New York State of the Judiciary 2015 - are the declared new "community justice centers" new "Ol' Boys' Club" business ventures or will they resolve any problems of the criminal justice system? Only time will show.

In his "State of the Judiciary 2015" address the Chief Judge of the New York State Court of Appeals Jonathan Lippman said the following:

Well,  Lippman keeps saying everywhere that we'd better close the door of our courts if we cannot bridge the justice gap - and the doors of the courts remain open, while the gap is not even close to be bridged, as Lippman acknowledges in that same State of the Judiciary 2015 address.

Now Lippman is saying "without trust there can be no justice" while public trust in all branches of the government, including the judiciary, is now at "all time low" according to the latest public opinion polls.

So, apparently, it is just some vacuum-filler words that our Chief Judge felt obligated to throw around in his State of Judiciary 2015 address about the non-existent "public trust" in the judiciary.

Jonathan Lippman indicates that the "rifts" between "some communities" and the government may be bridged by "working together" to deal with "low-level crimes", and "together" meaning between the "communities", the courts, the prosecutors and the probation departments.

Forgive my skepticism, but my experience as a defense attorney (including communication with prosecutors) prevents me from believing in this idyllic situation without seeing hard facts, reports and numbers - and none were provided in the State of the Judiciary 2015 address by Judge Lippman.

First of all, it is the prosecutor's job to prosecute crimes and not to "mend rifts with the communities".   If a prosecutor does his or her job, there should be no rifts.

The same refers to probation.

In my experience though, prosecutors are aggressively overcharging crimes to exert pleas, habitually withhold exculpatory evidence and habitually bluff about availability of support for often unsupportable charges.

As to probation, long time ago a "friendly" prosecutor admitted in private that the probation is the fastest way to prison, and it is better to call probation officers "violators", because that's what they seek to do - not to rehabilitate people convicted of crimes, but to violate them and pack them off to jail/prison.

That's not the law.  The law designed probation as a rehabilitative alternative to incarceration.  But that's how probation now works, in a large number of cases suggesting policy and collusion between probation and prosecutors.

And prosecutors wholeheartedly support such a policy, because it makes their job to pack of people to jail so much easier.

In probation violation proceedings, unlike the original criminal proceedings, hearsay is admissible, and acts of third parties are counted against the probationer toward violation of probation (think a bottle of wine belonging to your partner in your fridge at home that your probation officer found).

Probation has been known to violate people for most ridiculous of reasons, such as - taking a freezing animal, like a kitten, from out of the cold where, let's say, for a convicted sex offender, there is a condition prohibiting having pets (on the theory that ANY sex offender, including, obviously, those who are themselves under age or in a 16-22.5 situation, where the boyfriend is slightly above the 4-year age difference that can serve as an affirmative defense to a "statutory rape" charge).

Probation officers attempt to violate people for curfew for being in an ER and unconscious and failing to report to the probation officer being in an ER within 24 hours of getting there, whether the injured person can physically do it or not.

Lippman suggested to "bridge the rift" by "alternatives" to incarceration such as "drug treatment courts".

This alternative looks this way:

• First, the criminal defendants' right to remain silent in the criminal proceedings is compromised from the very beginning of the criminal proceeding, as a matter of court policy; and
• Then, drug courts violate that already convicted individual for failure to abide by the drug treatment at a very high rate and make drug court another "fast lane to prison", without the benefit of full constitutional protections at trial.

Drug courts are notorious for making it impossible for participating individuals to maintain a gainful employment, since at any time the individual may be called in for a random urine test, and it will be a violation not to abide.  Drug courts do not accommodate participants' work schedules.  Drug courts do not accommodate participants' lack of driver's licenses and the need to get to court, and that includes places where public transportation is non-existent and participants live at a great distance from the courts.

No employer, especially in these tough economic times, will keep a participant's job for long under the circumstances.

Remember, 49% of the 9 bln dollars New York spend on incarceration each year goes to post-conviction incarceration, including probation violations.

So, between judges who pledged to be "tough on crime" and can be best described not as "neutral arbiters", but as "convictors", and prosecutors who forgot long time ago their constitutional "dual" role to be tough on crime but at the same time fair to everyone involved in the criminal justice process, including the accused, and the probation officers who should better be described as "violators" rather than rehabilitators, 

With that said, maybe, my skepticism will be defeated in the future by the success story of the Brownsville Community Center announced by Lippman.  Maybe we will not learn in the future that the Center is yet another business venture of the "Ol' Boy's Club" and has nothing to do with the declared purposes.

Only future will show.

Until and unless I see real results of success of such pilot "community centers" claiming that they "re-engineered" response to anything, and provide alternatives to incarceration, job training etc., I will hold my breath as to any celebrations for opening such centers.

Porter Kirkwood for judge! He is exactly what Delaware County needs - clueless, vindictive and ready to lie to protect somebody with a status

Porter Kirkwood now officially announced that he is "running" for the second seat of the County judge in Delaware County, New York.

Exactly as the number of cases in Delaware County is dwindling, the second judge became necessary.  At $152,000.00 a year, and the current judge's (Carl F. Becker's) friend and former colleague and subordinate for years.

Porter Kirkwood is the only attorney I know who lost a trial with nobody appearing in opposition and while having all available resources.  He simply did not use the resources and assumed that he will win anyway.  He lost.

Porter Kirkwood prosecuted a child neglect case where he treated the child as an adverse, hostile party, instead of trying to protect him.  The interesting detail was that the reason he treated the child as a hostile party because the child's interests were, indeed, adverse - to Porter Kirkwood's own son.

Many people who live in Delaware County know from personal experience, and I wrote a lot on this blog how Carl F. Becker fails to disclose his own conflicts of interest, fails to recuse himself when such conflicts of interests exist and retaliates against people who raise the issue of that conflict of interest, or simply people who Carl F. Becker does not like.

Porter Kirkwood is a good student of Carl F. Becker's style, having worked under Carl F. Becker for years, and having been Carl F. Becker's friend for the years Carl F. Becker was on the bench.  Kirkwood was regularly seen behind the courthouse talking to Becker while having cases pending in front of Becker, and who knows how many times they communicated without being seen.

I described here how Porter Kirkwood lied to me that my client does not have a file with Social Services.  Had he told me the truth, I would have learnt during the pendency of the Family Court case that Becker is disqualified from the case by his extrajudicial knowledge of the case and by participation in the case as the attorney for the Social Services, and adoption attorney for one of the relatives of a party, due to which conflicted situation the Delaware County Department of Social Services, then represented by Becker, created a secret indicated report against the wrong person, without that person's knowledge (but with Becker's knowledge).

I learned about Porter Kirkwood's lie only in 2013, when the existence of the file and of the contents in the file came up through proceedings in another county.

The Family Court (judge Connerton) rejected without any reasoning the motion to vacate due to Becker's non-disclosure.  Well, nothing like corporate solidarity between judges.  Now Porter Kirkwood is joining into the brotherhood, and will continue his dirty tricks on the bench.  Exactly what Delaware County needs.

Porter Kirkwood is very vindictive, which is another trait that this county absolutely needs in a judge. After all, his current client the Department of Social Services brought a frivolous and fraudulent child neglect proceeding after I asked Judge Becker to recuse, and I was the first attorney (according to what I was told) who did that based on Becker's non-disclosure to the parties and counsel that he is presiding over a bench trial (judge as a factfinder) where he is "finding" issues of credibility of his own former clients and colleagues, about whom he has extrajudicial knowledge.

Porter Kirkwood's agency and Porter Kirkwood also brought that child neglect to try to label my child for purposes of possible (and still possible) lawsuit against Porter Kirkwood's son for a gang assault against my child on the school's ground.

Nothing like the father of a child who assaulted your child prosecuting you for child neglect (meaning that he must protect the interests of my child against me) and, during such a prosecution, trying to "evaluate" your child and label your child to weaken future litigation of your child against his son.

That was, to me, the ONLY purpose of the proceedings (well, apart from humiliating and labeling us as child abusers or neglectful parents).  That was the proceeding where Kirkwood brought in an expert who, without ever seeing the child, attempted to labeled him (I do not know how much Kirkwood paid him to sell out his professional ethics). 

Yet, somehow that did not work.  Had my child been labeled, he would have had a weaker case against Porter Kirkwood's own child in the future potential gang assault litigation tolled due to infancy.  Porter Kirkwood could not stand such a chance.  Porter Kirkwood is a really ethical lawyer, you know.  So he rushed to protect - who? - his own son's interests - by using his position as an Assistant County attorney and prosecutor of child neglect cases.  Yet, the case was dismissed.

Just the integrity and temperament we need for Delaware County and Family Court judge.

Recently, I placed on this blog two recordings - of the Chief of Delaware County jail and of Porter Kirkwood.  The Chief of Delaware County jail lied to me that all attorneys' files are being searched when they come to see inmates in that jail (while that never happened for 40 years, it is illegal, and they started to do that to me only when I started to represent a particular client, the person who Becker hated, who sued Becker in one case, who served Becker with a lawsuit in another case).

In his recording Porter Kirkwood pretended that he does not know about the policies of the Chief of jail in his own county - meaning, he confirmed that as an attorney he is incompetent.

I also know that Porter Kirkwood had a private practice on the side while he was a full-time county employee, and had paying private cases which presented a conflict of interest to him as then Assistant County Attorney (he defended a case claiming elder abuse when, as an Assistant County Attorney, Kirkwood had to investigate and protect victims of elder abuse). 

Kirkwood also represented those conflicted private clients during his taxpayer-paid county time.  But, of course, Becker and Kirkwood could not entrust handling this case to any other defense attorney or judge.  Becker forgave Kirkwood incompetent representation and failure to raise defense of standing in the Answer, and the Appellate Division affirmed, ignoring the issue of waiver.

Also, please, bear in mind that if you elect Gary Rosa, Gary Rosa did not work for social services for decades and does not have extrajudicial knowledge about people in front of him regarding what is the file of people who were investigated, and, possibly, have secret undisclosed indicated reports against them which never came to be reviewed in court.

Porter Kirkwood has such knowledge, which already disqualifies him from presiding over many cases.  No litigant in Delaware County can consider himself or herself safe from having a secret file on them with Porter Kirkwood's current client the Delaware County Department of Social Services.  Nothing like having a judge who does not disclose his extra-judicial knowledge about you (unfavorable) or about social services' witnesses (favorable, as his former colleagues) presiding over your trial as the only fact-finder, and Porter Kirkwood will also preside over criminal trials and sentencings and may factor in such secret information that he knows and you don't, into his sentencing decisions.

With his level of "integrity", I have no reason to doubt that Kirkwood will be using the secret information against you without telling you.

Incompetent, vindictive, unethical - what more do you need in a Delaware County and Family Court judge?  You will have twins in the courthouse.  And with those twins glued to the bench, you will have nowhere else to go, they will block with their butts all doors to justice for you and all opportunities to ever have an impartial and competent judicial review of your cases.

Vote!  .... for somebody else.

What is the essence of the rule of law in Nebraska, is long dead in New York. And we need to revive the rule of law now - before it is too late.

Recently, when I was putting in a Russian-language blog on death penalty in the United States, I came across a spectacular document, a "Sentencing Philosophy" statement by the Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court of the District of Nebraska the Hon. Laurie Smith Camp.

I provide here a portion of Judge Camp's statement that I found extremely relevant to what is going on in courts in New York state - in federal and state courts.

Judge Camp writes in her "Philosophy of Sentencing" statement that the essence of the rule of law is equal application of laws notwithstanding the individual characteristics of a litigant, and uniformity and, thus, predictability of such application from case to case:

I completely support and share Judge Camp's view as to what the rule of law should be, what it does, and what will happen if the rule of law does not exist.

Yet, I've lost count how many times I've been sanctioned for requesting judges to follow the law, or to recuse because they favor a status and refuse to apply the law in the fair, reasonable and predictable manner, as it should be applied.

I've been sanctioned for what precedents and statutes say is legal conduct.

I've been sanctioned for raising constitutional arguments based on legal research and precedents.

And, as Judge Camp says, since I am not at all assured how a certain judge will rule in a certain case, even where the law (case law, statutory law and constitutional law) is quite clear as to how the judge should rule, I, as a litigant cannot make reasoned decisions about my own life, and I, as an attorney, can only give my clients a "triple" advice:

(1) this is what the law is;
(2) this is what the record is of this particular judge as to this law, in various cases, for various parties, such as:

• men v. women;
• rich v. poor;
• people with a criminal record v. people with no such record;
• social services v. everybody else;
• the government v. regular people;
• politically connected attorneys v. regular people or sole practitioners;
• attorneys who sit with judges on "councils", "Committees", donate to judges election campaigns etc. v. attorneys and parties who did not cater for the judge in any way

(3) and as a bottom line - I DO NOT KNOW how the judge will rule in your case, even if the law is clear.

And, as an attorney and officer of the court, I did not take my constitutional oath of office to guess whims of judges and to cater for those whims in order to win cases.

Unfortunately, I am far from the only one affected by this "selective" application of the rule of law in federal courts within the State of New York and in New York state courts.

As a result of my own personal experience as an attorney and litigant, communications with other attorneys, feedback on this blog, I can, unfortunately, conclude that the problem with unpredictable court rulings, and ruling contrary to the existing law which are not corrected on appeal, or where people simply cannot afford to appeal and the judge who refuses to apply proper law, knows it - such cases proliferate and constitute the rule rather than the exception.

It is definitely not my personal problem only, it is the problem of access to justice for people in this entire state.

The rule of law should be there, and if it is not there, there will be problems like Judge Camp described in her Sentencing Philosophy, and worse.  The rule of law prevents tyranny and it prevents chaos.

If the rule of law dies, tyranny and chaos will ensue.

Tyranny is already here, as is already known to many litigants who were ever confronted with court decisions that they cannot change where courts defied the law, and where courts clearly favor parties and attorney with high status and political connections than those who the law favors.

Chaos may ensue following the further advancement of tyranny.

It is to make sure that the rule of law is there and is enforceable, the beginnings of tyrannies may be timely caught and rooted out, and chaos is prevented, the Civil Rights Act was enacted in the 19th century, and in the 19th century U.S. Senators pointed out that, where there is no rule of law, rebellions may ensue.

Federal courts made the Civil Rights Act practically unenforceable with judicially created amendments existing in the form of various "doctrines" restricting application of the Act - "abstention" (until the biased state court predictably decides against you) doctrines, "deference" (to the biased state court) doctrines, the "Rooker-Feldman" (your case was already heard by the /biased/ stated court, you are a LOSER and we won't hear your claims of constitutional violations by that court) doctrine, self-given immunity doctrines etc.

So, the door to nipping governmental, including judicial, tyrannies in the bud at their very beginning, through civil rights litigation, is slammed by federal courts into the public's face, and what remains is that shut door to federal courthouses and state courts where judges rule according tot heir whims and not according tot he law, knowing that litigants can do nothing about it.

One does not have to have a crystal ball to predict that, if the rampant judicial corruption, misconduct and refusal to follow the applicable law continues on a scale it exists now, and against the worsening economic situation, public rebellion is not far away.

As a person who was born in the Soviet Union, a country rampaged and ravaged by a revolution and its consequences, I would really prefer this country to be spared of any violent solutions to this problem.

We need to seek legislative resolutions of the rampant problem of judicial misconduct, access to court and rule of law crisis in New York.   Now.  Before it is too late.

New York State of the Judiciary 2015 address - delving into the State of the Legislature

As I mentioned in my previous blog post, in his State of the Judiciary address, Judge Lippman failed to address glaring problems pertaining to the New York State judiciary that cause and contribute to the "justice gap" that exists at this time.

The only issue that Judge Lippman was interested in was raising pay for judges.

Yet, Judge Lippman made excessive appeals for reforms to one of the two other branches of the government - the Legislative branch.

Judge Lippman appealed to the Legislature to reform this and that, while not trying to reform a damn thing about his own (very) filthy stable, where he could do that, simply by changing court rules of recusal and rules requiring judges to publish their financial reports and family trees (at least to litigants, on conditions of confidentiality, if necessary, as to the rest of the public, but at least allowing litigants to verify for themselves whether a factfinding judge is or is not disqualified from the case).

It is easy to deflect your own problems by pointing into out that your neighbor (the Legislature) did not do his job properly.

But Lippman has enough of his own problems with the judiciary to clean up.

If Lippman does not see those problems and considers New York judiciary "spectacular" and "the absolute best" in the country, as he did in his State of the Judiciary 2015 address, maybe Lippman is not professionally competent for his job as the overseer of the New York court system, and should be taken off that job now, not waiting for his retirement at the end of this year that will not come a second too soon.

New York State of the Judiciary 2015 address on the state of the judiciary - New York needs the best judges money can buy

In his State of the Judiciary 2015 address made on February 17, 2015, the Chief Judge of the State of New York Jonathan Lippman addressed - predictably - issues pertaining to the judiciary.

Which issues did Judge Lippman, part of the judiciary, address?

The ONLY issue (in Judge Lippman's mind) pertaining to the judiciary that needed to be addressed in his "State of the Judiciary" address was raising judicial salaries.

At this time, judicial salaries at at the "meager" $152,000 per year for the County judge and at the no less meager $174,000 for the Supreme Court justice this year.  I use the word "meager" because that same word was used by the Supreme Court judge Kevin Dowd in a court proceeding in front of an indigent party when the judge explained to that party that he, Judge Dowd, has the authority, in exchange for the "meager bucks that he is being paid by the state, to decide issues that the litigant was raising.

Judge Dowd recused from that case after a complaint was filed against him, but not before he abused that indigent party some more.

Well, back to the "meager" pay of judges.

Once again, that was the ONLY issue pertaining to the state's judiciary that Judge Lippman believed necessary to address.

Not the recusal reform - where judges are considered "arbiters of their own recusal", even though the standard for recusal is from the point of view of OBJECTIVE reasonable DISINTERESTED OBSERVER, and the judge sought to be recused is neither an observer (he/she is a participant), nor is the judge disinterested (when his own integrity or impartiality are being challenged), nor can he/she be deemed by any stretch of imagination, objective, for the same reasons.

The objective for recusal in the first place is to ensure the litigants' constitutional right of access to court, and the litigants' constitutional right to a fair trial by an impartial tribunal (court).

Those constitutional rights may not be subject to judicial "discretion", they must answer to strict rules, and in New York it is not so.

It is difficult, if at all possible nowadays to find an attorney who would be brave (or suicidal) enough to make a motion to recuse.  

It should be prohibited for judges to sanction attorneys for making motions to recuse against them due to obvious conflicts of interest and because such motions are seeking to ensure a constitutional right for attorneys' clients, yet, judges in New York rain such sanctions on attorneys who dared to make such motions left and right - and turn attorneys into the disciplinary committees for further sanctions.

Lippman did not touch upon the practically non-existent system of judicial discipline.

Of course, Lippman knows just how non-existent the system of judicial discipline is since he personally invited to his confirmation hearing the NYS Commission for Judicial Conduct's counsel Robert Tembeckjian while there was no public notice issued for such hearings, and while a complaint against Lippman was pending in front of the Commission at that time.

The Commission has long become a shredder for complaints against judges, starting with the County/Family court level.

The Commission needs to be disbanded, and a transparent and effective system of discipline needs to be established.

To demonstrate just how corrupt and ineffective the Commission is, New York State needs to do just one thing - open the records of complaints against judges, and of answers to those complaints (if the Commission even has such an archive), and to provide copies of those records in the judicial directory, against the names of the judges complained about.

Since complaints are about court cases, the public will then be able to investigate whether conduct complained of actually occurred and is reflected in the record - many times it is - and see for itself whether complaints were dismissed improperly.

At this time, such statistics is unavailable to the public since proceedings against judges are secret.

Lippman also did not cover the burning issue of judicial corruption or, if not corruption, appearance of inappropriate behavior.

In federal courts, judges at least started to begin to pay lip service to the fact that there may be a problem in judges attending private seminars, and judges are required to publicly disclose such attendance.

In New York, it is impossible to get information:

• if a certain judge participated in any social functions/seminars sponsored, directly or indirectly, by attorneys, and where the judge had an opportunity for an ex parte communication with such attorneys;
• whether the judge participated or "served" or "serves" presently on any of the countless "Boards", "Councils", "Programs", "Projects", "Trusts", etc. where participating attorneys have an unlimited opportunity for ex parte communications with judges;
• whether the judge or judge's relatives have social networking connections with litigants or their attorneys, like Facebook friendships;
• whether certain law firms employ judge's relatives and judges in question are in a position of power to influence decisions for such law firms, and whether such law firms appear in the courts where judges preside.  Where law firms may have hundreds of attorneys, and where the relation with the judges may be obscured by different last names or common last names, it is absolutely necessary to start requiring judges to publish his or her family trees, up to the 6th degree of consanguinity and affinity, with places of work of the judge's relatives (for purposes of disqualification when judges preside as factfinders - the same as the law for disqualification of jurors);

It is absolutely necessary to equalize the way jurors and judges are disqualified from fact-findings functions, including voir dire,  background investigation and peremptory challenges.

It is absolutely imperative to allow cameras (and not only of the media, but mainly litigants' video cameras) into the courtroom to preserve evidence of potential juror, attorney and judicial misconduct or non-verbal communication that cannot be captured by the transcripts, especially that, as my disciplinary case indicates, court transcripts can be and have been falsified.

It is absolutely imperative to do away with the all-encompassing and stretching beyond any limits "absolute judicial immunity", an unconstitutional self-serving gift of judges to judges, by which judges are now allowed to violate the Constitution the moment they have made an oath to protect it and get on that bench through that oath.

Yet, none of that was addressed by Lippman in his State of the Judiciary Address in 2015. 

The only important issue was raising the already high pay for judges.

Apparently, New York has to have the best judges money can buy.

New York State of the Judiciary 2015 Address - the reform of attorney discipline or agonizing attempts of New York judiciary to prevent the public from having qualified legal representation in civil rights cases?

In his "State of the Judiciary 2015" address Chief Judge of the State of New York Jonathan Lippman announced that he intends to transform the way attorneys are disciplined in New York and is creating a task force that is going to review the attorney disciplinary system "top to bottom" to see how it can be changed.

Of course, attorney licensing and discipline in New York exists (allegedly) for protection of the public.

Of course, the public is not given nearly any voice to decide which attorney needs to be investigated or disciplined, as lay members of the public have just a token presence in the attorney disciplinary committees.

Of course, attorney disciplinary hearings, (same as judicial disciplinary hearings) must be open to the public in accordance with EXISTING law, but it never happens for judicial disciplinary hearings.

Of course, when a disciplinary proceeding against an attorney is triggered, as in my case, by a shower of retaliatory sanctions imposed by a judge after I sued him, and I want a public hearing in my disciplinary case to show the public just HOW and WHY it is protected from me - the very same judiciary (literally) who was giving the address on 2015 (Eugene Fahey sitting behind Jonathan Lippman during the address - a judge out of my disciplinary panel in the 4th Department who denied me my statutory right to an open public court hearing) fights tooth and claw not to give the attorney a right which the Legislature already gave the attorney.

Of course, the "task force" for reviewing what needs to be revamped in the attorney disciplinary system in New York will by chaired by the Chief Administrative Judge of the State of New York A. Gail Prudenti and will consist of "members of the bench and the bar" (judges and attorneys). 

My question to you, ladies and gentlemen, New Yorkers, is why Jonathan Lippman used YOUR money to create a task force without YOUR participation to decide how it is better to "revamp" a system that is designed (allegedly) to protect YOU.

Why such an extreme paternalism - at your expense?

Why you are not asked BEFORE this decision was made whether YOU, members of the public, would like to conduct such a task force, at taxpayers' expense, without ANY input from "the bench and the bar" unless the public Task Force asks their opinion?

After all, it is the public that is sought to be protected by attorney disciplinary system?  Right?

And the public that is paying a heavy price for having attorney disciplinary system, where 4 out of 5 New York litigants cannot afford an attorney, yet the disciplinary system continues to exist and, apparently, protect the rights of 20% of New Yorkers who can afford an attorney by preventing 80% of New Yorkers from ever having an attorney due to high prices of legal services CAUSED by the existence of attorney licensing.

Who gave Lippman authority to use taxpayers' money to make a decision - without public input - to create such a Task Force to begin with?

Who will be assigned to the "task force" - political donors, friends and relatives of political donors? There obviously is not going to be any public oversight over the budget of this "Task Force", assignment of this "Task Force", or how it will operate.

And, you may be assured that "members of the bar" "serving" on this "Task Force" will be completely removed from the reach of attorney discipline themselves, as already are all politically connected attorneys, as well as relatives, friends, employees and former employees of the judicial system.

And since being a licensed attorney for a set number of years is now a threshold to judgeship, and since the judgeship is the ultimate sinecure for attorneys who did not make it in the outside world and who want to earn enough money for the last 10 years before pension to get that substantial pension, and since the judiciary has a grip on attorneys and thus attorneys get out of their way to please judges, including catering them at "mentoring" programs, inviting them to free dinners with drinks, bringing them to health resorts for "educational" seminars, contributing to their election and re-election campaigns, employing judges' relatives, friends and former law clerks, it is unthinkable that anybody other than judges and lawyers would be on the task force to see how the legal profession should be regulated - if at all.

Furthermore, faithful to his course to announce populist (and meaningful, or harmful) decisions in order to appease public concerns without actually addressing them, Lippman announced a new feature in shopping for attorneys: availability of information about attorney discipline when you "shop for an attorney" on the website of the New York State Court Administration - the attorney directory.

It is obvious that tremendous work, at public expense, was done before the date of Lippman's address, February 17, 2015, so that this information system becomes possible.

As a side note, and I will address it more in a separate post regarding issues about the judiciary that got addressed (or not addressed) in Lippman's "State of the Judiciary 2015" speech, is that while information about public discipline only against attorneys is now put on the website, right next to the attorney's name (which is not bad had the attorney discipline been applied even-handedly, by neutral representatives of the public and for public benefit instead of to root out competition and whistle-blowers of judicial misconduct, as it is now), Lippman did not put any programmers to task to put available public disciplinary information next to judges' names on the judicial directory.

An interesting - and telling - omission.

I checked the information system out.

And I was amazed at what I DID NOT find on this "public information system".

What I did is I checked out information for two cases where, according to information I could find on the Internet, or know from personal sources, attorneys were suspended or not reinstated, or both, for criticism of judicial misconduct.

These two cases are of attorneys Doris Sassower and Leon Koziol.

Here is the snippet from attorney registration website for Doris Sassower:

Doris Sassower, a respected member of the bar and one of "bar leaders", suddenly fell out of grace with the judiciary and was speedily suspended, as far as I know, without a hearing, when she sued to declare cross-endorsement agreements between the parties for judges illegal.

At this time Doris Sassower and her daughter Elene Sassower are founders of the Center of Judicial Accountability, a non-profit organization taking a vocal stand for transparency of judicial disciplinary proceedings.

Ellen Sassower testified at the Senate Confirmation hearings of Jonathan Lippman and publicized the fact that there was no notice of public hearing, no allotted time for opposition witnesses, the Senate Judiciary Committee did not review information provided by opposition witnesses and did not provide that information to the Senate for purposes of confirmation of Lippman.

In other words, Elena Sassower made an open claim that Lippman is not a legitimate judge and that he is a usurper.

Usually orders regarding attorney discipline are available in the Internet.

I could not find the order of suspension of Doris Sassower - who was suspended in 1991, that is 24 (!) years ago and still not reinstated.  Even when an attorney is disbarred in New York, he or she is entitled to apply for reinstatement after 7 years of disbarment.

But for a suspended attorney to remain suspended for 24 years without reinstatement?

Most interesting.

So, when Lippman announced that all public orders of discipline against attorneys are now available, I rushed to the attorney directory to look up finally, what kind of reason did the judiciary concoct to suspend Doris Sassower.

I faithfully clicked on the link under Doris Sassower's registration information.

Here is what is showed me.

Oh, yes, Lippman mentioned that he only made information available about public attorney disciplinary decisions since December of 2003, and Doris Sassower's decision was from 1991.

Yet, when members of the public look up attorneys, they do that not only to shop for an attorney - obviously you cannot employ a suspended attorney - but they may do that to see on what grounds courts decided to remove an attorney who provided services for the poor from the reach of the poor, a matter of public concern.

It would make sense to provide information about public discipline of attorneys who are publicly disciplined (disbarred, suspended, censured), but are alive at this time.

And it would make sense to also see not only the Decisions, but the attorneys' full disciplinary file - why they were disciplined, what did they answer, who complained about them, whether they applied for reinstatement, what documents they presented to be reinstated, what were the reasons, if any, to deny reinstatement.

All of those issues are issues of public concern.

If you think that, according to Judiciary Law 90(10) disciplinary information on attorneys becomes public and available at the time public discipline is imposed, think again.

I am currently suing in federal court the Professional Conduct Committee of the 3rd Department for access to the file of my husband who was disbarred by that department (under circumstances clearly suggesting corruption - I wrote about it on my blog previously), to get access to his disciplinary file which is now allegedly open to the public.  The name of the case is Neroni v. Zayas, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York.

It appears that the file simply disappeared and does not exist.

And that is the "deep secret" that the New York judiciary, probably, would not want the public to know - that information as to WHY certain attorneys were suspended, disbarred and not reinstated, simply VANISHED once it allegedly was supposed to become available to the public.

Like, I am sure, information from my file will vanish if I am suspended or disbarred - while now I am not allowed access to my own file (same as my husband was not allowed access to his own file during his disciplinary proceedings), I am not allowed to open my proceedings to the public, to the point of being charged criminally for an alleged attempt to release information from MY OWN disciplinary proceedings.

So - before discipline is imposed, the information is secret because the courts say so (whether it is lawful or not, whether the attorney wants the "confidentiality" or not), and after the public discipline is imposed, the information is not available because either the Committee's block it in the hope that the suspended or disbarred attorney will be so demoralized and financially devastated that he or she will not be able to challenge them, or those documents simply vanish.

One more aspect of the information that is NOT available is information about denying reinstatements to suspended or disbarred attorneys. 

Here is a snapshot of registration information of a well known New York civil rights attorney Leon Koziol who was speedily suspended after he publicly challenged judicial misconduct: 

If you click on the link "View Possible Court Decisions Imposing Discipline", you will see the decision to impose discipline, but not the decision denying reinstatement.

And Mr. Koziol was denied reinstatement BECAUSE he testified before the now-disbanded Moreland Commission as to rampant and uncontrolled judicial misconduct in the State of New York, and because he runs a website and a blog where he raises issues of judicial misconduct in Family and divorce courts in New York, a matter of extreme public concern.

By the way, attorney Peter Torncello who actively opposed Mr. Koziol's reinstatement on the grounds that Mr. Koziol raised issues of public concern on his blog and in front of the Moreland Commission, resigned from the Professional Conduct Committee the same year, and he resigned "amid investigation into filing false time sheets".

According to his registration information, Peter Torncello was never publicly disciplined.

Apparently, in New York, filing false timesheets is ok for an attorney.

Speaking out on issues of public concern is not ok for an attorney.

So, the "spectacular" and "absolute best" judiciary, with its boss Judge Lippman, while throwing under-educated law students "to bridge the justice gap" and represent the poor, prevents two well qualified civil rights attorneys from returning to serving their clients because they raise issues of judicial misconduct during the time of their suspension.

And THAT must be a matter of public concern.

What I would suggest Judge Lippman might want to do if he really wants to inform the public of attorney discipline is have all the records pertaining to suspension or disbarment of attorneys now living to be scanned and put online next to their names.

What I also would like to suggest is to give information to the public not on the basis of attorney-by-attorney, but by a list.

What is NOT available on the website of the State of New York is a list of attorneys who have been licensed to practice law in New York since licensing began, even though such information is available through individual searches of attorneys.

Why this information is so important?

So that the public could readily see from the list what categories of attorneys are disciplined in New York.

I bet that then the public will have hard facts, not available now because the New York State Court Administration does not compile such statistics, and if it does not compile such statistics, it does not have to provide such statistics to the public on Freedom of Information requests (the usual and convenient tactic of the government to avoid review of its wrondgoing).

I bet that if and when not only court orders where courts usually try to obscure and hide the real issues of why an attorney is being disciplined, but also the FULL FILES, including attorney's answers and motions in their disciplinary proceedings, and affidavits and testimony of witnesses, if available, become readily accessible to the public (and that, by the way, will not require much money since not so many attorneys are disciplined), the public will know that, while the claim is that attorney licensing discipline is imposed to protect the public from bad attorneys, it operates to remove qualified civil rights and criminal defense attorneys' services from the reach of the poor.

If the public has in front of it a list of all attorneys who have ever be licensed (and disciplined) in New York, the public may come to realize that attorneys from the government, from powerful and politically connected law firms, relatives, friends, employees and/or business associates of judges are never disciplined, while discipline befalls predominantly on private, solo, independent attorneys, mostly criminal defense and civil rights lawyers,  or female attorneys fighting discrimination in the legal profession, or immigrant attorneys fighting discrimination against non-native speaker attorneys.  

But Lippman wouldn't want you to know that, would he, especially when he is cackling about "access to justice" and "bridging the justice gap", while actions of the judiciary operate to widen that gap and preventing it from ever being bridged.

New York State of the Judiciary Address 2015 - using slave labor of under-educated law students to bridge "the justice gap" created by attorney regulation. Can anything be more hypocritical than these "solutions"?

Here is a scenario for you.

You have a complex legal problem.

You have the money for a lawyer/advisor to help you with that problem.

With that problem and that money you are looking for an attorney to help you with the problem.

And you know that attorney licensing - allegedly - protects you.

And that only licensed attorneys may represent you.

And that an attorney can only be licensed in New York if:

1. The attorney, before becoming an attorney, SUCCESSFULLY - graduates from an ABA-accredited law school;
2. Then and only then - on SUCCESSFUL graduation out of law school - will the attorney be allowed to even sit for the bar.

Now look at the "solution" to the "justice gap" in New York where over 80% of New Yorkers (4 out of every 5, or nearly 2 MILLION litigants every year) cannot afford counsel.

So, now your lawyers in the "PRO BONO Scholars Program" will have not 3 years of law school education (remember - the reason for attorney license was to guarantee to customers uniformity and quality of legal education, among other things?).

Such "scholars" will have 2.5 years of law school education.

So, the poor are entitled to representation by under-educated law students who did not yet finish law school.

Now, please, tell me, what makes such law students "scholars"?

The law on internships is clear - the internship can only be an internship if the person who is in the internship is TAUGHT something.

These under-educated law students are not thrown in to be TAUGHT anything - they are thrown in - remember why? - TO BRIDGE THE JUSTICE GAP, simply as slave labor.

Everybody knows how expensive legal education is nowadays.

Nothing is said here that the "PRO BONO" students will be forgiven their last-semester law school tuition?

I doubt law schools, currently struggling already from decreasing enrollments, will agree to that.

So, most likely, the students are going to still have to pay their last-semester tuition while working PRO BONO - for a semester!

And this proposal of slavery is supposed to have this expected effect:

I remember a similar incentive in the Soviet Union - to gave to the best workers a red banner, passing from worker to worker as a great honor.

Well, unless Lippman omitted some significant details in the "Pro Bono Scholars Program", I don't see the incentive to go their for law students, especially because the Pro Bono Scholars will not be allowed into the areas where they will learn skills that will allow them in the future access to a customer base who can pay for their services.

The biggest incentive would have been here - loan forgiveness.  Complete loan forgiveness if a law student, on graduation - ON TIME, after 3 years of school - agrees to donate a certain amount of hours to people in need of legal services.

Apparently, New York does not have the budget for that.

And slave labor was never effective, even when it is portrayed as "the honorable service" of "our best and brightest".

Somehow I do not see Jonathan Lippman's children, both attorneys, one Harvard-educated and the other Cornell-educated, to rush into pro bono representation of under-served individuals.

That would have been one big PR campaign for Lippman.  But - alas.

And in the same address Lippman was pushing for even higher pay for judges - which at this time already is 3-4 TIMES higher than any salaries that "our best and brightest" can earn if they decide to become "full-time advocates for those in need".

Again, populism and hypocrisy.  As usual.

The next brilliant solution of the "justice gap" - the whole of 20 scholars for the "poverty solution" project will go after graduation to "legal service providers".  20 new and inexperienced attorneys to bridge the gap of 2 million litigants who cannot afford legal representation.  

Lippman really had to announce this "solution" in his "State of the Judiciary" address as a big achievement.

I wonder how many times less those 20 scholars will cost the state of New York than maintaining the lavish suites for judges of the NYS Court of Appeals and other courts, and take care of carvings, furniture and paintings in those courtrooms.

Just out of curiousity.

What Judge Lippman did not really concentrate on is what kind of QUALITY of legal representation his proposed "solutions" give to people.  

After all, attorney licensing is heralded as necessary to protect consumers (even those 4 out of 5 who, because of attorney licensing, and associated higher prices of legal services, cannot afford the services of those same licensed attorneys), to ensure quality of legal representation.

First of all, who are those mysterious "we"?

Was Lippman ever evicted to speak of "hard-earned experience"?

And don't "we" know from "hard-earned" experienced that what a person needs in the courtroom is not the presence of a "lawyer", but the presence of a professional adviser (unfortunately, due to criminal laws against unauthorized practice of law those advisers at this time can be only licensed attorneys, without regard to their actual experience or skills) who knows what he or she is doing.

Lippman is bridging the gap with either students who did not yet graduate from law school, or by students who just graduated and do not have any experience.

To proclaim such "solutions' as "bridging the gap" and helping indigent people find proper legal representation is a SICK JOKE that can only be perceived with applause by spoiled rich people, such as New York State judges are (as compared to the average income of New Yorkers, County and Supreme Court judges are rich).

I have a funny feeling that these "solutions" to the "justice gap problems" is nothing other than procuring funding to some "friendly organizations".

With this in mind, I will be investigating who stands behind the "approvied" "private-public partners" in this "Poverty Justice Solutions" program, the partners announced by Lippman in the same address:

Lippman is retiring this year.

His friend Silver is under criminal prosecution for corruption and, probably, cannot help any more.

So - there may be a real need to start building bridges for the future jobs-after-retirement for Lippman.  And what would work more nicely than a chunk of change to a "certified" "public-private partner", where nobody can really trace whose nephew, friend, colleague, brother, sister-in-law, etc. of a founder of that "private-public partner" will employ the retired judge in the future.

Do I believe in people who are work for public good without hope of a monetary - or any other - reward?

Of course, I do.

I just do not believe in sincerity of Lippman, or that Lippman will choose such people or firms for "public-private partnerships".

The next "solution" by Lippman is - without deregulation of attorneys - expansion of the now-pilot program of PRO BONO non-lawyer "court navigators".

I have not heard anything about removing from the books the recently elevated to a felony level UPL (unauthorized practice of law) Penal Law, and what Lippman proposes "court navigators" are doing would easily result in UPL charges against, let's say, a suspended or disbarred attorney.

Filling out forms, advising as to deadlines imposed by courts etc. etc. etc.

Why not deregulate the legal profession already?  How does Lippman suppose he will get those "court advocates" in needed numbers if they are required to be PRO BONO - what is the incentive for MILLIONS of people, in our state of economy, with majority of Americans living from paycheck to paycheck, to become PRO BONO "court navigators"?

Of course, the New York State Bar association will see "great progress" in "court navigators", as long as they do not get a cut of the pie and are not allowed to (1) charge for their services, or (2) represent people in lucrative areas of law - divorces, criminal law.

It is "ok" for the NYSBA to have "court navigators" "assist" indigent litigants in cases housing and consumer debt cases.

In fact, both housing and consumer debt cases require skills and diligence.

In consumer debt cases most cases are resolved by default or by waiver of the main issue in such cases - standing and fraudulent assignments of debts.

To analyze documentation and properly present it to the courts, one needs training, and I DO NOT insist that there should be a requirement for a licensed attorney representation in such cases.

I saw enough of licensed attorneys who did not have a clue what they are doing in such cases.

Once again - if the "court navigators" are allowed in two types of cases, providing services that can be charged as UPL:

(1) why allow to do that ONLY pro bono;

(2) why allow to do that only in two types of cases - housing and consumer debt?

(3) why restrict what "court advocates" can do?

My suggestion to our illustrious and "spectacular", "absolutely the best" judiciary.

Stop acting like you do not see the solution that is right under your nose.  

Stop bridging the very real justice gap by stupid tricks that only your spoiled rich associates can applaud to.  

Stop introducing half-measures and non-measures.

Just deregulate the legal profession - and the justice gap will instantly shrink, if not disappear.  Soon.

But I doubt that the judiciary will be promoting deregulation, as the judiciary is interested in (1) having control over lawyers;  (2) having control over what lawyers say about judges; (3) secure well-paid positions after retirement in law firms.

And, if the judiciary pushes for deregulation, who will wine and dine them?  Who will donate to their election campaign?  Who will bring them to resorts for "educational" seminars?  Who will employ their relatives and friends?

The push for deregulation and for really bridging the justice gap will not come from the judiciary.

It should come from the People of the State of New York, through our own legislative initiatives.

Let's come together and do it.