For how long will attorneys be regulated by an interested regulator? The case of Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzmann

In doing some research, I am reviewing cases of the nearly absent discipline of prosecutors for misconduct by the regulators of the legal profession, judges. 

Of course, prosecutors are a touchy bunch, they can prosecute judges for crimes, right?  For that reason, it is better to appease them - with prosecutorial immunity, for example, or with support as a breeding pool for judiciary. 

But a law license of a prosecutor in the hands of a judge as "regulator" of the legal profession can be a handy tool at times.

Think Pennsylvania's former Attorney General Kathleen Kane, elected by 4 million of voters, who was:

1. first suspended and then disbarred by judges who she criticized and investigated;
2. turned into a grand jury by an "obedient" prosecutor whose license was in the hands of the judges she criticized and investigated;
3. convicted "by jury" when an obedient judge (also a law license holder whose license was controlled by the judges who Kathleen Kane criticized) blocked jury's access to information that criminal proceedings against Kathleen Kane were politically fabricated by the powerful subjects of her investigation.

Convicted, disbarred, removed from office, bad-mouthed.

That's what awaits a prosecutor, an attorney, a woman who dares to criticize the judiciary and investigate it for corruption.

And prosecutors, also licensed attorneys, take notice.  They do not criticize judges.  They do not investigate or prosecute judges.  And judges are grateful.

The only discipline for misconduct that I am finding though is discipline by the regulator of the legal profession (the judiciary) for criticism of that same regulator of the legal profession.

Think Kathleen Kane, PA.
Think prosecutor George Westfall in Missouri
Think prosecutors Elizabeth Holtzman and Paul David Soares in New York.

One of the most prominent cases of discipline against a prosecutor for criticizing a judge is discipline in 1991 of New York City prosecutor Elizabeth Holtzmann - for protection of a victim of rape who was humiliated by the judge in chambers, outside of the view of the public and, of course, while that show of humiliation was not 

Yet, there was no mention of that truly heroic deed of Elizabeth Holtzmann in the Wikipedia article about her, so I decided to correct that omission - especially when contributions and edits to Wikipedia articles are encouraged by Wikipedia.

The only condition for a contribution was that the contribution should have quotes and not contain defamatory statements - false statements of fact.

I registered as an editing contributor, and offered a section "attorney discipline" to Elizabeth Holtzmann's Wikipedia article.

Since I doubt that Wikipedia will dare to publish it - even though every statement that I have made there is supported by court cases, one White House report, a law review article authored by a judge, an admission by a former judge in his "prison memoir" and an article in New York Times - I am republishing my contribution to Wikipedia here.  Since the font of the scans may be too small, I am also publish the submission in PDF format, so that readers can enlarge the font for easier reading, here.

Nothing in the review is defamatory, as all my statements are based on public records and long-published sources, including self-reporting by judges through court cases, memoirs and law review articles.

Let us consider what Elizabeth Holtzmann was disciplined for once in connection with the #MeToo movement and the recent "Women's March" - where her name was not even mentioned, despite the price she paid for her personal courage in protecting the victim of rape from humiliation by a male judge which surely discouraged many more victims of rape from coming forward.

She was disciplined for "defaming a judge".

Judges are regulators of the legal profession in the United States and in New York - which means in plain English that judges control every lawyer's ability to work and earn money for his family.

Coincidentally, all other witnesses present in the chambers and who refused to support Holtzman's story were people whose livelihood was controlled by the judge:

• a defense attorney whose license the judge could easily revoke through sanctions for criticism (as it was done to attorney John Aretakis in 2008, for criticism of a judge in a motion to recuse in a criminal case) and
• two court employees who the judge could fire at any time.

The witnesses preferred self-preservation.

No independent record (a videotape or an audiotape) existed to verify Elizabeth Hotlzmann's words.

Now, what usually happens if anybody thinks he is defamed?

The "aggrieved" person who thinks he was defamed can sue the person who he thinks defamed him.

And, such a lawsuit in New York involves a "special pleading" standard - if that "elevated" pleading standard is not met, the complaint is dismissed before discovery or trial.

And, such a lawsuit in New York would require to be proven - to a jury no less (trial by jury in New York is provided as a matter of right by New York Constitution for all issues of fact) - by preponderance of the evidence.

And, where the plaintiff is a public official, the public official faces a nearly impossible task of claiming that not only the statements against him were false, but they were made with a malicious intent.

And, in such a trial, the victim of rape would surely be able to testify under oath, in public, and describe what is being done to her in the judicial chambers.

And, Elizabeth Holtzmann, a defendant in such an action where Judge Irving Levine would have been a plaintiff - who would have had to:

1. draft a complaint - meeting the elevated pleading standard;
2. file it publicly in court, subjecting himself to discovery, written interrogatories under oath, out-of-court depositions under oath

would be able to depose Judge Levine and cross-examine the living hell out of him in a public trial.

So - the necessity to expose the judge to the

1. expense;
2. public exposure; and
3. pleading standards;
4. standards of proof before an impartial jury of people whose livelihood does not depend on whether the judiciary gives or does not give them permission to work (like they do with attorneys and court employees)

in a defamation lawsuit by a judge against an attorney is tremendous.

And, of course, Judge Irving Levine who was taken off the bench 2 years after the episode reported by Elizabeth Holtzmann because - instead of a puny prosecutor whose license was in the hands of Judge Levine - his misconduct, corruption, was now outed by FBI agents who overheard his lovely conversation about fixing a court case for his very wealthy and very influential friend Meade Esposito (to whom Judge Levine owed his judicial career), the "former Brooklyn political leader", when Judge Levine was casually discussing the fixing of the court case with Meade Esposito, ex parte, in a restaurant.

What kind of influence Meade Esposito had on New York State judges, up to the Chief Judge of the New York State Court of Appeals (the top state court) is demonstrated in these two articles of New York Times - from 1972

and from 1973:

Still, by the time FBI agents overhead the court-fixing conversations between friends, the judge-maker Meade Esposito and Judge Irwing Levine, Esposito was already convicted for public corruption - but not sent to prison, mind, where ordinary folks get locked up for stealing five bucks.

Thus there was no brow-beating the FBI agents at that time, and the New York State Commission took Levine off the bench, including for lying to the FBI agents in denying misconduct - but Judge Levine was never criminally prosecuted for case-fixing and corruption and was never disciplined as an attorney.

He died with "no record of public discipline".

Yet, when a prosecutor, Elizabeth Holtzmann, who reported a different kind of judicial misconduct of Judge Irving W. Levine, her fate was quite different from the fate of the FBI agents whose testimony the New York State Commission for Judicial Conduct could not shrug off as easily as Holtzmann's press-release.

Her report of Levine's judicial misconduct was first reviewed by Robert Keating, Administrative Judge of the New York City Criminal Court, who is now an adjunct professor of Pace Law School and even Vice-President of that school:

It is Judge Keating who conducted a "review" - instead of requiring Judge Levine to go to court and file a defamation case if he wants to claim that he was defamed by Elizabeth Holtzmann.

And it was Judge Keating who, instead of a jury in a never-filed defamation lawsuit who "found" that report of judicial misconduct of Judge Levine (friend of influential and wealthy judge-maker Meade Esposito) by Elizabeth Holtzmann "is not supported by the evidence".

Judge Keating had an interesting connection with the same Meade Esposito, judgemaker and "boss" of New York State judges and friend and career-maker of Judge Levine.

In his biography published on his Pace Law School webpage, Vice-President of Pace Law School mentions that he was "the Coordinator of Criminal Justice for Mayor Edward Koch from 1980 to 1982" and that he was only "later being appointed to the Criminal Court bench in New York City" and further up the judicial ladder.

Coincidentally, Meade Esposito made Robert Keating's former boss NYC Mayor Koch the mayor of NYC. 

Since Keating was himself "appointed" after working for Koch, and Esposito was the one who "made" judgeships at that time, it is fair to suppose that Esposito played a role in Keating's judicial career, too.

So, Levine's friend and colleague, connected with Levine not only as a colleague, but also through connections with Levine's wealthy and politically influential friend, supporter of Levine's judicial career for whom Levine fixed court cases, absolved Levine from the necessity of filing a defamation court case against Elizabeth Holtzmann.

Mind that as an "administrative judge" of criminal court, Robert Keating had no authority to conduct any reviews - he was not a member of the Judicial Conduct Commission.

Yet, not only he did it, but several state authorities relied on his review in disciplining not the judge, but the judge's critic, prosecutor Elizabeth Hotlzmann.

It is interesting to see how discipline of Elizabeth Holtzmann fits into the record of her own - quite outstanding - career as a public servant.

Her report of judicial misconduct of Judge Levine in 1987 was not the first time when she upset a powerful political figure related to the judiciary.

15 years before that, at the age of 31, she has upset the many-times-incumbent Chief it he U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee by ousting him and being the first woman to be elected into the U.S. Congress.

And, in her report in 2016, Elizabeth Holtzmann provided the following additional details as to her discipline for criticism of a judge when she was a District Attorney in New York City.

First of all, she pointed out that at that time public officials were not ashamed in publicly denigrating  and demeaning women,

including female attorneys:

Second, Elizabeth Holtzmann was the woman who upset the "Old Boys Club" of the judiciary by her previous election to the U.S. Congress that ousted the male Chairman of the Senate's Judiciary Committee of many years, the woman who won the District Attorney elections against a male opponent who was putting her down as a little girl, and was fighting to abolish the requirement that rape could be proven only if the women proves resistance and could never be proven against the woman's husband, making marital rape legal, enabled and encouraged.

It is that with that background in mind that discipline of Elizabeth Holtzmann was handled.

No defamation lawsuit was required of Judge Levine to win against Elizabeth Holtzmann.

Instead, the judiciary's role as the regulator of the legal profession - regulation introduced to help consumers find competent and honest attorneys - was used to create a private and institutional benefit for regulators themselves, to quash critics of their own misconduct.

It must be stated with regret that even the single female judge on the Court of Appeals, Judge Judith Kaye, supported discipline against Elizabeth Holtzmann claiming that she is protecting not a judge from criticism of misconduct, but the public from "unfair" defamation of a judge, knowing that defamation must be first proven in a defamation lawsuit - a lawsuit that Judge Levine never filed.

Judge Kaye's

• "being a good girl",
• bowing to the Old Boys' Club in browbeating a female prosecutor simply because she protected a victim of rape from vile misconduct of a male judge and
• blocking the path of so many victims of rape to a legal remedy - who would want to subject themselves to humiliation the kind of which the victim of Judge Levine's misconduct suffered -

paid off big time for her: Judge Kaye was appointed by Governor Mario Cuomo as the Chief Judge of the court in just two years after that, when Cuomo's friend Chief Judge Sol Wachtler was charged with federal crimes.

Moreover, Wachtler reported in his prison memoirs that Kaye sent him friendly notes to prison:

"Joe Bellacosa, my friend of forty years, who had sat with me as a judge on New York State’s highest court for eight years, came to visit me today. He flew down from Albany this morning to, as he put it, give me “a hug.” He did more than that. He gave me reassurance of the affection and concern of my former colleagues and delivered a warm note from Judith Kaye, the Chief Judge.

Wachtler, Sol. After the Madness: A Judge's Own Prison Memoir (p. 140). Open Road Media. Kindle Edition. "

Once again - Wachtler was convicted for extorting money from a woman in exchange for a promise that he will not kidnap her minor daughter.

It is interesting to mention that, when Holtzman's discipline was upheld in 1991 by the Court of Appeals, and when judges created a court precedent portraying her as a dishonest person making false statements against judges, Holtzman was already elected as New York City Comptroller - at the time when "it has long been an open secret that New York City courts are patronage mills where party loyalty buys judgeships and judges reward party hacks with lucrative assignments".

In fact, Kaye herself conducted a token "investigation" into such practice, which continues throughout New York State to this day, long after Kaye has gone from the Court of Appeals and died.

The discipline did not stop Holtzman.

After discipline was affirmed by the Court of Appeals in July of 1991, in October of 1991 Holtzman tried to have the Senate's Judiciary Committee hear testimony of a second alleged rape victim of a U.S. Supreme Court judicial nominee Clarence Thomas.

The witness was not heard.

Thomas was appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Another witness against a federal judicial nominee, also a young woman from New York City, Elena Sassower, protesting against nomination of Judge Richard Wesley, who insisted on her testimony before the U.S. Congress, was simply jailed by the old boys' club, and the judge was still appointed.

Coincidentally, Elena Sassower's mother, attorney Doris Sassower, was suspended indefinitely from the practice of law just one month before discipline against Holtzman was affirmed by the New York State Court of Appeals, for filing constitutional challenges of the cross-endorsements party schemes, the kind of which Meade Esposito was the mastermind.

New York State now celebrates trailblazer women who fought against the establishment for civil rights.

Yet, I do not see Elizabeth Holtzmann, while giving speeches about progress in women's rights, pointing out to the plight of other women attorneys who have less connections than Holtzmann's and whose license, thus, could not be saved from judicial retaliation after they exposed judicial misconduct.

Doris Sassower, suspended in 1991 for criticism of judicial corruption and for her work as a civil rights attorney filing constitutional challenges to that corruption, remains suspended.

This author, suspended in 2015 for the same, see the article where a local newspaper in Delaware County, New York, with connections to a judge who is behind my suspension, acknowledges that I was suspended for criticizing "gross judicial misconduct"

remains suspended. Mind this bibliographical rarity, The Walton Reporter is the only public source (other than my blog) that has made this "slip of the tongue", a confession that my law license and livelihood was, indeed, taken by judges taking advantage of their roles as regulators of the legal profession in retaliation for criticism of those same regulators, judges. 

Other sources, including the order of suspension itself, does not state that I was suspended FOR criticizing judicial misconduct - even though I was really suspended

• without ANY fact-finding hearing
• based solely and exclusively on sanctions imposed upon me by the corrupt Delaware County judge Carl Becker (whose pictures with bears he killed Walton Reporter regularly posted in the past) FOR making a motion to recuse Becker because of his misconduct and corruption (he recused from my cases in 2009, then got himself reassigned to my cases in order to be able to get me, got me in 2011 and immediately put his sanctions into the "disciplinary pipeline", same as Judge Levine did with Elizabeth Holtzmann).

The only prosecutor disciplined since Holtzmann in 1991 was Paul David Soares, the Albany County DA, in 2012 - "coincidentally", also for criticism of a judge.

By the way, my discipline was sustained by the court in a similar fashion with Holtzmann's discipline - by the time I was suspended in November of 2015 Judge Carl F. Becker already ran from the bench during an FBI and Commission for Judicial Conduct investigation.  

Yet, it is a crime for an attorney to criticize a judge even if his misconduct has already caught up with him.

Since Holtzmann's discipline many, many attorneys, regulated by the judiciary, were disciplined by judges, and removed from the reach of the public they could benefit by their services, for criticism of their own regulator - which is, as Holtzmann knows and argued to the court, not only unconstitutional, but requires the change of the interested regulator of the legal profession.

Holtzmann, knowing full well that attorney regulation, introduced for the benefit of the public, is used to the detriment of the public, sat by in Congress for several decades, not trying to lobby the federal Legislature to remove the regulation of the legal profession, and with that, of public access to court, from the hands of the regulator who is using it to grab private privileges for the regulator itself and to quash criticism of its own misconduct.

So, when we are celebrating "Power to Women", we must ask ourselves - for what purpose do some powerful women, like former Congresswoman Holtzmann, used that power?

For self-promotion only?

That is not what voters expected of her.  And that is why I do not support pink-hatted "women's marches".  They are useless.  Their organizers are nowhere to be found where real women's real civil rights are violated.

I did not hear anybody "of consequence" trying to speak at that Women's March about the plight of many, many, many attorneys, female and male, who are disciplined and lose their licenses for criticizing their regulator - which is their duty to their client and to the public to do and their citizen's rights to do, too.

The change of the judiciary as the interested regulator of the legal profession is long overdue.

The way the judiciary uses attorney regulation to gain privileges and quash critics, skipping the necessary defamation proceedings against critics to find defamation through closed-doors "Star Chamber" proceedings without prior discovery or a jury trial, is a shame of the American judicial system.

An interesting historical note before I bow out.

The American judiciary grabbed regulation of attorneys claiming that such a power of the judiciary to regulate the legal profession is "historical", that it was like that in the "Old Country" - the country separation from which because of its unfair laws was won through a bloody war, and paid for with so many lives.

Yet, even in the Old Country cases where people were prosecuted for criticism of the government were taken away from judges of the Star Chamber in 1792, and put into the hands of juries, by the Libel (Fox) Act, specifically because judges proved they could not be impartial in handling criticism of themselves.

Let's remember the date when this rule was revoked in the Old Country - and based on a petition drafted by a Star Chamber Judge Sir Edward Coke who knew from his own experience how biased he was in cases of seditious libel (criticism of the government).

1792.

In 1792 in England, by an act of Parliament, cases of prosecutions for criticism of the government were taken from judges and given to juries.

Of course, juries often do not help if they are fed self-serving law by judges.

For example, in 1964 the U.S. Supreme Court (itself a regulator of its own "bar"), decided Garrison v Lousiana where it reversed a criminal conviction of a prosecutor for criticism of judges, saying:

"A state court convicted him of violating the Louisiana Criminal Defamation Statute, which, in the context of criticism of official conduct, includes punishment for true statements made with "actual malice" in the sense of ill-will, as well as false statements if made with ill-will or without reasonable belief that they were true. The state supreme court affirmed the conviction, holding that the statute did not unconstitutionally abridge appellant's rights of free expression.

Held:

1. The Constitution limits state power to impose sanctions for criticism of the official conduct of public officials, in criminal cases as in civil cases, to false statements concerning official conduct made with knowledge of their falsity or with reckless disregard of whether they were false or not. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, followed. Pp. 379 U. S. 67-75.

2. Appellant's accusations concerned the judges' official conduct and, did not become private defamation because they might also have reflected on the judges' private character. Pp. 379 U. S. 76-77."

After Garrison, disciplinary boards (entities populated and controlled by judges and considered as "arms of the court") continued to provide a service for those who gave them their licenses and ability to earn a living, judges, while blocking access or control over the regulation by people who they are supposed to benefit - consumers (just look up compositions of disciplinary boards, consumers are always present in token numbers, if at all - in such numbers as never to outvote judge-regulated attorney members).

Disciplinary boards allowed judges, as described above, to skip the necessity to file defamation lawsuits against attorneys who they think make false statements against them, and to take their licenses without any impediments like open court proceedings, discovery or jury trials.

Instead, judges are offered a "service" - just complain to us, and we will stage a Star Chamber for attorneys and decide who gets to continue to practice, and who gets to starve because they dared to criticize "the hand that feeds them" - even though the supposed "hand that feeds" attorneys is only a REGULATOR of law licenses FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE PUBLIC, not the King to do with the license what they want because of their personal grudges.

In other words, disciplinary boards continue to offer judges Star Chamber services that were prohibited in the Old Country in 1792.

And, American attorneys - and the public they represent - continue to live in a pre-1792 era.

And, nothing is done about it because attorneys whose licenses are controlled by judges have so far overpowered all branches of the government, so the concept of "checks and balances" became a mockery.

What importance this all is to the public at large minding its own business far away from "attorney squabbles"?

Next time when you cannot find an attorney who would not be afraid to take on a civil rights case of judicial misconduct, or file a motion to recuse a judge - remember to ask former Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman, who cozily hid behind her connections and public officer's salary for 50 years.

Ask her just one question.

You knew that the regulator of the legal profession has a major conflict of interest and uses that conflict to grab personal advantages to the detriment of the public - instead of doing its job and regulating the profession for the benefit of the public.  You knew that to pursue that goal the judiciary makes attorneys live in a pre-1792 Star Chamber England.

Why didn't you use your 50 freaking years in the U.S. Congress to change that?

Just saying.

Otsego, Delaware and Chenango Counties, New York, are united in giving its law enforcement license to commit violent crimes against minorities, women and children

I wrote on this blog in 2014-2017 about the case of Delaware County "alleged" police officer Derek Bowie, nephew of Delaware County District Attorney's office long-time investigator Jeff Bowie who:

1. never took or passed the required civics test;
2. did not reside, as required, in Delaware County while working as a deputy sheriff;
3. never passed Taser certification;
4. nearly killed two look-alike women, while trying to put both in jail;
5. lied in court multiple times under protection of his uncle's employer DA Northrup (now Delaware County Judge Northrup).

For details of the story, just enter the name Derek Bowie in the search window on the right of this blog.

Naturally, Derek Bowie was never charged with vehicular assault and attempted murder of Barbara O'Sullivan because Barbara criticized and sued judge Becker, former law partner of Assistant District attorney (and now District Attorney) John Hubbard, and Derek Bowie was the nephew of the employee of the District Attorney's office.  The rule of law ceded to tribal ties that are exceptionally strong in Delaware County.

Moreover, when, after fabricated criminal charges against Barbara O'Sullivan and her daughter by Derek Bowie were dismissed (Barbara) and acquitted in a jury trial (her daughter),

• first, one of their dogs was found dead under the circumstances suggesting that Derek Bowie's dog could have done that (especially that Derek Bowie was already accused - that was part of posted deposition transcripts - of killing a neighbor's dog out of anger), and then
• somebody's trained hand threw a Molotov cocktail into Barbara's house, right where her then-pregnant daughter was supposed to be sleeping (it was sheer luck she was staying with friends), and the house burnt down, the local firefighters arrived without water and made sure not that the fire is extinguished, but that the house burns down and another dog dies, and the local authorities would not investigate, would not file necessary reports, and certainly would not charge Derek Bowie as one of the most likely suspects in the case.

Yet, after dismissal of charges against Barbara by the DA's Office fabricated by Derek Bowie as a supposed witness after he nearly mowed down Barbara in his police vehicle for videotaping his misconduct, the same judge who dismissed the charges, then also dismissed Barbara's lawsuit against Derek Bowie claiming that she failed to comply with Bowie's discovery demand - while papers he demanded to "disclose" burned in the house fire which the same Bowie likely caused.

Neither Lambert nor Bowie nor Northrup nor Hubbard were ever disciplined, on the opposite, Northrup and Hubbard advanced their careers after that:   Northrup became a Delaware County judge and Hubbard became the Delaware County District Attorney.

There was a burglary and attempted arson in our house, but Northrup refused to investigate or prosecute.

Judge Becker forged a certificate of election from 2002 and filed the forged documents, but Hubbard (without disclosure that he is the judge's former law partner) refused to prosecute.

At the same time, a man was charged by the same Northrup with a D felony and convicted for threatening Judge Becker.

The conclusion:  in Delaware County it is permissible to law enforcement and anybody else to attempt violent crimes against critics corrupt judges, prosecutors and police officers.

In Chenango County, one judge (Kevin Dowd), after hearing that a court attendant/ Nazi sympathizer acted in a way that can be perceived as an anti-Semitic threat, enabled that Nazi sympathizer further by allowing that same Nazi sympathizer, armed to the teeth, to stand behind the Jewish litigator's back, search his effects and then bodily throw him out of the courthouse.

In the same county, the former law clerk of Judge Dowd, Judge Revoir, just acquitted a white corrections officer of a hate-crime, attempted murder of an African American, despite ample evidence that the officer shot the African American deliberately and with a racist motive.

No jury could ever acquit under such circumstances, but the corrections officer saw the opportunity to use a biased judge who already dismissed the charges despite ample evidence of the crime and was eager to defy the appellate court that reversed his decision, waived jury trial - and got what he wanted: an acquittal.

I myself was a witness in 2015 how an African American who claimed he was beaten up by the police was put into Chenango County jail where nobody attempted to document his visible injuries, and I as his then-attorney was not allowed to bring in photographic equipment to document the injuries either.

So, in Chenango County racist violence by law enforcement is encouraged and enabled by the local government, including the court that practically blessed racially motivated killings of African Americans by law enforcement.

Otsego County would not fall behind in such glorious behavior.

In 2011, Otsego County Judge Brian Burns denied a "youthful offender" status and sent a mentally disabled teenager, Anthony Pacherille, to 11 years in prison, convicting him for a crime of attempted murder because Judge Burns was pissed that the boy's father asked the judge for mercy personally, pointing out that Judge Burns is also a father.  Judge Burns triggered criminal prosecution of the father, but never recused from the case and retaliated against the boy for the father's actions - which were not illegal.

And, when the Oneonta City police beat up and tasered an African American man, Timothy Baron when he was stopped on a pretense because his turn signal was on, and when the police tried to fabricate charges of possession of marijuana against him -  no charges for assault against the police were filed against the police officers and nobody was disciplined.

Instead DA Muehl was trying to prosecute the beat-up African American man with a felony, threatened him that if he does not plead guilty, he will be indicted for more - and only when Mr. Baron turned down the plea bargain and we came close to a trial, did DA Muehl confess that he cannot "locate" his main witness and thus that he was trying to obtain a plea of guilty through mere bluffing.

Yet, at the same time when the Otsego County Sheriff Richard Devlin's son Ros Devlin promises to shoot up two local schools, the schools are not notified, the same Otsego County District Attorney John Muehl - who convicted a child, Tony Pacherille, and who tried to lock up the victim of police misconduct, African American Timothy Baron - makes no attempt to charge the son of the County Sheriff Ros Devlin with a terrorist crime when he promised to shoot up two schools, does not even care to notify the potential victims, and does not attempt to arrest the Sheriff's son.

Here are the exact words of the Sheriff's son reported in the local press - also note that the Devlins is not the only clan working in the Sheriff's Department (Otsego County does not have an anti-nepotism policy on file, which allows employments of whole clans).

The entitled son the local nobility violated two rules, and when it was pointed out to him that he actually needs to comply with rules, like everybody else does - he promised to shoot up two schools "as a diversion" and then to shoot himself in front of the supervisor.

So, the violent compulsive terrorist remains free, waiting for a new chance to threaten (or shoot up) local schools - and is not only not charged and not fired, but is suspended "with pay", so, Otsego County taxpayers are forced to pay him for doing nothing, and he is rewarded with $55,000 a year for threatening to shoot up two schools and then sitting at home.

Moreover, Sheriff Richard Devlin had the audacity to participate in his own son's investigation and hamper it, and Ros Devlin had the audacity to apply for a gun permit after it was initially - naturally - revoked.  That means that Ros Devlin thinks that what he does is right and proper, and should be allowed to him as the local nobility, and that he will never be held accountable in any way.

Well, Ros Devlin has a point in that - given the record of what is allowed to law enforcement in Delaware, Otsego and Chenango Counties - minorities, women and children can be shot or tasered or mowed over with police vehicles, or burnt with their houses in these three counties - if the perpetrators are members of the local glorious law enforcement.

And this crap WILL continue and WILL get worse - if people continue to tolerate it and do not insist that criminals be held accountable as provided by law.

By the way, I sincerely hope that the victim of racist shooting by corrections officer Wayne Spratley sues the hell out of that officer, and out of Chenango County - since when spouting racial slurs and shooting, Spratley also flashed his badge and thus claimed he was acting in an official capacity.

And - acquittal in a criminal case is not a bar to that lawsuit, since the burden of proof in criminal proceedings is much higher than in a civil rights lawsuit.

If Revoir thought that Wayne Spratley may not be found to be guilty "beyond the reasonable doubt", certainly a federal jury may find Wayne Spratley - and Chenango County - be found liable by preponderance of the evidence.

I also hope that parents of children of the two schools that were not notified sue the hell out of Otsego County, Ros Devlin individually, and Richard Devlin individually - for making such a threat (Ros Devlin), for not notifying them of the threat (the County), for hampering the investigation (Sheriff Devlin) and for letting the son-of-the-local-king-of-the-hill terrorist roam free for a year.

They only understand when they are hit in their own pockets.

It is a disgrace.

The succession of brain-dead judges in Chenango County, New York - the anti-Semitic Dowd is out, the racist Revoir is in.

According to my sources, the anti-Semitic and brain-dead Judge Kevin Dowd of Chenango County Supreme Court who harassed a Jewish litigant by subjecting him to illegal searches and force of a court-attendant/Nazi sympathizer and escaped liability only by claiming "absolute judicial immunity" has finally left the court - retired.

He mentored and left behind a twin younger copy of his own self - Judge Frank B Revoir who claimed in 2014 that making constitutional argument is an equivalent of lying to the court.

I will not be surprised if Revoir will try to ascend to Dowd's thrown of the Supreme Court Justice by running for his seat this year.

Revoir already made a necessary step towards that coveted goal.

While I personally know that Revoir is frantic about his personal safety as a judge - in his chats at attorney conferences he boasted of the new courthouse in Chenango Courthouse with a separate entrance and elevator for judges, so that judges would not have to "mix" with the mere mortals - Revoir has just appeased the racist all-white local law enforcement community of Chenango and surrounding counties by acquitting a white correctional officer charged with a racially motivated attempted murder of all charges.

Let's remember, in a neighboring Otsego County, a mentally disabled teenage boy was recently sent by a judge to prison for attempted murder of an African-American boy

while the judge denied him a youth offender status simply because the judge was pissed with the boy's father who wrote to the judge asking him for mercy to his son.

The African-American boy was wounded in the arm.

Yet, in Chenango County, when an adult white corrections officer, spouting racial slurs, shoots an African-American point-blank with a Glock gun in the abdomen, a judge first dismisses the charges, and, after the prosecution appeals and three out of 6 charges are reinstated on appeal, punishes the prosecution and the People of Chenango County for appealing his decision by acquitting the perpetrator of a violent hate crime of all charges.

Here is how the Appellate Division 3rd Department described what happened in the case:

After the shooter, a white corrections officer, was - naturally - indicted by the grand jury, Revoir DISMISSED the hate crimes for - guess what? - "insufficient evidence"!  Just re-read the above portions of the appellate court's decision.  That evidence was insufficient for a white judge to charge a white corrections officer with a racially-based violent crime against an African-American who he intentionally shot calling him a "nigger", a "monkey", a "jungle bunny" and promising to kill him.  That's some judge!

Defense attorneys in New York routinely make motions to dismiss an indictment based on insufficient evidence before the grand jury, but obtaining such a dismissal is nearly impossible, and the reason is - by New York law, grand jury proceedings and transcripts are secret from the defense (but not the prosecution), only a judge may review grand jury transcripts, and does it without revealing them to the defense.

Therefore, judges routinely use that advantage to deny such motions off-handedly while claiming that they reviewed the transcripts (even if they didn't) and did not find anything lacking.

In this case, Revoir, the judge who considers human rights, constitutional rights as a form of "lying to the court", bent over backwards to find fault with the indictment - and dismissed hate-crime charges where not only no reasonable judge, but no decent human being could do that.

The prosecution appealed, the appellate court, the just-retired "honorable" Presiding judge Karen Peters, remanded - without changing the obviously biased judge, knowing what will happen next.

District Attorney McBride, knowing what happens to attorneys who file motions to recuse biased judges - even in criminal cases, even to prosecutors who are usually never disciplined - did not file a motion to recuse.

That allowed Revoir to do what he wanted to do anyway, punish prosecution for embarrassing him with an appeal, and put the last nail into the coffin of the criminal case.

The defendant predictably waived the jury trial that would never have acquitted under the circumstances and chose the biased judge.

The biased judge acquitted the racist shooter of all charges, and double jeopardy attached.

Congratulations, people of Chenango County.

You have a real ascending star, a gem of a judge on your throne.

He outdid even his anti-Semitic teacher, Kevin Dowd.

At least, Dowd did not let a violent racist shooter go free.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The attorney-husband persisted with the criminal appeal.

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

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

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

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

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

The judge went pale.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Judges do not like attorneys who criticize judges.

The bottom line of the story.

=====================

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

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

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

Much, much, much honor.