What is in common between lawyers not reporting judicial misconduct and social workers improperly taking away children?

I have written a lot on this blog about the one-sided enforcement of contradictory disciplinary rules against lawyers, where, at the same time, lawyers are:

• required to report judicial misconduct, but
• prohibited to "impugn" (make "false" statements) about integrity and competence of judges (and all statements of lawyers about competence and integrity of judges are considered false by disciplinary panels where the absolute majority of members depend on the same judiciary for success of their businesses and their well-being, even with evidence proving that the statements are true, not to mention that such rules against criticism of judges is unconstitutional).

So, when lawyers are required, at the same time, to do diametrically opposite things, and when lawyers know that they will not be disciplined for NOT reporting judicial misconduct, but that they will lose their licenses and livelihood (for a lifetime) for reporting it, as happened in numerous cases, and continues to happen across the country, lawyers, naturally, keep silent about judicial misconduct - and that silence misinforms the public, the voters, members of the popular sovereign

("The words "people of the United States" and "citizens" are synonymous terms, and mean the same thing. They both describe the political body who, according to our republican institutions, form the sovereignty and who hold the power and conduct the Government through their representatives. - Scott v Sanford, 60 U.S. 393 (1856))

about the actual state of affairs in the judicial system.

That silence in the face of apparent judicial misconduct is also, more than anything else, undermines public trust in the integrity of both the judiciary that persecutes its own critics, and in the integrity of lawyers who would rather sell out their clients and fail to fulfil their contractual and constitutional duty to secure their clients' true access to court and their right to impartial judicial review than risk losing their own livelihoods.

In Pennsylvania, for example, lack of such reporting of judicial corruption in the court system of Luzerne County resulted in the "Kids for Cash" scandal where children suffered, the feds had to ultimately step in and have two judges criminally charged, convicted and incarcerated - but lawyers still kept silent, because Pennsylvania judiciary still continued to punish lawyers for criticism of judges.

After the Kids for Cash scandal, Pennsylvania did not revamp their attitude about holding judges accountable for their misconduct, and intimidation of witnesses of judicial misconduct, attorneys, continued - several lawyers were sanctioned for criticism or investigation of judicial corruption:

• Pennsylvania AG Kathleen Kane (suspended, criminally charged, convicted through a fabricated trial violating all possible rules, and disbarred);
• attorney Andrew Ostrowski - for criticizing judges, running a radio show "Justice Served with Andy Ostrowski" where attorneys disciplined for criticism of judges came and explained to the public what is happening, and for running for Congress on the platform of judicial reform;
• most recently, end of last month - attorney Joseph R. Reisinger was disbarred for criticizing in pleadings and lawsuits, and filing criminal complaints with state and federal prosecutors against judicial corruption in the same Luzerne County from where two judges were already taken by the feds in shackles, for judicial corruption.

A comparable double standard was revealed recently in another area of grave public concern: unnecessary taking children away by social services.

While it is obvious that taking a child away brings trauma both to the child, and to the family, and constitutes a waste of public resources, the reasons why social services try to err on the side of taking the child are usually not revealed, and social services are claiming that all takings of the children are appropriate.

Of course, social services are not revealing monetary interests (eligibility for federal funding for foster care and adoption out of foster care) that drives removal of children.

In June of 2016, in the same blessed state of Pennsylvania, in the City of Philadelphia, where public hearings were held as to why children were taken away from parents at inordinately high rates, at least some of the truth started to seep out when Vanessa Fields, vice president of District Council 47 of the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees said the following:

So, lawyers, in order not to be disciplined, do not report judicial misconduct and corruption, letting judges do whatever they want until, in some (but far from all) cases the feds step in and criminally charge judges in most egregious (or most publicized) cases of corruption.

Of course, unspeakable damage is done to individual people and the public by that time.

Similarly, social services, fearing discipline for NOT taking the child away "if anything goes wrong", but not fearing discipline for taking the child away unlawfully, disrupting the family and traumatizing the child and the parents (and violating constitutional rights of both), do the "default thing", and the "default thing" is - according to the confession of the vice-president of labor union of social workers, to take the child away, so the social worker's back is covered.

And, similarly, unspeakable damage is done to individual people and the public because of this fear of discipline for one thing, but not another.

So, attorneys and social workers, fearing professional discipline through regulation that is supposed to protect the public, are jeopardizing the public.

Unfortunately, both tendencies will continue for a long time until:

1. regulation of lawyers by the government (and especially by the judiciary that invents rules to protect itself from criticism of lawyers, most knowledgeable and credible witnesses of their misconduct) is either discontinued altogether, or relegated to a public body that has no connections whatsoever to the legal system; and until
2. all financial incentives to take children away are removed from social services, and courts are prohibited to grant social services "immunity" for taking away children when it was done unlawfully - which is what protects them from discipline for such takings at this time.

On polite lawyers cheating their clients out of their constitutional rights - and a great job for an indigent client by an assigned attorney, Ariel Podolsky Schneller

An interesting decision came out of Queens County (NY) criminal court - dismissing a criminal case because People's statement of readiness for trial was "illusory" under New York statutory speedy trial law, Criminal Procedure Law 30.30.

In New York, prosecutors must announce readiness for trial on record within 90 days for a misdemeanor charge or within 6 months for a felony charge.  In this case, it was a misdemeanor charge.

The prosecution did announce readiness for trial early on, but then were not actually ready for trial and asked for adjournments on multiple occasions.

The case is very informative for criminal defendants because it contains a detailed and painstaking calculation by the judge of which adjournments were counted against the People, which are not, and why.

Defense attorney's good work in this case for their indigent client must be noted - as the judge did mention that, as in any other case, the defense attorney was busy on certain occasions with other cases, and asked for adjournments, but did not "agree" to adjournments requested by the People, otherwise such adjournments would not have been counted to the People.

It was a young defense attorney Ariel Schneller, a recent Harvard Law graduate, who should be commended for doing an excellent job for the indigent client in this case.

Usually, attorneys are "polite", "civil", "civilized", agree to adjournments of prosecution "out of professional courtesy" (that's what I have been told, formerly, by prospective clients and now by readers, about their prior attorneys again, and again, and again), while clients do not realize that their rights for a speedy trial (and for a dismissal for violation of the speedy trial statute, such as happened in this case) are given away by the "polite" and "courteous" attorney.

So, whenever a criminal defense attorney in New York agrees, "as a matter of professional courtesy", to adjournments by the prosecution, such a defense attorney is selling out their client's right to a dismissal on state statutory speedy trial grounds.

This is a very rare case.  Usually, judges bend over backwards to deny motions deeming prosecution's statement of readiness for trial illusory. 

Good job, once again - attorney Ariel Podolsky Schneller.

On secretly demented judges. While sealing civil rights cases is unconstitutional, it is done when judicial reputation is at stake - as it was done in federal court in Louisiana when magistrate judge Kathleen Kay sued U.S. District Judge Patricia Minaldi claiming Judge Minaldi's mental incapacity

I've just recently run a blog about 91-year-old federal judge Edwin Kosik from Pennsylvania who was taken off cases under a fake reasoning that he was recovering from bones fractured in a fall in his house, while in reality he was taking medication for memory loss, was likely demented, and the truth came out only when he left home in a car, drove on the highway, potentially jeopardizing other travelers, and was located, after a full police and U.S. Marshall search, only after a day of search, in a remote wooded area of Pennsylvania.

Now, it has been reported that yet another potentially mentally unstable federal judge, U.S. District Judge Patricia Minaldi (in Louisiana), the one who was charged with a DWI in 2014, was abruptly pulled off her cases, and a lawsuit was filed against her reportedly challenging her mental incapacity - while the lawsuit is sealed, and the docket about her does not appear on Pacer.gov:

In December of 2016, on the 6th year anniversary of impeachment of another federal judge in Louisiana, Judge Thomas Porteous, for taking bribes, Judge Minaldi was reportedly taken off all of her cases.

A point of impeachment for a judge is intoxication on the bench, other judges have been removed on these grounds, and I've personally seen at least one judge, at that time Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York who looked visibly intoxicated to me.

It was reported first that a criminal case was removed from Judge Minaldi when she made "a series of procedural errors", including "assigning some of her duties to a prosecuting attorney".

Well, that's what I personally saw a New York town justice (and an attorney) do, numerous times, in open court, as a matter of usual way that particular judge "did business" -  assigning his duty to conduct allocution and obtain waiver of the defendant's rights.  By the way, the prosecutor whose office was routinely teaming up with the judge to do the judge's duty in that court, and whose misconduct I addressed in a motion to disqualify in 2014 in that same court, was not only not disciplined, but was elevated since then to the position of New York Chief Judge, and punished me from that side by presiding on my appeals and deciding them against me.

So, everybody is looking the other way, commending a judge for the brilliant jurist that he or she is - until something happens that does not allow the court to look the other way any more.

In Judge Rinaldi's case, it is not even the arrest and conviction for drunk driving - it is starting to act bizarre in court cases, which, I understand, was described in detail in the now hidden lawsuit in the hidden docket. 

Attorneys reported (anonymously, I presume, as they were afraid to lose their licenses and livelihoods) that Judge Minaldi has been appearing drunk on the bench, handling cases, for some time, and that at least one case has been removed from her to another court because of it.

In December, 2017 an anonymous attorney appearing in front of Judge Minaldi was quoted as saying:

So, when your judge is drunk on the job, an impeachable offense, it is "unfortunate" for an attorney who must, as part of his or her professional duties, REPORT that.

And, apparently, the judge was doing that before, then stopped, then started it again - and the court system must have known what was going on, but covered it up to prevent massive reversals of the judge's cases - same as in the case of Pennsylvania demented federal judge Edwin Kosik, same as in the case of allegedly mentally unstable former New York Chief Judge Sol Watchler convicted for a federal felony of stalking and intimidating a woman and her minor child.

Already on December 9, 2016 a question was asked, in comments to a media article about Judge Minaldi's "situation" about negligence of the Chief Judge of that federal court in allowing Judge Minaldi to preside over cases at all:

At the end of December, 2016, reportedly, 27 cases were transferred from Judge Minaldi to another judge, and that happened after a trial "ended abruptly" before picking a jury.

Moreover, requests for transcripts regarding jury selection were denied to journalists - and I do not see any firestorm in the media from Washington Post or New York Times claiming their readers' right to know about potential misconduct or inability to perform by a federal judge.

The transcripts that were released to the press, allegedly, showed that Judge Minaldi skipped such basic requirements as even telling the jury that the burden of proof in a criminal case lies with the prosecution, not the defense.



At the end of January 2017, Judge Minaldi was put on medical leave for an unknown length of time, without giving the public the reason for the medical leave.



So, once again, we want to know, and are given information, whether President Trump is in good health while holding his finger on the big red nuclear button, but we are not given a right to know whether and for how long a federal judge was incapacitated - and, I do not see any litigants or their attorneys (afraid to be disbarred) to file lawsuits to get such information and seek to vacate Judge Minaldi's decisions.



Now we have a lawsuit filed by one judge (magistrate) against the other judge (District Judge) of the same court, in the same court, claiming mental instability of a judge, and that lawsuit is sealed from public view by that same court that neglected to remove that same judge from cases or tell the public until it was unable to conceal the problem any longer.



Of course, when just a month ago, existence of secret court dockets was discovered in Nassau County Courts, New York, the New York Office of Court Administration immediately claimed its embarrassment and investigation of such a practice, acknowledging that such a practice is unconstitutional.



And, not one, but two federal appellate courts agreeing on that issue, that secret court dockets are unconstitutional, were quoted: here are the decisions of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in U.S. v Valenti in 1993 and of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit in Hartford Courant Co. v. Pellegrino in 2004 ruling that hiding court dockets from the public is unconstitutional.



Of course, federal courts within the state of Louisiana report to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, but that does not mean that hiding court dockets from the public in federal court in Louisiana is ever less unconstitutional than it is within the jurisdiction of 2nd and 11th Circuits.



What is completely dishonorable as to the court that is already guilty of negligence, the court where all personnel can be subpoenaed as witnesses, did not recuse from hearing the case against Judge Minaldi - while it should be transferred out of that district court simply because the court that is also a witness in the case, the court whose officials are likely chargeable for screwing who knows how many cases, convictions and civil judgments by allowing a drunk and mentally unstable judge to decide those cases, cannot be allowed to preside over and decide these cases.



But, count on the "honorable" judges not to recuse when such recusal is absolutely required, and to hide the truth of its own negligence from the public, when hiding such truth is considered unconstitutional.



I will continue to follow reports about the lawsuit against Judge Minaldi.



Stay tuned.

Pennsylvania disbars yet another attorney, #JosephRReisinger, for criticizing judicial corruption and for filing criminal complaints against judges - in the Kids for Cash Luzerne County

Pennsylvania has quite a reputation - while it is, on the one hand, a state in-famous for its ongoing corruption and misconduct scandals of its judiciary and prosecutors, it is also equally in-famous for suspending, disbarring and denying reinstatement to attorneys criticizing judicial corruption in the state.

The latest victim of that trend is the 72-year-old attorney Joseph R. Reisinger who was not only disbarred for "excessive court filings" challenging court corruption (of course, anything challenging judicial corruption is "excessive" - from the point of view of challenged corrupt courts), but also made to pay costs of investigation and prosecution against him.

The order of disbarment - a disbarment "by default" - is short and does not provide any explanations for this drastic measure.

Here is the same decision, together with the "Report and Recommendations" upon which it relies.

Attorney Reisinger was not only a licensed attorney, but also holds a masters degree in taxation, and he has filed a civil rights action against the Luzerne County - the very County where Judge Marc Ciavarella happily kept sending kids to juvie prison in exchange for kickbacks, for years, with nobody in the County supposedly knowing that what the judge was doing was illegal.

Attorney Reisinger's fight with Luzerne County over forced sale of his 26 properties appears to have been a long one.

But, attorney Reisinger was not disbarred for suing the county, and, as it appears, not even for "making excessive filings with the court".

He was disbarred for the ultimate no-no, the so-called "career suicide" for any attorney - for suing judges and claiming judicial corruption in those lawsuits.

Here are some portions of the "Report and Recommendation" for disbarment of attorney Reisinger showing just that.

So, attorney Reisinger alleged, in lawsuits, in public pleadings, corruption of not just one judge (a big no-no), but of several judges acting in conspiracy, an even bigger no-no.

Judges whose alleged misconduct attorney Reisinger challenged in his lawsuits are:

1. the double-dipping #JudgeCharlesBrown - who was asked to recuse in a court case, but refused, and who attorney Reisinger claimed was unfit to sit in any court in the State of Pennsylvania judging by the quality of his performance;
2. #JudgeKennethBrown;
3. #AttorneyMichaelShucosky (Luzerne County Court administrator);
4. #JudgeMichaelTVough;
5. #AttorneyDanielPillets, law clerk to #judgeFredPieratoni;
6. #JudgeLesaSGelb;
7. #JudgeJohnBLeete.

Moreover, attorney Reisinger committed even more no-no's by suing a group of people, including his own disciplinary committee, for a conspiracy for fabricating disbarment charges against him:

And, of course, people who attorney Reisinger sued, of course, remained completely impartial throughout the investigation and impartially recommended his disbarment, which the Supreme Court of the State of Pennsylvania (the one that permitted judge Michael Eakin, before his retirement, and during pendency of the then-AG Kathleen Kane's investigation involving his misconduct personally, to be part of the panel suspending AG Kathleen Kane's law license) then no less impartially accepted and disbarred attorney Reisinger "by default".

Considering that the U.S. Supreme Court has declared attorney disciplinary proceedings quasi-criminal in nature, there can be no adjudication in attorney discipline "by default", but we are talking law, and here there was a necessity to quickly punish the arrogant heretic attorney who dared to engage in seditious libel against the King's Court, because that's exactly how these proceedings look like.

Attorney Reisinger even filed complaints to investigate the judges' allegedly criminal conduct with the Pennsylvania Attorney General's office Kathleen Kane in 2015.

It is interesting to know whether AG Kathleen Kane added attorney Reisinger's complaint to her investigation - because AG Kathleen Kane was herself suspended from the practice of law during the pendency of her investigation of the Porngate scandal where justices of the "investigating" and disciplining Pennsylvania Supreme Court were targets of investigation.

The Luzerne County Court administrator testified at the hearing against attorney Reisinger in the disciplinary proceedings and alleged that attorney Reisinger was doing something improper simply by filing civil rights actions against "judges, attorneys, counties and so forth":

So, in the court administrator's view, exercising constitutional rights enforceable through an act of Congress (Civil Rights Act) by an attorney is evidence of attorney misconduct.

It was held against attorney Reisinger that, predictably, expecting corrupt courts to resolve issues of judicial corruption against themselves proved futile:

The Court administrator then testified that judges are afraid to take attorney Reisinger's cases - possibly, because attorney Reisinger did not have "deference" to evidence of judicial incompetence, bias and corruption and called it as it is, and judges did not like exposure:

The court administrator (and defendant in lawsuits filed against him by attorney Reisinger, so he was a witness with a huge conflict of interest) also "credibly" (of course) testified that criminal complaints by attorney Reisinger were delivered on the day of hearings for judges, and that attorney Reisinger would then claim that judges are biased and disqualified from presiding over his hearings because of their criminal behavior.

And, of course, the big no-no was that attorney Reisinger has contacted the FBI - the feds who already had to judges out of Luzerne County convicted and sentenced to several decades in federal prison, after disciplinary authorities turned a blind eye on actions of those same judges, so the feds brought them away in shackles.

Given that history, it was reasonable for attorney Reisinger to expect that only federal criminal authorities could help him resolving issues that he saw as judicial criminal acts of corruption and conspiracy for corruption.


Of course, testimony of judges was regarded, by fellow judges and by licensed attorneys whose livelihood was in the hand of those judges, to be credible - and, of course, no jury trial is envisioned for attorney disciplinary proceedings in Pennsylvania, why, a jury may choose to acquit, and those targeted for discipline must hang, it is usually pre-decided before such disciplinary proceedings are even brought.

So, attorney Reisinger was hung for violation of this in-famous rule:

As I have stated in my blog article just two days ago,

• there is no such thing as false statements about competence (qualifications) or integrity of a judge, that
• competence or integrity are subjective, non-quantifiable, non-objectively-measurable, non-falsifiable opinions and not statements of fact, because
• binding U.S. Supreme Court precedents declared that there is no such thing as a false opinion,
• because attorney speech is protected as well as anybody else's, and attorney license may not be revoked as punishment for contents of attorney speech - as three (3) precedents of the U.S. Supreme Court prohibited withholding or taking away state benefits as punishment for exercising federal free speech rights;
• because there is a long string of U.S. Supreme Court cases that content-based regulation (criticism of judges) is subject to strict scrutiny, because engaging in lawful conduct (complaining about criminal acts to criminal authorities) may not be punished in any way other than for filing false criminal complaint - and that punishment must be meted out by a court of law after a jury trial.

The U.S. Supreme Court clearly stated, in several precedents, most recently on March 29, 2017, that content-based regulations of any speech, even of commercial speech, are unconstitutional.  Criticizing judges is political speech, entitled to the highest degree of protection under the 1st Amendment.

In June of 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Reed v Town of Gilbert that content-based regulation of speech is subject to strict scrutiny.

No such scrutiny was applied to speech of attorney Reisinger in the "Report and Recommendations".

On August 15, 2016 the disciplinary Board of the State of Pennsylvania has filed the following "recommendations":

So, since judges say they didn't do it - in a hearing where 72-year-old attorney Reisinger was not even present because he was incapacitated by the onslaught of disciplinary proceedings against him, following what he says happened to his properties and what happened to him in court when judges "did not conspire" (of course) to fix his cases, but the disciplinary authorities obviously refused to give him adjournments, which is required under the Americans with Disabilities Act under the circumstances - and since attorney Reisinger had a "penchant" of filing criminal complaints against judges, and since filing lawsuits and complaints against judges is an equivalent of frivolous conduct (unless the feds grab and lock up those judges for corruption in that same Luzerne County, as it happened before) - attorney Reisinger is, of course, to blame.

That's what the disciplinary board said, without any application of strict scrutiny in this clear content-based speech regulation case (and thus disregarding binding precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court).

So, the U.S. Supreme Court said in June of 2015 - no content-based regulation of speech without strict scrutiny.

The disciplinary board asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in August of 2016 - disbar attorney Reisinger for his criticism and criminal complaints against judges (for contents of his speech) without any strict scrutiny, and without even giving him an opportunity to recover so that he would be able to fully participate in hearings seeking to take his livelihood.

On March 22, 2017 the Pennsylvania Supreme Court regulated speech based on its content by denying reinstatement to civil rights attorney Andrew Ostrowski for, among other things, engaging in "advocacy" through his organization called "Pennsylvania Civil Rights Network" and, implicitly, for running for Congress on the platform of judicial reform.

The U.S. Supreme Court said again on March 29, 2017 - content-based regulation of speech violates the 1st Amendment.

2 days later, on March 31, 2017, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court disbarred attorney Reisinger, without stating its reasoning, fully accepting reasoning in the "Report and Recommendation" of the disciplinary board - which clearly violated the 1st Amendment and a string of U.S. Supreme Court precedents on content-based regulation of speech.

And, this whole circuit of self-protection by judges is presented to the public as protection of the public.

From whom?

From knowledgeable and vocal critics of corrupt courts?

Is it the same court that ruled back in 1880, this:

“No class of the community ought to be allowed freer scope in the expression or publication of opinions as to the capacity, impartiality or integrity of judges than members of the bar. They have the best opportunities of observing and forming a correct judgment. They are in constant attendance on the courts. Hundreds of those who are called on to vote never enter a court-house, or if they do, it is only at intervals as jurors, witnesses or parties. To say that an attorney can only act or speak on this subject under liability to be called to account and to be deprived of his profession and livelihood by the very judge or judges whom he may consider it his duty to attack and expose, is a position too monstrous to be entertained for a moment under our present system,” Justice Sharwood in Ex Parte Steinman and Hensel, 95 Pa 220, 238-39 (1880).

I guess, democracy in Pennsylvania has regressed dramatically from 1880.

Williams v Pennsylvania, "officer of the court" status and invalidation of ALL criminal convictions in the United States

In 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court, through Williams v Pennsylvania, said that a judge cannot be at the same time an "accuser" and an "adjudicator".

So, judge and prosecutor cannot be ONE.

In other words, judge cannot be prosecutor, and prosecutor cannot be judge (part of adjudicating court).

But, every prosecutor is a sworn "officer of the court".

And, attorney disciplinary prosecutors are also deemed an "arm of the court" - see the saga of how I sought a FOIL request from such a disciplinary prosecutor who kept claiming she was part of the court, here and here.

So, if a judge is the court, and the prosecutor is the court (officer of the court), the judge = prosecutor, and prosecutor = judge in EVERY criminal case.

Now, every criminal case in the United States, due to this "officer of the court" requirement for all prosecutors, has been invalidated by Williams v Pennsylvania, including the death penalty cases which are scheduled for execution?  Including those where people were already executed?

The concept of officers of the court and the right to practice law

No attorney in the U.S. is allowed to practice law without first being sworn in as an "officer of the court".

Yet, all State Constitutions prohibit judges - "officers of the court" - to practice law.

So, the practice of law is conditioned in the U.S. upon joining a class of people who, by State Constitutions, are prohibited to practice law.

And, the rule for lawyers to be "officers of the court" (who are not allowed to practice law) in order to be able to practice law was concocted by lawyers themselves, who are the best experts in the practice of law.

Mamma mia. 

Pennsylvania leads in deregulation of the legal profession - again

First, it suspended Attorney General Kathleen Kane's law license, but Kathleen Kane remained the head of the Attorney General's office.

Then, Philadelphia District Attorney Self Williams agreed to temporary suspension of his law license, but will continue to head his prosecutorial office.

Somehow, in real life, in real time, one case after the next, law licenses become disjointed from law practice - or whatever it is lawyers are doing in their jobs.

The road to the demise of attorney regulation continues...