Disciplinary proceedings against Judge Kreep of San Diego, California - a political retaliation?

While reporting on judicial misconduct, I came across bad judges with pretty telling names.  I already reported on judges by the name of Free, Best and Real.

Now is the turn to report on Judge Kreep.

Judge Gary Kreep, of San Diego, California, was recently charged with 11 counts of misconduct, some valid, some not and some really petty.

Judge Kreep's behavior, as charged, is crude, on occasion improper, sexist and racist.  And, Judge Kreep engaged in ex parte communications and did not represent facts correctly during his election campaign.  Yet, the timing of the charges - 4 years after the election, the pettiness of some charges, and the fact that this particular judge was the target of blanket peremptory challenges by criminal prosecutors suggests selective enforcement of judicial discipline against Judge Kreep.

After all, he did nothing that other judges do not do - on a regular basis. Not that it is right, but, once again - anybody appearing in American courtrooms, after looking through the charges, can find that "their" judges behaved in the exact same manner, as to one, more than one, or all charges of misconduct against Judge Kreep.

Here is the description of the charges.

Judge Kreep likes to crack a joke - like this:

And he joked again with a public defender.  Like this:

And, also jokingly, of course, Judge Kreep called attorneys appearing in front of him by nicknames - just as retired Delaware County (New York) Judge Carl F. Becker did (he called an attorney a clown and a Santa Claus).  Here is Judge Kreep's jokingly invented nicknames for attorneys:

JudgeKreep also joked about an attorney's pregnancy - that the opposing counsel needs to wrap up the arguments shorter so that the pregnant attorney can go home and have her baby:

And Judge Kreep openly joked about how good a friend he was to a disabled personal friend:

I wonder how many friends Judge Kreep will have left after that particular disclosure, and how many of them will ask Judge Kreep for help - or offer help, for that matter.

And #JudgeGaryKreep joked yet again - with a criminal defendant:

Judge Kreep is a judge in San Diego, California.

The Bunny Ranch is a brothel in Nevada, which also has an online sexually explicit content.

Apparently, Judge Kreep had personal knowledge (and, maybe, experience?) of this brothel - which he readily shared in an open courtroom, jokingly of course, while accepting a plea from a young woman for prostitution and giving her a fatherly advice as to how to turn her life around.

Judge Kreep's jokingly humiliated young attorneys:

Judge Kreep jokingly - of course - referred to criminal sentences he imposed on people as "gifts":

Judge Kreep referred to cases by ethnicity of criminal defendants involved - and connected that ethnicity with attorneys appearing in front of him:

Judge Kreep is accused of using crude language in the courtroom:

Jiudge Kreep stressed Latino ethnicity of defendants and attorneys:

Amazingly, while lawyers are usually very submissive to judges, Judge Kreep was, apparently, so bad that lawyers boycotted his courtroom.

Of course, I do not know how that can technically be done without hurting clients' cases if the judge is assigned to the case - but a boycott by lawyers was reported, and, reportedly, on the day of the boycott the judge threatened a public defender that "they" will come "for her" if "they" "came for" the judge.

Here are the charges against Judge Kreep in full.

Judge Kreep is also charged for:

• misrepresentation to voters - and thus being elected by fraud (which reminds me of Albany County (New York) Supreme Court judge Christina Ryba ["ryba" means "fish" in Russian, by the way] who was FIRED from her job in the Appellate Division 3rd Department because she engaged in election fraud, but the New York State Commission for Judicial Conduct refused to find anything amiss in Ryba's behavior):

• running for judicial public office without resigning from another public office, as required by law:

• opposed a candidate for a public office (the President of the United States) while running for another public office (this charge I find questionable since a candidate for public office does not lose his voting rights by running for a public office)

(3 lengthy examples are included into the charges, you can see them fully here);

• failed to report certain expenses during his election campaign;
• used his personal credit card and his personal bank account to finance his election campaign, instead of the campaign contribution account;
• remained for six weeks as counsel of record in a federal case after taking office as a judge;
• issued reimbursement checks in a way creating an impression that the judge continued to practice law after Judge Kreep took the bench

• pre-judged a case without a hearing and while refusing to allow an evidentiary hearing that was scheduled (Count 6);
• made improper remarks about people's ethnicities - be it Latino, Mexican, Chinese (described above), or Phillipino

• obtained legal advice for cases from attorneys who did not represent any parties, and then made rulings based on that advice

• delegated authority to parties to decide cases instead of himself

• during a trial, while being a fact-finder, injected his personal experiences into the trial (4 examples are contained in the charges, Count 10);
• presided over a motion scheduled in an ex parte manner and granted it (Count 11).

Well.

All of the above, with the one exception I noted (as to voting rights of a candidate for public office) is bad.

But, I bet that readers who have any experience with American courts would say that all judges that they appeared in front of are exactly the same - and are doing exactly what Judge Kreep was doing.

• Assigning nicknames to attorneys;
• Making inappropriate, crude, sexist, racist jokes in and out of court;
• engaging in ex parte communications;
• pre-judging cases;
• injecting their own experiences into cases - same as Charges 1 through 11, with specifications, allege against Judge Kreep.

And, judges who do all of that, do not get any discipline - the absolute majority of complaints against judges are dismissed without discipline or even an investigation, in all states, including the blessed state of California, home to Judge Kreep.

Moreover, charges were filed in 2016 against Judge Kreep for his alleged misconduct in 2012 during his election campaign, 4 years after the fact.

Why Judge Kreep?  Why now?

Is it a belated revenge against Judge Kreep for being what was characterized a "legal activist" and a "high profile birther", questioning authority of President Barack Obama to be re-elected to office based on claims that he was born outside of the United States?

Also, even though charges to mention that Judge Kreep made inappropriate comments about a public defender, the bulk of the charges were because of the boycott by the City Attorneys - who usually act as prosecutors.

And, back in 2013, when Judge Kreep was just elected, by a narrow margin, it was mentioned in a high-profile legal blog that Judge Kreep "earned the ire only of prosecutors", while public defenders had no problem with the judge.  The ire that Judge Kreep somehow drew from the prosecutors resulted in a "blanket challenge" - through the use of statutory peremptory disqualification - from all criminal cases, I described what is a peremptory challenge to a judge more than 2 years ago, here.

Not to mention that Judge Kreep's opponent in his election campaign, Garland Peed, is reportedly working in the city attorney's criminal division that is boycotting the judge.

And, many Counts of the charges are outright petty.

You just don't charge a judge with an ethical violation simply because he complimented a female attorney or employee in the courtroom for being pretty.

That is really, really, really petty.

By the way, one of the counts was that Judge Kreep had ex parte communications with public defenders.

I bet that Judge Kreep would never have been charged if he did what other judges are usually doing - having ex parte communications with the prosecutors.

I can recall another case that I recently reported on - of New York judge Thomas Keefe who was forced to resign because prosecutors were not happy with him.

If defense attorneys were not happy with a judge, he would, probably, be given a badge of honor, no matter how crude, rude, sexist and racist he would be with defense attorneys.

And that is the whole problem with disciplinary prosecution of Judge Gary Kreep in California - as well as with the disciplinary prosecution of Judge Thomas Keefe in New York.

Bashing attorneys for the poor as a norm in American Courts? #MaleChauvinistPig Galore: handcuffing public defenders, episodes 1 through 3 - and still no disciplinary proceedings for Nevada Judge Conrad Hafen

I wrote two days ago about the outrageous incident where a judge in Nevada, white elderly male (ugly - it's the truth) Christian judge handcuffed a young female beautiful immigrant darker-skin attorney, a public defender, for allegedly "talking over him" when he was "making a ruling",  because she was following her duty and trying to put in additional argument and make the record for appeal against incarceration of her poor client BEFORE the judge made his ruling.

As of today, I did not find any information that any disciplinary proceedings were started against Judge Conrad Hafen.

Yet, there was a report indicating that Judge Hafen never criticized her before he had her handcuffed (while lying that he had problems with her in the previous 6 months), and that Judge Hafen was, in fact, "very complimentary" about attorney Zohra Bakhtary in his conversations with other attorneys.

Reports Judge Hafen's secret compliments to Ms. Bakhtary only confirm my suspicion that having her handcuffed had nothing to do with what she did in court, and had everything to do with her youth, beauty and sex appeal to the aging (and ugly) judge.

Yet, there appeared an article where the author agreed with me that what occurred appeared to be an intentional discrimination against women - and against public defenders - and that the court system thus demonstrated its contempt for the poor through its contempt for those who represent the poor.

The article cites to two other episodes - in D.C. in 2007 and in California in 2015 where the same was done to - "coincidentally" - female public defenders for constitutional arguments in court on behalf of the poor.

Here are the parties in D.C. and California cases.

D.C.:

The judge - John B. Bayly, Jr. 


Judge Bayly is white.

Judge Bayly is Catholic - judging by the Catholic wedding ceremony of her daughter in 2009.


By the way, Judge Bayly was sued, by a dark-skinned man, Henok Araya, for religious discrimination - and the lawsuit dismissed only o contrived judicially created grounds - because in a child custody proceedings he awarded custody to the parent of his own religion, Catholic, specifically allowed questioning about the opposing parent's religion and made his determination of custody, apparently, because he personally preferred children to be raised in his own faith.

Judge John B. Bayly, Jr. is reportedly a member of the American Inn of Court, a secret organization, funded by legal elite, providing free perks to judges.

In 2015 Judge Bayly requested a reappointment as a Senior Superior Court Judge of D.C. Court.

Apparently, Judge Bayly was reppointed - to a misdemeanor court, where he "serves" until present time.

In regards to the case of handcuffing, unlawful detention and strip-search of female public defender Liyah K. Brown, Judge Bayly was only "reprimanded" for that - just reprimanded, for "intemperate conduct".

Judge Bayly's reasons for the order were exactly the same as Judge Hafen's:

So, a public defender was "oppositional and defiant" in arguing about this:

Here is the full order of reprimand of judge John H. Bayly, Jr.  It mentions an "intrusive patdown search", but does not mention that Ms. Brown was actually strip-searched, as her lawsuit against the guard says.  And, even though the guard was less liable than the judge who ordered Ms. Brown's ordeal, the judge escaped with a slap on the wrist and continues to be a judge.


Don't be a bad boy, judge, the order of reprimand for "intemperate conduct" said, don't have those naughty female public defenders handcuffed, detained and strip-searched in the presence of a male deputy marshall.  I wonder whether the creep watched the court security video of the strip-search, too, he certainly had access to it as a judge.  There is no indication that the Judicial Conduct Commission checked into judge's being a potential sexual predator in the courtroom.  Judges who are sexual predators are routinely protected from discipline and are allowed to continue to "serve".

The public defender who "talked over" judge Bayly in making a constitutional argument for her poor and homeless client was Liyah K. Brown, an '04 law school graduate, just 3 years out of law school at the time, reportedly a Soros Criminal Justice Fellow, a young, bright and dedicated public defender.

Her dedication to her homeless client, apparently, earned her a handcuffing, a detention and a strip-search.

I will give credit to her colleagues, attorneys who reportedly started to wear red armbands to the courthouse, in solidarity with Ms. Brown.


Ms. Brown filed a lawsuit against the security guard for strip search and unlawful detention, but the guard died mid-litigation - and, of course, the main culprit, the judge, was unreachable by lawsuit because the judiciary gave itself a gift of absolute judicial immunity for malicious and corrupt acts on the bench.

It is obvious that the main reason for handcuffing, detaining and strip-searching Ms. Brown, a young woman, in front of men was to humiliate and embarrass her - and, possibly, for the judge to have an opportunity to see her naked body on the court security cameras.

California:

In California, no judge was involved (at least no involvement by a judge was disclosed), but a female public defender Jami Tillotson was arrested by male police officers when she objected to interrogation of her client in protection of her client's 5th Amendment rights.

All of the three attorneys share the same traits:

• they were female;
• they were public defenders;
• they protected constitutional rights of the poor.

Even President Obama has recently succumbed to bashing of public defenders and did not nominate to the U.S. Supreme Court a judge who was a public defender, based on false accusations against her in the press which were easily verifiable as false.

And, in view of what happened to female public defenders Liyah K. Brown, Jami Tillotson, Zohra Bahtary, the recent claim of "Justice" Sonya Sotomayor for the need to mandate pro bono representation of the poor appears as even more of a hypocrisy.  

"Justice" Sonya Sotomayor maintains self-given judicial immunity for herself and for other judges for malicious and corrupt acts on the bench, and at the same time wants to mandate representation of the poor by all lawyers, while knowing the degree of contempt, disrespect and attorney-bashing of criminal defense and civil rights attorneys who already represent the poor, and while regularly tossing appeals of such attorneys when they are punished for criticizing such judges and punished for raising constitutional arguments on behalf of the poor in court.

Such behavior by Judge Sotomayor is an act of ultimate hypocrisy.  

What is happening to public defenders, especially female public defenders who are trying to do their jobs for the poor properly - even while being underfunded and overworked - is sending a message that lawyers representing the poor can and likely will be subjected to any kind of embarrassment and humiliation by the courts for doing their jobs properly - and that judges will be "immune" from punishment and protected by the system.

That is not exactly encouraging for attorneys to provide quality representation for the poor.

It is encouraging such attorneys to do the opposite - sell their clients out.  After all, they cannot sue them for malpractice, being the poor.  In New York the poor cannot sue their criminal defense attorney (mainly assigned) unless they overturn the conviction, even if the conviction is obtained through poor representation.  Quite an incentive to sell out poor clients...

At this background, "Justice" Sonya Sotomayor claims that she believes that slave lawyers will still be providing good representation to the poor "out of professional pride", seems like an even bigger hypocrisy.

Try exercising you professional pride and providing proper representation for the poor, for payment or especially for free, knowing that, if you are a female, and especially if you are a young and pretty female, you may be spotted by some old white pig judge, ordered handcuffed, put into a cell, your breasts will be bared in front of men there, and the judge and his whole entourage will be watching your naked body over security cameras.

And, very likely, your law license may be stripped if you persist in your "frivolous" constitutional arguments on behalf of the poor, you will be blackballed from any decent employment for life, as it happens to many attorneys suspended or disbarred for criticizing the judiciary - and any other licensing in the increasingly licensed labor market of this country will be denied to you, too.

And, if your license is stripped,  "Justice" Sotomayor will make it prohibitively expensive and burdensome for you to appeal to her court, even if you are pursued by a creepy judge like judges Hafen and Bayly, and will toss your petition without an explanation, preferring instead to review cases that will get her sensational reviews and gratitude from wealthy parties. 

Knowing all that, I wonder, how much of "professional pride" will motivate you then to properly represent the poor.

Yet another attorney-blogger who criticized judicial misconduct, specifically, criminal sexual misconduct of two federal judges, ex parte communications of federal judges, and misconduct of personal lawyers of presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and of judicial nominee of President Obama is targeted for disbarment. A tribute to the courage of attorney Ty Clevenger

I wrote on this blog about attorney Ty Clevenger who outed through complaints and blogs misconduct, including sexual misconduct, of several federal judges and high-ranking politically connected attorneys.

Specifically, some high-ranking public officials who got into the cross-hairs of Ty Clevenger's criticism are listed below, and the main target of Ty Clevenger's criticism was Judge Walter Scott Smith Jr., of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas

Walter Smith was outed by attorney Clevenger for sexual misconduct revealed in attorney Clevenger's own disciplinary proceedings in the State of Texas - dismissed proceedings - where the victim of Judge Smith testified under oath that Judge Walter Smith:

1. spotted her years before he started sexually harassing her, because the judge actually had in his private chambers monitors where he saw court employees coming and going from the courthouse, and the victim was initially the newly-hired probation officer;
2. after the victim was promoted to become a court clerk four year later judge Smith used his power as the judicial officer to order the victim to appear in his private chambers at the time was drunk on the job, groped her when she appeared, and propositioned to her;
3. when the victim got away from Judge Smith and notified her superior not to leave her alone with Judge Smith because of her advances, Judge Smith started to pursue her by sending her flower bouquets, pressing her to go to rendezvous with the judge outside of the courthouse,  ordering the victim's superior to step away and keep away while judge stayed alone with the victim, and, when the victim was forced to leave her job and filed an employment discrimination complaint,
4. the victim was restored in her job, but then the judge created an impossible hostile atmosphere at work where the victim was actually blamed for making a complaint against the judge by co-workers who had to tolerate the judge's misconduct; and,
5. the judge caused his law clerk to exert pressure upon the victim to withdraw the complaint,
6. and exerted pressure on another employee in the courthouse who tried to reason with the judge and protect the victim, to also resign from the job.

See one of my blog about misconduct of Judge Smith here.

Likely because of Ty Clevenger complaints and blogs, the investigation against Judge Walter Smith that initially ended in just a reprimand and a short suspension without loss of judgeship, without loss of law license and without referral of the judge to criminal investigative and prosecutorial authorities, recently renewed and "deepened".

In April of 2016, attorney Ty Clevenger asked the U.S. Chief Judge John Roberts to speed up investigation of Judge Smith.

In response, Ty Clevenger was targeted with disbarment proceedings, where disbarment charges were filed by personal counsel for presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and attorney for Bill Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, attorney David Kendall (and a former clerk of the U.S. Supreme Court Justice Byron White) who was among her team of lawyers who destroyed evidence, specifically, THIRTY THOUSAND of e-mails on Hillary Clinton's private server, where such evidence was targeted by both court subpoenas and Freedom of Information Act requests.

By the way, it was recently reported by a Sun Foundation, a watchdog of government compliance with access-to-records requests, that the U.S. Department was not exactly truthful with the U.S. President as to the rate of disclosure on those FOIA requests - and that it was simply an "inaccurate report", given what Hillary Clinton's legal team did, is an understatement of the century, it looks more like deliberate shielding of high-standing public official from requests that could expose them to criminal charges, see also what is done all over the country to people who seek access to public records, see what happened specifically in the State of Georgia last month. 

I was actually personally sanctioned and ordered to pay tens of thousands in sanctions and opponent's legal fees for "harassing" opponents (a former judge) through disclosure of his misconduct in a court proceeding based on information I obtained through an access-to-public-record request.  Moreover, my license was suspended by a judge in response to a motion based on information received through such an access-to-records request revealing that the "judge"'s claim that he is a judge is not based on competent evidence required by law and is, thus, false.

See also how the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, a court that habitually puts civil rights appeals on a "fast-and-sloppy" track of summary non-precedential orders (see also my blog here) made by extremely old judges, is trying to stall my FOIA request about potential widespread corruption between federal and state judges and politically connected attorneys that 2nd Circuit covers up for, and likely has been covering up for - for decades.

Individuals seeking public records and exposing such records of misconduct and corruption of public officials are usually citizens hurt by such misconduct, journalists and civil rights attorneys.

All of these people, as explained, with proof, above, are subject to harsh retribution in this country by the politically powerful targets of the criticism and their helpers.

Ty Clevenger's case is no exception.

After all, he not only publicly criticized judicial corruption in his blog, but published the actual transcript of testimony implicating a federal judge Walter Smith in sexual misconduct against at least one and possibly more court employees.

That was, of course, unforgivable, and the former law clerk of a U.S. Supreme Court justice, a former counsel of the U.S. President Bill Clinton, the present counsel of presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and the chair of disciplinary committee (what "coincidences"!) of the D.C. Circuit court
David Kendall, had to file disbarment charges against Ty Clevenger based on trumped up charges, while himself engaging in criminal conduct that is not subject to discipline because David Kendall is a "golden boy" and is above the law, and

who used attorney disciplinary proceedings as a tool of political destruction of critics of judicial misconduct, and who himself, by public admission of his high-ranking client, engaged in a crime, was not investigated or prosecuted, in a disciplinary proceeding or in a criminal proceeding.

That the D.C. District Court for the District of Columbia actually uses attorney disciplinary boards staffed by supermajority of attorneys, competitors to those attorneys the boards investigate and prosecute, in violation of the recent precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court declaring that disciplinary board consisting of super-majorities of market players (licensed attorneys disciplining licensed attorneys) is a violation of federal (civil and criminal) antitrust laws (see also a letter from a former federal antitrust prosecutor on liability of such attorney grievance committees for doing what they are doing to Ty Clevenger), and in violation of the recent ruling of the D.C. District Court's supervising court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. Circuit that regulation of an industry by a participant and a competitor in the industry is a violation of due process of law of the competitors.

Obviously, while the D.C. Circuit Court rules that it is a violation of the "regulated" businesses and individual's due process rights when they are regulated, or rather, railroaded (pun intended since the D.C. Circuit case refers to regulation of the railroad industry by Amtrak) by their own competitors, the D.C. District Court continues to appoint competitors to railroad attorneys like Ty Clevenger who dare to expose judicial misconduct - bad judicial misconduct, sexual criminal judicial misconduct, as well as bad criminal misconduct of attorneys with political connections to the highest echelons of power in this country. 

By the way, the dismissed Texas State disciplinary proceeding against attorney Ty Clevenger where the victim of sexual misconduct of federal judge Walter Smith testified was conveniently brought on  complaint of an attorney who represented, without disclosure, Judge Smith's in the judicial investigation of his misconduct. The attorney was rewarded for representing Judge Smith in the investigation by protection from well deserved discipline. 

The convenient disbarment proceedings were brought against attorney Ty Clevenger in the D.C. Circuit court by an attorney who conveniently destroyed e-mails that likely presented evidence of Hillary Clinton's criminal conduct and could have secured, instead of presidency, prison, disbarment and disgrace for Hillary Clinton.  Attorney Kendall was rewarded for his criminal conduct on behalf of Hillary Clinton similarly with protection from discipline or criminal prosecution.

By the way, and, of course, coincidentally, Hillary Clinton is the preferred candidate of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Ginsburg who recently was subject of criticism for her public statement that Hillary Clinton's opponent, presidential candidate Donald Trump, is a "faker" and has "no consistency".

Justice Ginsburg also claimed that if Donald Trump gets elected, Justice Ginsburg will have to flee to New Zealand.

Statements of a judge in anticipation of "Gore v Bush" # 2 with a harsh personal opinion about one of potential parties in front of her in such a case, constituted judicial misconduct, but Justice Ginsburg was not impeached.

Justice Ginsburg did not express regret - initially - for her personal remarks against Donald Trump and, when Donald Trump publicly stated that Justice Ginsburg should resign, stated "gloomily" that she does not know how Donald Trump can become president and that he gets "too much of free publicity."

Yet, when criticism against Justice Ginsburg heated up, Justice Ginsburg did express making remarks about Donald Trump, but did not resign, and very recently, 9 days ago, reportedly held private out-of-court meetings with attorneys "and their guests" at a private resort in New Mexico, discussing who knows what in ex parte meetings with those attorneys "and their guests".

Just in February of this year, another U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia's misconduct was revealed only after he turned up dead also at a private resort, but in Texas, at the border with Mexico, when his death was clouded with secrecy, local laws were violated in how his death was pronounced without an autopsy, and his body was secretly whisked out of the crime scene and criminal jurisdiction, evidence destroyed by embalming his body, and then his body was removed to Washington and he was hastily and pompously buried. 

I wrote a lot about that occurrence, my blogs can be found by a word-search "Antonin Scalia" in the search window on the right of this blog, but one of the most prominent statements made about Antonin Scalia's passing was that we as a nation should not allow ourselves to lament the passing of a racist judge caught dead, literally, during a trip suggesting corruption, simply because of his high status.

Recently, yet another U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Sonya Sotomayor, expressed at yet another private gathering, in Alaska, that criticism against her "get to her stomach", sending out a clear chilling message to attorneys and parties who appear in front of her, or have a possibility of their cases heading towards her court, to shut up and not criticize her no matter what misconduct she is involved in.

I already broke that rule, by criticizing Justice Sotomayor in September of 2015, "coincidentally" 2 months before suspension of my law license, for potential corruption;  in May of 2016, see also here, and June of 2016, for advocacy of slavery ;  and in August of 2016 for making a thinly veiled threat against those who criticize her.

"Coincidentally", after I criticized ALL the U.S. Supreme Court justices for misconduct in book-writing while tossing meritorious cases without review and for "sponsoring" (in words) the law clerks for all expenses paid trips to England at the expense of secret bodies funded by their secret attorney members and their foreign colleagues, an anonymous criticizer who admitted only to being a male lawyer, but who was likely a judge or a person close to the U.S. Supreme Court justices, published comments on my blog, castigating me for my allegedly "misguided" criticism of judicial misconduct.

When my criticism continued, I was quickly suspended from the practice of law.

Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court was outed for more corruption when a foreign reputable media source, the Reuters agency, published an article about "The Echo Chamber", 66 attorneys with ties to the court, former law clerks of Justices of the court, former colleagues or social contacts (57 men, 9 women, no blacks), who continuously "win" discretionary review in front of the U.S. Supreme Court - at the time when the court cut its intake in half from 1980s by 2009 while the population increased at least 1/3 by the same 2009, and while the Internet, smart phones and social media cause an extraordinary surge of civil rights litigation lately based on documented evidence of governmental misconduct.

With that background, it is not at all surprising that, when attorney Ty Clevenger asked the Chief U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts to speed up investigation of sexual misconduct of federal judge Walter Smith, attorney Ty Clevenger found himself facing a hasty disbarment proceeding.

Attorney Clevenger expects to be railroaded soon - not sorry, disbarred - because the disciplining court made it obvious, by providing Attorney Clevenger with less than 30 days' notice to prepare, less than 30 minutes to present his defense, and denied him the opportunity for discovery - what the court's judgement is going to be.

You do not criticize judges in this country without an expectation of harsh retribution.  Especially if you are an attorney.

Attorney Clevenger understands it well:

As law professor Carl Bogus stated in 2004 in a law review article (that was also the target of harsh criticism by the judiciary), attorneys must "scrape and bow"  to judges - or be destroyed.

Of course, lack of criticism of judges is not "cruelly unhelpful" to judges - it is actually what keeps them on their benches for decades no matter what misconduct, including criminal conduct, they engage in.

Not only lawyers treat judges as "omniscient", they are paying for seminars where judges tell lawyers about their whims - so that lawyers could serve them better.  Please, note that since I ran the blog, the CLE provider conspicously removed the description of the "pet peeves" program - which happens often with links to content exposing judicial misconduct.

I am not proud.

I saved that content, predicting that it will be deleted once the blog exposes it, and just reposted it in the update to the original blog, and here - please, note that the "precious face time with local judges" is sold, for $359 a lawyer, to be exact.

Professor Carl Bogus in his law review article "The Culture of Quiescence" clearly points out at a taboo on criticism of the judiciary - in Rhode Island, but it exists throughout the country, as cases I keep describing on this blog since its beginning in March of 2014 show.

Like the D.C. District is trying to do to attorney Ty Clevenger - who obviously does not scrape or bow.

Good for him!

Yet, professor Bogus calls upon attorneys - and rightfully so - to display leadership and courage, in large numbers, to criticize judicial misconduct:

Yet, it is easy to call people to go to barricades under bullets, but, when it becomes increasingly predictable what happens to those people who actually do go there and display their courage and "leadership" - like it is about to happen to attorney Ty Clevenger - calling for attorneys to fall on the sword is not enough.

What is needed is a grass roots movement to eliminate the source of power and retaliation against attorneys destroying and eliminating from the reach of legal consumers those attorneys who display that "leadership", with courage, honesty, and competence.

And such a grass roots movement is already rising - in the media, on the Internet, step by step, We the People, we citizen journalists do our work, day by day, and the tide is turning.

Just look at the number of judges removed or disciplined after a public outrage in social media, and even criminally prosecuted. 
We are not powerless.

And we need to keep going.

Like Ty Clevenger does with his blog.

Did the 9th Circuit, together with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg and a party in litigation, fix the case Washington v Trump?

Since last Thursday, February 9, 2017, when the 9th Circuit made its unanimous decision denying the stay of the temporary restraining order (TRO) imposed upon the President's #ExecutiveOrder on immigration by the U.S. District Court for the District of Washington James Robart (a former pro bono lawyer for refugees), I've read a lot of statements in social networks and in the press, in different languages about the decision, and a lot of them were of praise and admiration.

Praise to the country which has "the rule of law".

Praise to the situation where the President is "not above the law", and where the "court of law" can "show" the President - a lot of impolite words were used as to what exactly the 9th Circuit has "showed" President Trump, but the main polite words were - that the 9th Circuit has "shown" the President of the United States that "he is not above the law" in his actions.

And, a lot of Facebook legal experts appeared immediately who taught anybody who would disagree with the legality of the 9th Circuit decision (my analysis of that decision is coming next after this blog) that the 9th Circuit decision is now "the rule of law" and that anybody who is against that decision is an idiot. 

Well, at least the public has started to pay attention, even vicariously, through attention to the President and what he is doing, to the doings of the nations federal courts, and what those courts are doing.

But, before I even engage in legal analysis, I would like to discuss an entirely different matter - conflicts of interest of the 9th Circuit judges that are clear in sight, but which the courageous press that has a lot to say about what the President's wife and daughter are doing, but is surprisingly, or maybe not surprisingly, mum as to the egregious conflicts of interest of judges or appearance of corruption involved in judicial decisions.

Judges interpret the same clear text in a variety of different ways.  The same set of facts presented in lawsuits against President Trump, resulted in a well-reasoned decision denying the TRO - from a federal court in Massachusetts, and in a long and also reasoned (I would not say well-reasoned) decision denying the stay of a TRO in the 9th Circuit, and attempting to overrule the Massachusetts court, for which the 9th Circuit had no power whatsoever (because the federal court in Massachusetts answered to a different appellate court, the 1st Circuit).

But first and foremost, judges should be impartial and should have no personal interest in the outcome of the matter.

That nobody should sit in judgement of themselves, or in cases where they have personal financial interest, or any kind of personal interest, is a given, and is shown in a number of U.S. Supreme Court precedents, for example:

1. when a judge had a personal interest in the outcome of the case because he was given so much money by the attorneys for the party in the election campaign (over a million dollars in that case), when even more money was riding on deciding a case by a court to which the judge aspired to be elected - and was elected using that money - that his appearance of impartiality "could reasonably be questioned" (and that is an understatement of the century) - Caperton v. A. T. Massey Coal Co. 556 U.S. 868 (2009), and the decision is open-ended, not restricting itself to just financial interest of a judge;
2. when a judge had a personal interest in the outcome of a death penalty case because he himself, while being still a prosecutor, sought that same death penalty from the lower court, when his personnel elicited perjury from a witness in order to get that death penalty, when he used that death penalty conviction to get onto the bench, and when he ruled, while on that bench, 4 times, to deny to the prisoner condemned through his own misconduct and misconduct of his office, his habeas corpus petitions, including the one when egregious misconduct of his office as a prosecutor was finally found out by the defense and presented to the lower court in an evidentiary hearing - the court concentrated all of the above into a prohibition for a judge to act as an accuser and an adjudicator in the same or related court cases - Williams v Pennsylvania, 576 U.S. __ (2016);
3. and when the judge has a personal interest in a case when he is paid out of the fines he imposes in that case - Tumey v. Ohio 273 U.S. 510 (1927).

What is also interesting is that when President Trump criticized judges (Judge Curiel in 2016 and judges presiding over immigration cases brought against him in 2017), he was rolled into asphalt by the media and a lot of commentators on Facebook, to the point that the American Bar Association jumped into the fray and claimed that criticizing judges (which the ABA President called "personal attacks") is somehow an assault upon the U.S. Constitution.

Nevertheless, in 2012, when the previous president, Barack Obama, criticized judges, the press attacked the judge who allegedly retaliated for that criticism, and not the President for "assaulting the U.S. Constitution" by criticizing judges.

In 2010, Barack Obama criticized the U.S. Supreme Court's "Citizen United" ruling as a politically motivated decision, and in 2014, Barack Obama again criticized the U.S. Supreme Court's decision regarding the Obamacare, before the U.S. Supreme Court made a decision regarding that case, while the case is pending.

And, while President Trump is not a lawyer, former President Obama has a law degree, and knew that there are rules of lawyers that frown upon lawyer's comments of a case before the court made the decision. 

Of course, being a lawyer, and not willing to lose his law license, President Obama made some curtsies to the U.S. Supreme Court at a "press luncheon", even while discussing the case, with a thinly veiled criticism of what the court was doing:

And the curtsy was the recognition by the former President - and present lawyer - Barak Obama that "the Supreme Court is /sic/ the final say on our Constitution and our laws, and all of us have to respect it".

First of all, it is not clear where the lawyer Barack Obama got the idea that the U.S. Supreme Court DOES have "a final say" "on our Constitution and our laws".  The U.S. Constitution that the lawyer and former President Obama was sworn to enforce and protect, says nothing of the kind, its Supremacy Clause does not include precedents of federal courts.

Nevertheless, President Obama was not subjected to criticism by the press for criticizing the court deciding his case, and making comments on the case while it was pending.  Maybe because President Obama was so well loved by the certain press that, instead of being attacked with criticism by the press, the press actually invited President Obama to a luncheon, after his criticism of judges, and to elicit more criticism out of him, while President Trump is so hated by the press that supported Hillary Clinton that the press cannot bring itself to engage in honest investigative journalism regarding his court case, even regarding facts that are out in the open and do require much time, or resources to investigate.

Now, some more boring staff about the exciting "rule of law" that people are so eagerly discussing in the press and on Facebook as total experts - saying that the 9th Circuit has "shown" the President of the United States Donald Trump a lot of things, including that same "rule of law", and that he is not "above the law".

The U.S. Constitution guarantees all litigants:

1. access to court - through the Petitions Clause of the 1st Amendment; and
2. access to court means access to an impartial judge or judges, and to an impartial judicial review by a "neutral and detached" - under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, and the U.S. Supreme Court precedent Ward v. Village of Monroeville, 409 U.S. 57 (1972) ""it certainly violates the Fourteenth Amendment, and deprives a defendant in a criminal case of due process of law, to subject his liberty or property to the judgment of a court the judge of which has a direct, personal, substantial, pecuniary interest in reaching a conclusion against him in his case", citing to Tumey v Ohio, above.

Additionally, there are rules of judicial conduct, and, in federal law applicable to the 9th Circuit federal court, a statute, governing judicial disqualification, 28 U.S.C. 455, providing additional statutory prohibitions for judges to serve.

Most prominently, by federal statute, federal judges are disqualified when:

28 U.S.C. 455 (a) - the judge's "impartiality might reasonably be questioned";

28 U.S.C. 455 (b) (1) - when the judge has personal bias or prejudice concerning a party, or personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts concerning the proceeding;

28 U.S.C. 455 (b)(4) - the judge "knows that he, individually or as a fiduciary, or his spouse or minor child residing in his household, has a financial interest in the subject matter in controversy or in a party to the proceeding, or any other interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding";

28 U.S.C. 455 (b)(5) - the judge

• is a party to the proceeding,
• is acting as a lawyer in the proceeding; 
• is known by the judge to have an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding; 
• is to the judge's knowledge likely to be a material witness in the proceeding.

Even though a judge's law clerks are not included into the texts of any decisions or statutes, their financial interests very obviously will disqualify the judge, too, since law clerks nowadays play an essential role in judicial decision-making.

And, according to Williams v Pennsylvania (above) decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in June of 2016, just several short months ago, even if just one judge was disqualified out of a panel of judges making the decision, the decision is still void as tainted by deliberations with that disqualified judge and by that disqualified judge's input into those deliberations.

With that in mind, let's look at one of the judges on the 9th Circuit panel that decided the case in Washington v Trump on February 9, 2017 against President Trump and in favor of the states, prominently placing in his (and his colleagues') decision, as a "standing to sue" (which, if denied, would have been a jurisdictional barrier for review of the case by the court) - the so-called "proprietary interest" of State Universities (p. 9 of the decision):

After some reasoning - which I will not be discussing here, since disqualification of a judge renders void whatever legal discussions, and since I will provide a legal analysis of the case, as I said earlier, in a separate blog, concentrating here on disqualification of a judge, and on reasons for it only - the court arrives at the following conclusion as to that particular point of standing, for "proprietary interest" of State Universities:

Even though just two states, Washington and Minnesota, were suing in this case, the TRO that the 9th Circuit panel refused to stay at President Trump's request applied nationwide, and thus concerned "proprietary interests" of ALL state universities in the United States:

So, the 3 judges of the 9th Circuit panel, unanimously recognized "proprietary interests" of state universities in the entire country.

Is there a problem with such a determination?

See for yourself.

One of the panel judges, Judge Richard Clifton and his THREE current law clerks not only appear to be joined at the hip with the State University School of Law of the State of Hawaii, but so does the entire 9th Circuit court - and, unfortunately, also the U.S. Supreme Court, and below I will provide references to public documents and portions of such public documents proving it.

The interesting fact is that these documents are in open access on the Internet, but the anti-Trump press was not looking that way, and the American Bar Association was afraid to look that way when they sided with the judges rather that with the President of the United States, who was sued on behalf of all of us, taxpayers, and who grievously suffered, as did we all, and our national security, at the hands of a disqualified judicial panel.

You know, Hawaii is a good resort location to "exchange ideas", "share insight", "teach" and "be taught" about judicial excellence and all of that.

I am filing freedom of information requests with Hawaiian public agencies having custody of appropriate records regarding the involvement of the 9th Circuit, its judges and its law clerks, as well as of the U.S. Supreme Court and its judges, in the Hawaiian University Law School, which is located at 2515 Dole Street in Honolulu, HI, 7 minutes' drive away from where Judge Richard Clifton is sitting at 199 Bishop Street, Suite 2010 in Honolulu, HI :

I would also, at the very start of my story about the 9th Circuit's interesting involvement with the state university law school in Hawaii (and then ruling in favor of "proprietary interests" of state universities nationwide, including the Hawaii public university, finding standing where no self-respecting legal scholars would), point out another interesting coincidence - and, since the President indicated a desire to have the case go up to the U.S. Supreme Court, that little "coincidence" definitely matters to the public, and I am filing a series Freedom of Information law requests with various custodians of records to verify details regarding that "coincidence".

On January 30, 2017, the Hawaian State University School of Law published a picture and story of how Hawaiian University art students, with the donation from a law firm (Trecker & Fritz), painted a happy flowery 168-foot "mural" in order conceal a supposed eyesore - construction on the school grounds.

Good job, Hawaii State University Art Students.  Good job, the generous law firm Trecker & Fritz.

And, the mural was completed just in time for the visit to the sunny Hawaii of the very busy U.S. Supreme Court Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Ruth Ginsburg has a 3-month-long paid vacation each year , which no other federal or state public employee has, and in the summer, yet considered it possible to add to it by arriving into the sunny Honolulu and stayed there from Wednesday, February 8, 2017 through Sunday, February 12, 2017

(while the 9th Circuit decided the case in favor of "proprietary interests" of all state universities, including the Hawaii State University, on February 10, 2017, and the decision was made by Judge Clifton, who practically resides in Hawaii State University Law School, and whose three present clerks are professors in that court).

Ruth Ginsburg has so many cases filed with her court that she has no time to review them, rejects the overwhelming majority of them, and pushes the rest of them to be "screened" and sorted out, if not outright decided, by her law clerks, youngsters fresh out of law school - and traveled, during time when the U.S. Supreme Court is not on vacation and must be in session, reviewing cases - to a resort location.

By the way, one of Judge Clifton's recent law clerk's, Kamaile A. N. Turcan, is the current law clerk of Judge Ginsburg liberal colleague on the U.S. Supreme Court, who votes in unison with Judge Ginsburg, and vice versa, Judge Sonya Sotomayor.  By the way, the just interlinked article about Kamaile A. N. Turcan indicated that it was Judge Clifton who introduced her to Justice Sotomayor in the first place - so he knew that justice personally to begin with, and likely knows Judge Ginsburg, Sotomayor's friend.

So, good luck to the President for his right of a fair and impartial judicial review with these two judges from the U.S. Supreme Court.

Actually, good luck to the President as to the fair and impartial review of the overwhelming majority of the U.S. Supreme Court Justices deciding this particular case.

I recently posted a large blog about how Russian judges were ferried by the American Bar Association across the United States to pave the way of American lawyers into the good graces of the judiciary of Russia, and to promote interests of their clients.

Just a year ago, Ginsburg's friend, U.S. Supreme Court judge Antonin Scalia died under still unknown (and extremely suspicious) circumstances, during a Valentine Day's weekend at a remote resort next to Mexican border where he was "visiting" without his wife and mother of his 9 children,  where he was invited, according to reports, by a recent party or attorney for that party in whose favor he ruled in a case.

After Scalia's death, public debate surged for some time about impropriety of judges accepting freebie trips from attorneys and parties appearing in front of them.

The debate then subsided.

Yet, in Washington v Trump case, the debate should start to rage with new force - and I do not see it.

Judge (I WILL NOT call her a "justice", since it will do violence to the meaning of that word) Ginsburg knew that the President's case has a high likelihood to land on her desk.

Judge Ginsburg knew that the states raise issues of "proprietary standing" of public universities.

And yet, Judge Ginsburg considered it possible, during work time, and likely at the expense of the inviting party, to visit a public university in a resort location whose "proprietary interest" she will likely soon be reviewing in court.

To me as a citizen and taxpayer, that looks as an outright bribe.

Moreover, this is not the first trip of Judge Ginsburg to this particular law school.

The Hawaiian University School of Law has a "program", "sponsored" by a local large law firm - I am currently verifying the financial details of the deal through freedom of information request - called "U.S. Supreme Court Jurists-in-Residence Program".

As part of that program, 5 out of the 8 currently sitting judges of the #USSupremeCourt were ferried to Hawaii at the expense of lawyers, to a public law school in a resort location, to "share their wisdom", many of them not once, Judge Ginsburg showed up there with her husband, so, since the husband died in 2010, Judge Ginsburg has an emotional connection with Honolulu and with the #HawaiianStateUniversitySchoolofLaw that invited them for a free vacation with, I do not doubt, posh accommodations, on the ocean in Hawaii.

• #SonyaSotomayor (#RuthGinsburg's friend, voting twin on the court, and employer of #JudgeRichardClifton's former law clerk #KamaileTurcan) -  in 2012;

• #SamuelAAlitoJr. - in 2011;

This picture of Judge Alito was posted by the law firm Case Lombardi & Pettit that "sponsored" ferrying U.S. Supreme Court Justices to the Hawaii State University School of Law since 2000 (and represented that "sponsorship" as a "community service" on its website as attorney advertisement of their connections), which was done starting with the trip of the notorious lover of freebie trips Judge Scalia

• #StephenGBreyer  - in 2008;

• Anthony Kennedy in 1996, 2002, and 2006;

The last picture is from the law firm "sponsor"'s website of the "U.S. Supreme Court Jurist-in-Residence" program.

• Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in 1998 and 2004 with husband,

Case, Lombardi & Pettit got their return on "sponsorship" by getting to host a U.S. Supreme Court justice and her husband at their office and talk to them - discussing cases?

Ruth Ginsburg with husband and the Case, Lombardi & Pettit's founding partner (deceased this past summer) Daniel Case.

Ruth Ginsburg also just visited the Hawaii University School of Law in 2017, during the time when the case Washington v Trump was orally argued and decided by the 9th Circuit by a judge whose three law present time law clerks - Joshua Korr, Wayne Wagner and Aaron Henson - were, and still are, professors of the Hawaiian State University School of Law, and thus have a personal financial interest in the outcome of Washington v Trump.

Only 3 of the currently sitting Supreme Court justices, a minority - Chief Judge John Roberts, Clarence Thomas and Elena Kagan - so far escaped the enticement of a free trip to Hawaii at the expense of a public law school and a local law firm that is "sponsoring" the trips (the extent of "sponsorship" and financing travel expenses and accommodations of judges and their families will be revealed in answers to freedom of information requests).

By the way, President Trump's nominee Neil Gorsuch was a law clerk to a now-deceased U.S. Supreme Court Justice Byron White who also took advantage of this freebie, having visited as a "U.S. Supreme Court Jurist in residence" in 1992.

I wonder whether judge Ruth Ginsburg, together with the Hawaiian State University School of Law, a party with a "proprietary interest" in litigation, actually teamed up with these three law clerks of Judge Clifton during her trip to the Hawaiian School of Law on February 8, 2017, to give them instructions how to decide the case, meeting with them under the guise of meeting with the "faculty" of the Hawaiian Law School -  a great disguise for an ex parte communication in order to fix a court case.

After all, Judge Ginsburg's never tried to conceal her dislike of President Trump and even pledged to emigrate if President Trump was elected, even though she showed no hurry to deliver on her promise..

Instead of emigrating though, she apparently decided that a better use (or abuse) of her power is in in order - helping anybody who is opposing Trump.

In any event, whether Ruth Ginsburg was or was not involved in fixing the court case of the 9th Circuit by meeting with Judge Clifton's three law clerks under the guise of meeting with faculty of the Hawaiian State University School of Law - where Judge Clifton's three law clerks are law professors - it is a huge appearance of impropriety for a judge who, knowing that a case regarding a public university will come to her desk, accepts a free trip to from a public university located in a resort location, and especially from one with which she is connected with emotional reminiscences of trips with her late husband.

And, it is very apparent that the Hawaii University School of Law had large expectations from this visit of Judge Ginsburg, and had it for a long time (questioning whether Washington v Trump case was pre-planned and staged by the states in collusion with "liberal" judiciary), otherwise they would not be erecting a 168-foot Potemkin village (sorry, "mural"), and having its students happily painting it, to be completed, and happily announced, "coincidentally", right before Judge Ginsburg's visit - apparently, all efforts were made so that nothing at all would displease Judge Ginsburg.

As to Judge Ginsburg, she has a long history of using her power to elevate people based on her personal likes (and, obviously, dislikes).

For example, after Judge Ginsburg, who is Jewish, picked a Jewish girl and daughter of two psychiatrists and university professors Lisa Carol Schiavo to be her law clerk in 1989-1990, Judge Ginsburg continued to maintain such a personal relationship with her former law clerk that she officiated, along with a Rabbi, at her wedding, after which Lisa Carol Schiavo became Lisa S. Blatt, and then Judge Ginsburg systematically voted for Lisa S. Blatt in two ways:

1) first, as a matter of DISCRETION denied the overwhelming majority of petitioners to the U.S. Supreme Court, Ginsburg apparently voted to review cases where Lisa S. Blatt, with whom she shares her ethnic heritage, her former law clerk at whose wedding she officiated, was the attorney of record; and

2) second, in helping Lisa S. Blatt to win in 32 cases out of 33, thus elevating Lisa S. Blatt to the so-called "Echo Chamber" (one of 75 lawyers with most cases litigated and won in front of the U.S. Supreme Court), and the only female litigator who has such a "distinguished" record of "victories" in the U.S. Supreme Court - and helping Lisa S. Blatt immensely to gain lucrative teaching positions, in addition to her litigation, as professor of law in top law schools.

I wonder if Lisa S. Blatt's admitted credo in litigation - to win at ANY costs, no matter what the law is -

is what her mentor and friend Judge Ginsburg taught her.

And, since Lisa S. Blatt's "whole point, the only point, is to win", and her credo is not to "think about what the law should be or what the law is", only about how to win, it would not be beyond Lisa S. Blatt to use her influence and personal connection with Judge Ginsburg in order to win, not on the law, but because of Ginsburg's personal predisposition to her.

The question also emerges as to how broad is this practice, to exercise "discretion" to take 70 cases out of 8,000 filed a year of those who are former U.S. Supreme Court law clerks, or who provide to judges (and their spouses) other favors - like free trips to resorts - when the same people, again and again, "win" cases in front of the U.S. Supreme Court, as Reuters described back in 2014, while judges, including Judge Ginsburg, do not have time to even look at petitions of everybody else, sending them to their "cert pools" of clerks.

Same as Ginsburg is dedicated in using her powers as the U.S. Supreme Court justice to steer victories and success towards those she likes, Ginsburg, apparently is active in creating defeats for those - like President Donald Trump - who she publicly dislikes, in favor of parties in litigation (like the State University Law School of Hawaii in whose favor, among other state universities in the country, the 9th Circuit decided the case on February 9, 2017, during Judge Ginsburg's "visit" to the Hawaii School of Law and, likely, meetings with the "faculty", including Judge Clifton's three current law clerks - while the law school was located within 7 minutes' drive from Judge Clifton's chambers).

Even without Ginsburg's apparent interference by visit to the state university school of law where Judge Clifton's three law clerks taught as professors at the time the decision was prepared by those same law clerks, the conflict of interest of Judge Clifton himself and his law clerks, and of the 9th Circuit in relation to the Hawaii State University School of Law is staggering.

HAWAII STATE UNIVERISTY SCHOOL OF LAW WAS A PARTY MEMBER IN A CLASS LAWSUIT

Personal involvement with a state university of Judge Clifton

Judge Richard Clifton's personal involvement with the Hawaii State University School of Law.

The decision of the 9th Circuit in Washington v Trump clearly gave standing to the States because of "proprietary interest" specifically of state universities across the country, and refused to stay the TRO applied nationwide.

That means that ALL states and ALL state universities are parties and class members in the class lawsuit Washington v Trump.

Nevertheless, not only Judge Richard Clifton has been, without disclosure of the conflict of interest to Donald Trump and other parties and their counsel, an adjunct professor in the Hawaii University School of Law, but he is a constant fixture in that school, "coaching" law students for moot court competitions, presiding over "panels" and participating in "programs".

Just put Judge Richard Clifton's name into the search window at the law school's website, and you will see 10 pages worth of links with discussion of his personal involvement in the life of that public university.

Thus, Judge Richard Clifton:

1) should have disclosed his personal involvement with a party member of a class lawsuit, and

2) should have recused himself, or allowed parties to make motions to recuse based on that disclosure - which has not been done, I have checked the docket report from the case on Pacer.gov.

Personal involvement of Judge Clifton's three present law clerks with a state university


Moreover, Judge Richard Clifton had to know that his 3 law clerks worked in the Hawaii University School of Law as professors, which was disqualifying Judge Richard Clifton from considering "proprietary standing" of that school, as part of all state universities, in the action Washington v Trump.

As I mentioned above, the Hawaii State University School of Law parades on its website that they have, as law lecturers, Judge Clifton's three present law clerks,  Joshua Korr, Wayne Wagner and Aaron Henson.

After all, he was, likely, the one who has secured their teaching positions for them, because he obviously cared about his law clerks very much - cared so much that he introduced his former judicial extern Kamaile Turcan to Justice Sotomayor for clerkship, thus securing the personal connection to that higher appellate court for himself, while Justice Sotomayor was visiting the Hawaii State University School of Law as part of the "U.S. Jurists-in-Residence

and Judge Clifton was likely the connection securing the employment for his former law clerk Calvert G. Chipchase

both in the Hawaii University School of Law as a professor, and in his own former law firm Cades Shutte, which cannot be a mere coincidence.

So, once again, it will be insulting anybody's intelligence to suppose that:

1) Judge Richard Clifton did not know that his three present law clerks were professors in a public state university - while proprietary interests of public state universities was a large part of standing that Judge Clifton used to deny requested relieve to President Trump;

2) that Judge Richard Clifton did not know of the visit of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg, a public Trump-hater, to the public university school of law where he is personally and frequently involved, and where his three law clerks are part of the faculty.

Identifying the court with the state public university while making a decision in favor of the public university

That Judge Clifton's three law clerks are professors, and especially paid professors, in a state public university while they are helping their judge decide a case in favor of that university's "proprietary interest", is bad enough, and is already enough to disqualify Judge Clifton from the case - and to void the February 9, 2017 decision in Washington v Trump because of such undisclosed disqualification.

What is much worse is that, through actions of his law clerks and the law school, which Judge Clifton cannot claim he was unaware of, Judge Clifton has sent a clear message that the 9th Circuit not only SIDES with public state universities, but that it that the 9th Circuit and a state public university IS ONE AND THE SAME body.

Look at the announcements/advertisements by the Hawaii State University School of Law about Judge Clifton's clerks as professors of the school:

For the three of Judge Clifton's current law clerks who work as professors for the Hawaii State University School of Law, the school lists on its website the following contact e-mail addresses:

1. Joshua_Korr@ca9.uscourts.gov;
2. Aaron_Henson@ca9.uscourts.gov; and
3. Wayne_Wagner@ca9.uscourts.gov

• That means not only that these three law clerks are using their court-assigned e-mail address for their private employment, to exchange e-mails with their students, which is inappropriate enough;
• That also means that these three law clerks, instead of doing their work as law clerks, in a court deciding death penalty cases and civil rights appeal, and in a court where people have to wait, reportedly, over 15 months to get a decision, are doing their work as law professors while on the job as law clerks - because otherwise there is no reason for them to give to their students their work e-mail addresses;
• That also subjects the federal court to Freedom of Information Law requests under the Hawaii State Law, because the e-mails are used to exchange information that may be public records of Hawaii State University;
• That also makes the 9th Circuit in its entirety a WITNESS and a CUSTODIAN of information for a state university in a case over which it is presiding - through the use of the e-mails going to Judge Clifton's chambers as the contact information of THREE public state university professors alone;
• Using Judge Clifton's chambers' e-mail addresses of law clerks as contact information of one of the parties in a nationwide class lawsuit also sends a message that the state university in question identifies with the 9th Circuit court, and vice versa, that these two entities have merged and are one and the same - which is disqualifying not only Judge Clifton, but the entire 9th Circuit from this case.

Unfortunately, there is more to the disqualification.

A state university is the 9th Circuit's ongoing contractor

The Hawaii State University School of Law announced on its website of the existence of an organization called "The Ninth Circuit Pacific Islands Committee", collaborating with another organization called "The Pacific Judicial Council" "an organization made up of judicial officers from a number of island nations".

As it is reported in the same article, in 2014, the judge who presided over Washington v Trump, Judge Richard Clifton, has traveled, as part of activities of the "Committee", and together with the Chief District Judge Frances Marie-Tydingco-Gatewood of the District Court of Guam, a President Obama nominee and a beautiful young woman,

to New Zealand, of all places, no, not for a runaway trip, of course, but allegedly to "participate in the biannual conference" "chaired by the chief justice of New Zealand".

In the summer of 2016 the 9th Circuit extended its activities even further, and I quote:

"the Ninth Circuit contracted with the University of Hawaii's Richardson School of Law" - the word used is "contracting".

So, what did the 9th Circuit contract with the current party in litigation for?

It contracted "to organize and conduct the third Pacific Islands Legal Institute for island judges not having prior legal training".

A worthy cause.

But nevertheless, a reason for complete disqualification of the entire 9th Circuit in deciding any cases involving its own contractor.

Especially because, as it was stated in the same article,

so this is the first time that this state public university has partnered with the 9th Circuit only as to this particular issues, there could be other "partnerships" in the past, on other issues, and the "contracting" was apparently so successful that the Hawaii State University School of Law (modestly called here "Richardson Law School" to obscure that it is a governmental entity) is hoping for more "partnerships" like that in the future - while during that partnership, the State of Hawaii and its multiple institution continuously appear before the 9th Circuit as defendants in civil rights appeals...

Personally participating in the "training" organized by the 9th Circuit contractor - and now party in class litigation state university of the State of Hawaii School of Law - were:

1. 9th Circuit Senior Judge Mary M. Schroeder;
2. 9th Circuit Senior Judge J. Clifford Wallace - who did not only "served as chair and/or member of the committee from 2000 to 2007", but who also "helped secure nearly $500,000 in annual grants" - I wonder by what means - which "ma[d]e these educational programs possible".

So,

• the 9th Circuit has a committee;
• the 9th Circuit judges participate in such a committee for travel and entertainment disguised as "sharing knowledge";
• A 9th Circuit judge, as part of the "Committee's" activities engages in long-distance international travel, sponsored by unknown sources;
• Another 9th Circuit judge engages in a major fundraising for that committee, which likely would have to include rich parties and attorneys appearing in front of him;
• Then, the 9th Circuit hires, as a contractor, an entity which is now a party in nationwide highly contentious class litigation against the President of the United States bringing to the court world publicity - and praise.

And, ta-da!

the 9th Circuit presides over a case where it has multiple and multi-faceted personal and financial disqualifying involvements of its multiple judges and clerks - without any disclosure to the parties or attorneys for parties in litigation, and - surprise! - decides the case in favor of its own contractor and employer of one of the presiding judge's 3 law clerks.

There is nothing to be happy about.

It is not that the principled and independent 9th Circuit has shown the President that he is not above the law.

It is that a corrupt court has shown the President how things are usually done in courts, up to the very top of the mountain, and that - unless he cuts this Gordian knot by "draining the swamp" and pushing court reforms, it will continue to be that way.

Because now even the U.S. Supreme Court, the MAJORITY of its "justices" are tainted by freebie trips to a party in litigation - and this blog was about just ONE state university that offered freebie "programs" for U.S. Supreme Court justices, there may be much, much more.

There should be an urgent court reform, complete with:

• canceling life tenures of federal judges that allow them to be independent from the law and to use their position to create for themselves and for their personal friends a lifetime of sinecures and freebies at the expense of those who appear in front of them;
• reforming the U.S. Supreme Court, making review in that court mandatory instead of discretionary, to prevent the now-ongoing corruption with that "discretion", and providing as many judges as are required to review ALL petitions that come in front of the court - which will eliminate the lifetime power grab by the U.S. Supreme Court and will highlight the true amount of human rights issues that are dumped as not worthy for the corrupt court's attention; and
• by eliminating the institution of law clerks, those unnamed individuals (here, their names were exposed exclusively because of the bragging by the Hawaian School of Law, otherwise we would never know the names of Judge Clifton's law clerks - and of Justice Sotomayor's law clerk, who is also former Judge Clifton's law clerk) who decide cases instead of judges and who use their positions as law clerks to advance their career while their only value is as substitute secret judges, while there are not enough real judges to handle the existing caseloads;
• by cutting salaries of federal judges and court personnel, making work in court less attractive - yes, I know that there will be a claim that judges will then engage in more corruption, but they already come to the bench from higher salaries, so their only reason to do that would be to fix cases (Judge Friedland, for example, came to a salary of under $300,000 from a position of a law partner with a yearly profit share of $1.6 million, while she had a $300,000 sign-up bonus after the end of her clerkship year in U.S. Supreme Court - guess, why such a sudden vow of relative poverty);
• by cutting terms of federal judges to either a year or less, and making judges rotate across the country in an unpredictable manner (through electronic hearings, if necessary);
• by introducing a strict Code of Conduct for federal judges, with lay jury panels reviewing conflicts of interest of judges in deciding cases and with severe punishment imposed upon judges for such conflicts of interest - like the ones involved in Washington v Trump case,
• and, last but not least, by deregulation of the legal profession, at least to the point of removing control over it from the judiciary branch (occupational licensing of all other professions in the U.S. is handled by the executive branch of the government), to eliminate the current situation that even the President's lawyers are in the grip of fear and are unable to present a motion to recuse based on multiple disqualifying conflicts of interest in this case which are "hidden in plain sight".

Now that judicial corruption, in full swing, has reached even the President as a party in litigation, it is time to deal it a serious blow.

Please, Mr. President, as you promised - drain this swamp, too.

PS: I have filed a freedom of information request for certain records with the Hawaii State University School of Law, published it here, and will publish responses to it on this blog.