own courts, starting with the top one, the U.S. Supreme Court, because those same laws that we as a country claimed independence from in a war where many of Americans laid down their lives to achieve that independence, are jammed right down our throats through various "historic tests" - like the one described above - which restrict our constitutional rights based on the death grip of ancient British common law, the very common law that people fled from to America in the first place.

That's why I perceived the news that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit recently overturned a case where a judge, following the U.S. Supreme Court encouragement and directive in the Iqbal case to draw upon the judge's "experience", actually googled the case and based his determination of dismissal of an excessive-force civil rights lawsuit against the police upon newspaper articles.

I obtained the docket of the case from the lower court, and it is a saga of retaliation of Senior U.S. District Court Judge Milton I. Shadur against pro se injured (and now incarcerated) plaintiff Joseph Felton that I will describe in a separate blog.

For now - Joseph Felton won his appeal, and I hope he will be given a new judge on remand, because, judging from the docket, Judge Milton I. Shadur, date of birth June 25, 1924 who just turned 92 of age, has no energy to handle this case properly and is unable to treat Joseph Felton fairly.

By the way, in 2010 the same 7th Circuit reversed and remanded a too-lenient conviction by Judge Shadur of a politician convicted of corruption, to another judge.  The defendant was Edward Vrydolyak, date of birth December 28, 1937, a white male and a powerful Cook County official in Chicago.

This is Vrydolyak advocate judge Shadur:

I wonder if the two are relatives - looks like it by the facial features,  but what is beyond dispute is that both of them are old white powerful males, and one supports the other, in violation of his duties and the law.

In 2015, the wonderful white man Edward Vrydolyak, who was given an extremely - and inappropriately - lenient treatment by Judge Shadur that led to the reversal of 2010, was at the center of a federal tax-evasion indictment.

And, of course, you do not have to ask what race plaintiff Joseph Felton is.

Here is his picture.

From his decisions and conduct in Felton's lawsuit, Judge Shadur appears to be an elderly white racist thinking that injuries inflicted by the police upon a black man should not be chargeable in civil rights litigation per se - looks like, doesn't it?

Judge Shadur also recused from the lawsuit of Michael Jordan, a black litigant, and a famous black litigant, in June 2014, and retaliated against Michael Jordan's attorney who claimed bias.

That happened 2 months after Judge Shadur dismissed pro se black civil rights plaintiffs Joseph Fenton's lawsuit, 4 days after it was filed and before it was even served:

Note what the judge said in Docket 5, date September 8, 2014:

"It is frankly an affront to the judicial system for Felton to attempt, like alchemists of the Middle Ages, to transmute base metal into gold.  Section 1915A(b)(1) amply justifies the dismissal of both Felton's Complaint and his action as frivolous, and this Court so orders."

No service on defendants.

No discovery.

No jury.

Just Judge Shadur acting as the replacement of judicial process and who mocked the injured plaintiff and tossed his claim of excessive police force that, the plaintiff claimed, caused his injuries.  So, to toss the complaint, Judge Shadur had to also decide the issue of causation, without a medical expert, discovery or jury.

Judge Shadur undoubtedly acted here as an advocate for government defendants and mocked the civil rights plaintiff.

That behavior was noted by the 7th Circuit in another case when in November of 2014, the same year, the 7th Circuit reversed a sex-bias case decided by Judge Shadur, also because of bias, here is the full opinion.

The federal court specifically noted the "unmistakable (and to [the court] incomprehensible) tone of derision that pervades [Judge Shadur's] opinion"

Yet, after all of that, Judge Shadur was still allowed to stay on the bench and continue, same as another 92-year old federal judge who had multiple reversals, Manuel T. Real of a U.S. District of California and who remains on the bench despite an astounding number of reversals indicating, same as with Judge Milton Shadur, senility, and thus disability and incompetence and unfitness for the bench.

As to the  detailed story of how white Judge Shadur tossed black civil rights plaintiff Joseph Felton's excessive force case and what misconduct Judge Shadur engaged in to discriminate against Joseph Felton after the dismissal, interfere with his right to appeal and punish him for appealing the dismissal, stay tuned.

This coming weekend is the 4th of July weekend.

Our rights that the 4th of July celebrates, for the 240th time, are obtained by many Americans who gave their lives for us to have those rights.

Let's not allow our errant government officials to take those rights away.

What the 7th Circuit did in overturning Judge Shadur - again - is one step in the right direction to restore one of our major rights taken away by federal courts through Iqbal and Twombly and similar decisions.

The 7th Circuit reversed Judge Shadur for what Iqbal and Twombly allowed - for drawing upon the judge's own experience, however obtained (here, Judge Shadur obtained his extrajudicial experience by reading newspaper accounts of the chase of plaintiff Fenton).

We need to put pressure on the U.S. Congress to restore our rights under the 7th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution for a jury trial in civil rights litigation.

For a separate blog about Judge Shadur's discrimination against black pro se civil rights plaintiff Joseph Felton,  stay tuned.

You criticize a judge? Here's the new law for you: 28 ex parte communications and counting

I continue to report about misconduct of federal judge Norman Mordue and former Magistrate David Peebles (whose term expired on May 16, 2016, but he continues to pretend he is a judge).

On May 13, 2016 I filed a motion to recuse Judge Mordue and David Peebles citing numerous ex parte communications of the court with the parties and counsel about pending motions regarding my right to legal fees for 3.5 years of representation in that civil rights lawsuit (which settled, based on my work, but without paying me, on June 17, 2016).

Plaintiffs new attorney, the delightfully ... disingenuous Woodruff Carroll filed an affidavit with the court on May 31, 2016 (Docket No. 151) where he claimed, under oath, two diametrically opposite things:

1) that the court discussed multiple issues (Mr. Carroll dutifully listed those) at an ex parte in person hearing for which I received no notice; but

2) that there was no ex parte communications and those issues - from a still pending motion that I filed on May 13, 2016 (Docket No. 112) are "resolved" at the hearing.

The transcript of that hearing was then sealed, Docket 144, and the court proceeded happily to engage in more ex parte communications with parties and counsel.

I actually undertook to count the number of times when Judge Norman Mordue and David Peebles engaged in ex parte communications regarding my rights and pending motions.

28.

28 times.

11 ex parte communications before I filed a motion to recuse BECAUSE of ex parte communications and 17 ex parte communications after I filed that motion to recuse.  And the issue whether there were ex parte communications was "resolved", according to attorney Woodruff Carroll, on June 3, 2016, at yet another ex parte communication.

• Ex parte letter motions.
• Ex parte orders.
• The docket shows even an ex parte motion for an anti-filing injunction, to prohibit me to file anything without court's permission - filed by attorney Erin Donnelly of Levene, Gouldin and Thompson of Binghamton, NY, I guess, LGT trains its associates to file motions like that ex parte;
• Ex parte telephone conferences.
• Three ex parte in-person meetings, in January, February and June of 2016.

The transcript of the last hearing where, as attorney Carroll admitted in an affidavit under oath, issues from my pending Rule 60 motion and motion to recuse were discussed, was sealed, so I was not allowed to see what was discussed about my motion behind closed doors.

I was not given notice of any of that.

Go figure, it appears that the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York has a new rule - ex parte communications are now not only legitimate, but fashionable.

Mr. Carroll also filed a Memorandum of Law with the court where he claimed about 10 times that all my claims of case-fixing and ex parte communications are "crackpot", that's Mr. Carroll's new legal term for "irrefutable documentary evidence of judicial and attorney misconduct".

Of course, when somebody discusses motions against you in an ex parte manner

Apparently, I must accept that laws do not apply to me - because, as Mr. Carroll claimed, I was suspended from the practice of law for suing public officials.  That interesting suggestion never appeared in my disciplinary proceedings, or my order of suspension, so it would be interesting to depose Mr. Carroll about his sources of information.

In fact, I argued to the disciplinary court that my disciplinary proceedings are politically motivated.

Now Mr. Carroll, after some ex parte communications with Judge Mordue (who I sued) and David Peebles (who I also sued) reports to me in a Memorandum of Law (Docket 151-1) that the real reason of my suspension, which is not reflected in the record, is because I sued public officials (including, I understand, David Peebles).

And that my motion to recuse - for ex parte communications documented in the record - are "crackpot", and that I have an ability to "turn a traffic ticket into a felony" for myself.

In other words - why did you, stupid Mrs. Neroni insist on the rule of law? 

By the way, Mr. Carroll actually calls me "Tatiana", that's the only person, other than his nearly-70 year old client Dara Argro who he calls by their first names in pleadings, others he knows to address respectfully.  And, by the way, I did not permit Mr. Carroll to call me by my first name, we never met, never talked on the phone, and the only time I want to meet Mr. Carroll is in court when I will sue him for fraud and fraud upon the court. 

What transpires from Mr. Carroll's delightfully disingenuous Memorandum of Law (Docket 151-1) is, had I not engaged in professional activity as a civil rights attorney, I would have had my law license and livelihood intact.

Huh?

Isn't Mr. Carroll a civil rights attorney himself - at least, he pretends to be that?

Isn't Mr. Carroll supposed to question the government's motives on behalf of his clients?

Now, Mr. Carroll thinks that had I bent over, had you not insist on your stupid rule of law, Mrs. Neroni, you would have been hunky-dory now, just like him.

By the way, Mr. Carroll had the audacity to claim that I did not practice law for a long time - in a case which I litigated for 3.5 years, through several motions to dismiss and summary judgment, and brought to trial, in a case where Mr. Carroll enriched himself using the fruits of my labor, but tries to block me from being paid - at all, and claiming that my former clients have a "vested interest" IN MY SUSPENSION and will be PREJUDICED if my suspension is reversed.

Figure.

Since you do not want to accept that judges are gods and can do anything on a whim, Mrs. Neroni, since you tried to do SOMETHING to have rampant and pervasive judicial misconduct controlled at least somehow - here are 28 ex parte communications by judges you sued about your rights, Mrs. Neroni, it's the new law for you.

Enjoy.

The problem is though, that if such judicial misconduct is happening towards me, a vocal and well trained legal expert, what is happening with pro se parties?

Just imagine.

And the cashflow just got better - the U.S. v McDonnell SCOTUS case

On May 20, 2016 I ran a blog about the expected decision against Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell.

I said then, as I am saying now, that what the court was deciding was (1) a non-issue, but, since the court actually chose to decide that case, out of all cases, (2) it is very important to judges, personally.

The court was supposed to decide whether a mere quid pro quo is really corruption.

Appears like Governor McDonnell got a mint from a friend and cannot be blamed for it.

But, the "mint" was actually $175,000 in donations from a businessman for whom Governor McDonnell organized meetings and thus opened doors that would otherwise have remained closed.

And, lo and behold, the U.S. Supreme Court legitimized such "donations" to public officials in exchange for favors, as of today - that is amendment and annihilation of an anti-corruption federal statute through interpretation.

So, arranging for favorable treatment by public officials who are subordinates of the public official who is paid money to do the phone call, is not punishable as corruption.

YAHOO!!!!

As the court decision unrolled, I can envision lines forming of those who want to open the doors into offices of public officials, including U.S. Supreme Court judges, with their feet - because their hands are too busy holding gifts for favors, big and small, like the decision in Governor McDonnell's case.

That's how they did business from time immemorial.

But, at least, in time immemorial they did not have a Constitution and they did not have a court that spits on that Constitution by arranging for cash flow to continue an increase to corrupt public officials
at the time when America's economy is not at its best and when average Americans are financially struggling.

Or, maybe, it is because the economy is not at its best that the U.S. Supreme Court arranged for a sure channel of income for public officials.

So, now even if you catch a public official "arranging" a favor for a "benefactor", even for money, that will be "not unlawful" under U.S. v McDonnell.

Of course, to any reasonable person who is not a governmental official, that is a non-question.  Corruption is not just passing money from hand to hand, but passing "pleasantries", tangible and intangible benefits and favors.

So, as of today, Scalia's hunting trips would be legit.

I understand, corruption is so vast in this country that the U.S. Supreme Court got concerned that too many important hosters of hunting trips can be swept in, and all the freebies will be gone.

Of course, the U.S. Supreme Court does not have authority to LEGISLATE and to CHANGE a statute by interpretation.

And, of course, the U.S. Congress has the power to act and AMEND the Hobbs Act defining the punishable act to include what the type of favor that McDonnell did.

Whether the U.S. Congress will do that though, is a question.

After all, under U.S. v McDonnell, U.S. Congressmen may be paid LARGE amounts of money for NOT engaging in an official act of legislating - and that will not be corruption, according to the U.S. Supreme Court.

So - why bother?