Ex parte communications between attorneys and judges, public records about ex parte communications and sanctions for seeking and using public records about judicial and attorney misconduct

An article was published yesterday in Pennsylvania about extremely interesting events.

Several attorneys obtained from a County telephone records that indicated that there were text exchanges between district attorneys and judges, and, as I understand are using them or are about to use them to try to vacate convictions obtained by such prosecutors from such judges after they engaged in ex parte messaging, sometimes during hearings.

Even though the actual texts were not released, only records showing the fact of text exchanges between the prosecutors and judges was released, the judges involved undertook an unprecedented step - they filed for injunctions against attorneys who obtained public records showing that they were engaged in text exchanges during or in relation to open public proceedings. 

Moreover, these judges seek to DESTROY evidence of their own misconduct, and that is, before their victims, the criminal defendants in proceedings where the exchanges were taking place, get a chance to make motions to vacate their convictions because of ex parte communications!

I bet that judges did not include as necessary parties into that action to enjoin and destroy their own cell phone records the criminal defendants who they harmed and for whom that evidence is indispensable to overturn their convictions - and that is NOT right.

And the basis for such a request?  Judges indicated in their application to the court that, should the records be released, it will "ruin their public image".

The act of texting with the prosecutors, and thus, engaging in ex parte communication does not ruin, in their eyes, "their public image", but the contents of the text, confirming their misconduct, will destroy their public image - and for that reason the public information that must get the judges off the bench for misconduct, must be destroyed.

The same article (see the link above) indicates that several attorneys in the area declined to comment on the situation that became "toxic" for a very reasonable fear of retaliation from judges.

That is, members of the honorable profession (lawyers) who are supposed to report judicial misconduct, refuse to report it because they are afraid of retaliation for that against them and their clients from the extremely honorable members of the legal profession, judges, whose integrity courts always presume, despite granting them immunity for malicious and corrupt acts on the bench.

The sad part about it is that attorneys in Pennsylvania are still afraid to report judicial misconduct, even after the Kids for Cash scandal in that same state revealed that stifling reports of judicial misconduct can lead to unsafe situation harming (and even leading to deaths) of children.

It has been reported that several attorneys' licenses were suspended or revoked for criticizing judiciary IN PENNSYVLANIA, before the Kids for Cash scandal hit the media, thus stifling reports of judicial misconduct and jeopardizing the public.

The judges who were convicted and are serving federal prison time in the Kids for Cash scandal were subjects of multiple complaints, all of which were nonchalantly dismissed.

Now - a second such scandal, within a short time, pertaining to misconduct of judges, in the same state! And this time, judges belligerently try to have the PUBLIC records of their own misconduct destroyed! Think of the arrogance of these people who think they are not punishable and above the law no matter what they do!

Moreover, across the country judges uniformly sustain discipline against attorneys for criticism of judges protected by the 1st Amendment.

In New York, attorneys are as reluctant to report judicial misconduct, and they have a good reason for this.

My husband who reported misconduct of judges and sued a judge, was disbarred after that.

I am the subject of a disciplinary proceeding specifically based on sanctions imposed upon me by a judge whom I sued, after I sued him, on behalf of myself and two clients.

Judge Carl F.Becker of Delaware County punished me for the following legal conduct:

(1) for seeking under Freedom of Information Law of his financial semi-annual reports to the New York State Court Administration - $1,250 in sanctions;

(2) for using in the court proceedings open public records pertaining to misconduct of another judge (the late Robert Harlem of Otsego County)  and of his son Richard Harlem, which, if properly investigated and prosecuted would have resulted in disbarment of both of these attorneys back in 2000 - $5,500 in sanctions against me for "invading privacy" of the retired judge, his son, the judge's secretary and law clerk, all involved in fraud, for using open court records in another court where sworn pleadings of an Assistant New York State Attorney General Mary Walsh described misconduct, and $5,500 in sanctions against my husband and client Frederick J. Neroni for the same "invasion of privacy" and "harassment'.

The sanctions were imposed, by the way, at the stage of a pre-answer motion to dismiss where all of Mr. Neroni's allegations against these people were PRESUMED to be true, and thus could not possibly be a basis for sanctions - but still were.

And guess what - "attorneys of record" in that interesting case are the same Richard Harlem who was a party in that proceeding, and the firm where Richard Harlem's (and Mr. Neroni's and my own) disciplinary prosecutor John R. Casey is a partner, even though he picked from the bunch of attorneys referred for his investigation and prosecution, Mr. Neroni and me (complainant against retired judge Robert Harlem and his son Richard Harlem) to prosecute, and chose Robert Harlem and Richard Harlem as his firm's paying clients.

Moreover, Richard Harlem and John Casey's firm representing Richard Harlem had the audacity to ask the court to award legal fees against Mr. Neroni for this alleged "invasion of privacy", and, in a paroxysm of greed, John R.Casey's partner David Cabaniss disclosed the fact of ex parte communications between himself and Judge Becker's chambers (12 minutes, one day before the motion hearing) and with the chambers of the next judge, Judge Ferris Lebous (two times, 6 minutes each).

The reason these ex partes were disclosed is because Mr. Cabaniss wanted Mr. Neroni to pay Mr. Cabaniss' clients for Mr. Cabaniss' "legal services" provided during those ex parte communications.

In New York, court rules and Canons of Judicial Conduct prohibit judges to engage in ex parte communication.  Such behavior is also a fundamental due process violation, undermining parties' right to an impartial adjudication.

Yet, ex parte prohibition is not enforced in New York against well-connected attorneys, and the New York State Commission of Judicial Conduct refuses to look at proven ex parte communications as violations.

In March of 2014 I reported an ex parte communication between Judge Christopher Cahill, of the Ulster County Supreme Court, and attorney Dolores Felice (Delice) Seligman, where, in a highly contested divorce proceeding,  a judge invited first Ms. Seligman, an attorney he knew, into his chambers for a 15-minute conference, without my consent, and gave a direction to his secretary not to allow me to enter. 

Then the judge's secretary invited me, for a "leftover" ex parte conference, which I refused to attend.

When I confronted the judge (standing in the doorway of his chambers in plain view of witnesses and refusing to enter and engage in my own ex parte communication), the judge threatened to turn me into the disciplinary authorities. 

When I complained about the judge, the complained was dismissed as not having enough grounds for discipline.

The conclusion - it is ok in New York for judges to openly engaged in ex parte communications, and to threaten attorneys who disagree with such misconduct to have them punished for pointing the misconduct out.

Ex parte communications, even those who are openly observable, are pervasive.

In one and the same case, I moved to recuse, on affidavits of witnesses, one judge based on his ex parte communication IN COURT (after he adjourned the case and after I left the courtroom), in front of witnesses, with a prosecutor, and I am making yet another motion to recuse the next judge on the case, Judge Alta  R. Martin, the "acting" justice of the Greene Village Court, Chenango County, who was appointed after the one who engaged in the ex parte communication - for the same thing, for ex parte communications, for having conferences with the prosecutor in chambers behind closed doors and for engaging in coerced ex parte communications with a represented criminal defendant off record.

According to an affidavit of a witness that I have, prosecutor Michael Ferrarese of the Chenango County District Attorney's office simply barges in Judge Martin's chambers, closes the door and remains there for as long as he wants, discussing unknown topics and not inviting criminal defense attorneys or pro se parties who are present in the courtroom.

Also, Alta R. Martin is a judge who has authored and distributes in her court unique "scheduling notices" which, in defiance of the court's duty to advise criminal defendants of their right to remain silent during the entire criminal proceedings, advises them that they "need" to talk to the prosecutor before the next proceeding.

I just posted a previous blog about a whole ex parte motion that was decided in my disciplinary court that I cannot get access to nearly a year after it was made (and which I moved to vacate today).

I posted a lot this April about a whole ex parte trial conducted by Judge Kevin Dowd of Chenango County, without any shame, in my absence and while the judge knew I had a medical leave from work issued by a physician after diagnosing my back injury that did not allow me to come to trial or withstand the physical rigors of a multi-day trial.

Now in Pennsylvania judges outdid their New York colleagues by trying to have their brethren,  judges from other courts, order to destroy and prevent distribution of public records of gravest concern, obviously containing proof of the judge's misconduct, because otherwise why say that distribution of such records will destroy their "public image".

In fact, it will not only ruin the judge's public image, but will indicate that they engaged in a federal crime of WIRE FRAUD, and theft of honest services of a public officials, the crime that the feds charged New York State former Assembly leader Sheldon Silver at this time.  

The same also may constitute the state crime of fraud and may result in massive voiding of criminal conviction.

Think about it!

Can criminal defendants now move with courts to ask them to compel district attorneys to destroy evidence of their crime instead of prosecuting them?

So, how come judges in Pennsylvania who committed crime against the public and against such criminal defendants have a different status under the law?

Why evidence of their criminal activity must be destroyed?

Also, think how many lives may have been ruined, both of criminal defendants convicted with the help of such ex parte texting, and their families!

Think of the cost to taxpayers for such trials, unlawful incarceration and of the future re-trials!

That is not the judges' concern though. 

Their concern is how to destroy evidence in order to "preserve their public image" - an absolutely shameless request, but what else one can expect from a class of public officials who presume their own integrity while at the same time granting themselves absolute immunity for malicious and corrupt acts in office.

As the new Pennsylvania case indicates, there is no limit to judicial arrogance and the belief deeply entrenched into the judiciary that a judge is God and must be allowed  can do whatever he or she likes, with impunity.

Yet, judges are public servants subject to public scrutiny.

Let's help them realize that, through an appropriate legislative action against judicial immunities, for judicial accountability and for cameras in the courtroom.

Also, since cameras in the courtroom will definitely not catch texting through cell phones, I suggest introduction of laws requiring judges and parties to disclose their cell phone records to their opponents.

There is no place for ex parte communications in court proceedings, other than those that are restricted by statute and are in compliance with the U.S. and State Constitutions.

This situation is pervasive not only in New York and Pennsylvania, but also in other states, like Texas and Florida where such misconduct was reported by the media. 

In Florida (see link in the previous paragraph), a prosecutor and a judge exchanged 1,400 texts and phone calls during a DEATH PENALTY trial. 

In Texas, a judge recently resigned after having been caught texting with prosecutors.   In her texts, the judge was actually recommending to the prosecutions questions to ask witnesses. 

I encourage all attorneys representing clients in death penalty cases, whether in a trial or on appeal, and relatives of such criminal defendants (because one does not have to be an attorney to seek access to public records) to seek telephone records of prosecutors on freedom of information requests.  These records can be a lifeline to the condemned defendants.

On the brighter side, the courage of Pennsylvania attorneys who obtained records exposing texting between prosecutors and judges, distributed them and are fighting for their clients' rights to have access to such public records and to overturn their convictions based on evidence of ex parte communication has showed the way to other people.

Now, texts from cell phones of prosecutors are up for grabs under the Freedom of Information Law, and should be sought by every criminal defense attorney in every criminal proceeding.

And - if judges and prosecutors are ab-using the advancements in technology, why the public is not allowed to simply videotape court proceedings?  Private cameras in the courtroom would have made it a lot easier to catch the texting judges - something that transcripts of proceedings does not reflect.

If courts refuse to abide by its own orders, how can any court orders be binding on the public?

I have published on this blog the ex parte order by which the Appellate Division 3rd Department transferred my disciplinary proceedings to the Appellate Division 4th Department.

Here it is, again.

 

 

 

The order was based "upon the papers filed in support of the application".

 

The application was never served upon me, so it is an illegal ex parte order.

 

On receipt of the order, I immediately asked both the Appellate Division 3rd Department and the Appellate Division 4th Department for access to the following documents:

1. the "application";
2. "papers filed in support of the application";
3. proof of service of the application on me

My husband Mr. Neroni did the same, since his name mysteriously ended up on the caption of my disciplinary proceedings, in violation of all fathomable laws and rules.

 

The 3rd Department, the court that had to transfer all records, including the requested records, to the 4th Department, answered with an outright denial of access,admitting that it unlawfully retained a portion of the record of my disciplinary proceedings that it was supposed to transfer.

 

The 4th Department responded with a list of papers that were transferred to it which did not include the requested papers, thus confirming that it is illegally proceeding with my disciplinary proceedings on an incomplete record and is illegally deciding a motion for a summary judgment on an incomplete record.

 

Recently, I double-checked with both courts about access to these records.

 

The 3rd Department now engaged the services of an attorney for the New York State Court Administration who treated me like a pest and practically told me that since the 3rd Department once denied me access to the records (without any legal basis to do so since all the requested records should have been transferred, by the 3rd Department's own order of June 11, 2014 to the 4th Department), I should not be asking for it again.

 

On receipt of the answer from the NYS Court Administration attorney on behalf of the 3rd Department, I sent a letter to the 4th Department asking it two simple questions:

 

(1) did it receive the application, papers submitted in support of the application and proof of service of all of those papers upon me since our last correspondence when the 4th Department stated to me it did not receive such papers;

 

(2) when will the 4th Department provide to me the evidentiary hearing that it ordered to be provided to me on September 30, 2014.

 

In answer to these two simple questions I received this letter dated April 10, 2015:

 

 



 

 

 

 

The letter indicates two things:

 

(1) no papers were additionally transferred after the letter from the 4th Department dated July 30, 2014 and listing the records that were transferred to it from the 3rd Department in my disciplinary proceedings; to me it means that:

 

• the 3rd Department court, especially based on its latest response to my letter requesting access to records, is still unlawfully withholding records from my disciplinary proceedings;
• the 4th Department court is:
• unlawfully proceeding in attorney disciplinary proceedings on an incomplete record;
• is unlawfully reviewing a motion for a summary judgment on an incomplete record, which, all in all, constitutes in bias against me and in favor of the court's own disciplinary committee and harassment against me, especially taking into consideration other violations of my rights by the 4th Department court that I wrote about on this blog.

 

(2) The 4th Department court, same as the 3rd Department court, refuses to abide by its own orders.

 

The 3rd Department court issued an order of June 11, 2014 transferring all of my disciplinary proceedings to the 4th Department court, but refused to abide to its own order and withheld from the 4th Department court a portion of records from those proceedings, records that I never saw but which the court unlawfully relied upon in transferring the case to the 4th Department.

 

The 4th Department court issued an order of September 30, 2014 appointing a referee and ordering the referee to hold an evidentiary hearing for my benefit.  The referee did not hold the hearing, I asked when such a hearing will be held, and now the court is answering me that I need to make an extra motion, pay extra money and engage in extra effort (and undergo an extra stress) to obtain from the court what the court already granted to me in its September 30, 2014 order.

 

My question to you, my readers, as members of the public is:

 

if courts refuse to abide by its own orders, why should the public consider any court orders binding? 

 

 

The wealthy, educated and entrenched expressing the viewpoint of the poor consumers of legal services - what a joke!

I am reviewing the backgrounds of the "lay" members in the attorney disciplinary committees in the State of New York.

While the supermajority of members of such committees are attorneys, making it impossible for non-attorneys to carry their voices if they differ from those of attorneys, even then, the "lay" individuals appear to be carefully selected - by the courts - from the wealth and the educated, from that sector of the population that is not hurting from not being able to afford legal services and who has enough funds to simply sue their attorney for malpractice if he or she does something wrong.

It is apparent that the state-sponsored system of protection for consumers exists to protect those consumers who have no funds to do that for themselves, being poor and uneducated.

Yet, the "lay" members are:

• journalists, including "Ivy-league" educated journalists
• editors of major TV companies - all obviously not poor people
• individuals who came from "old wealth" (such as - the father is a prominent OB/GYN, chief of staff of a hospital in LA, the mother owns apartment buildings in LA, the person herself is a media producer, along with her husband);
• individuals who "serve" on a board of private schools for little privileged tykeks (K-12) where they have two children at a time enrolled, at the price tag of over $44,500 per year per each;
• financial specialists of different kinds, from CPAs to investment managers to equipment lease manager

Do I need to remind anybody that over 80% of people in New York state cannot afford an attorney and that the Chief Judge of the State of New York called this situation an ongoing crisis?

So how do we solve it?

We put market participants and wealthy and entrenched lay individuals on disciplinary committees to weed out exactly those solo, private, independent, not wealthy attorneys who actually serve the poor, and to keep afloat those who make donations and have a potential to hire these people or their companies to provide their investment or financial advice.

Nothing like just a little a crooked.

Some of the "lay" members of committees are either related to attorneys or connected to prominent law firms through financial ties - and that is only what I can readily find on the Internet, without asking for records.

• Dr. Hany Ghaleb (3rd Department committee) - married to the former judge and now practicing attorney Jhilil "Jill" Ghaleb;
• Dr. Richard Maceko (4th Department) - father to the Assistant Energy Counsel Emma Maceko, graduate of the Albany Law School;
• Miles Bottrill (4th Department) - Director, the Syracuse University College of Law who has a financial interest not to vote in a way that may affect generous donations of prominent law firms to his law school, so Mr. Bottrill has a financial interest not to ever vote to discipline attorneys of donors, no matter what they do 
• Louis J. Cercone, Jr. (4th Department) - Managing Director of Brisbane Consulting Group in charge of Business Valuations, Forensic Accounting, and Litigation Support Services who will lose patronage from large litigation firms if he affects their ratings and attractiveness to clients and the judiciary if he disciplines the firm or any attorney from the firm that hired him in the past or may hire him in the future, and the usual clients of such support companies are large and rich law firms, not the solo attorneys who are usually disciplined by such committees.

I am sure that for other "lay" individuals connections with the legal industry can also be found after some digging, the system usually insures herself so that no "rogue" people come on these committees to upset the apple cart for the prominent attorneys and their law firms.

So, not only the attorney-lay person ratio is slanted several times towards the market participants and against the consumers, but the voice of the real consumer is further stifled because NO consumers, NOT one low-to-middle-consumer of legal services, not one person (I am positive) with a criminal record, not one person who lost custody of a child or who is in arrears for child support and is in desperate need of affordable legal services is among the lay members.

This way, the "prominent" attorney members of the disciplinary committees have no problem eliminating competition of the solo attorneys who actually provide legal services at an affordable price to the under-served rural population and actually are accessible to their clients to talk to them at any time of day or night.

As Judge Lippman told his buddy Sheldon Silver at the time he was put on top of this pyramid of corruption - "not too shabby".

The collective reading of the writing on the wall - can "prominent members of the bench and the bar" turn back the wheel of history?

Hallelujah!

Chief Judge of the State of New York Jonathan Lippman, 

• the very one whose buddy Sheldon Silver was just indicted for fraud/theft of honest service of a public official, in federal court, 
• the very one who climbed to power with the help of that same Sheldon Silver, and 
• the very one who authors decisions in the Court of Appeals distinguishing constitutional violations into "substantial" and "insubstantial" - made a huge step (at least this is how it is announced) to change how attorneys in New York are being disciplined.

For that purpose, Judge Lippman appointed a "statewide commission" to review attorney discipline and make it (allegedly) more effective and consistent (consistent with what - nobody knows, right now the only consistency it shows is with the whims of the judiciary and politically connected attorneys who "serve" in the disciplinary committees).

The commission consists of 40 members, 3 of them non-attorneys, but all three of the non-attorneys are the "yes"-men (and women) for the attorney grievance committees.

Who are the lay individuals who had the happy occasion to have been appointed to "serve" in the distinguished company of the "prominent members of the bench and the bar" who came together to consider what to do with regulation of the legal profession which can soon either die on its own or be struck down by federal authorities as unconstitutional and designed and enforced with anticompetitive motivation and not with consumer interests in mind?

Here are the "winners":

Consumer No. 1 of 3, Rita DiMartino - a "lay" member of the Attorney Grievance Committee of the Appellate Division 1st Judicial Department where the ratio of attorneys to non-attorneys is 5 to 1 (12 lay members out of 73 members total, so it is 61 attorneys, 12 non-attorneys.  Do you think there will be any times when, with such a ratio, Rita DiMartino could carry through a "no"?  That's it, that's why she is simply a bobbing head of the committee, a puppet put into the commission to declare to the public - see? we put A CONSUMER as a member of our "statewide commission".

Consumer No. 2 of 3, William T. McDonald, a "lay" member of the Attorney Grievance Committee of the Appellate DIvision 4th Judicial Department where the ratio of attorneys to non attorneys is 6 to 1 (63 attorneys, 9 non-attorneys).  As you understand, that's one more decoy for the public demonstrating that A CONSUMER of legal services was appointed to the "statewide commission" thinking how to save the sinking ship of the legal profession without deregulating it - which is the call of times.

Consumer No. 3 of 3, Akosua Yeboah, a "lay" member of the Attorney Grievance Committee of the Appellate Division 3rd Department where the ratio of attorneys to non-attorneys is 6 to 1 (18 attorneys to 3 non-attorneys), if one forgets that one of the non-attorneys, Dr. Hany Ghaleb, is married to an attorney and former judge Jhilmil "Jill" Ghaleb, then it will be 19 interested market participants to 2 consumers of legal services.  With a ratio such as this, no "no" votes from Akosua Yeboah will ever be carrier, so this person is yet another decoy of the system to show that A CONSUMER was appointed both to the grievance committee and to the "statewide commission" as to how to fix the system that was designed to be corrupt and self-serving.

Of course, the ratio of market participants over consumers in the "statewide commission" is 37:3, or 12.33: 1.

I understand that "prominent" attorneys, even though they command high fees and will fight tooth and claw to keep those high fees at the expense of the consumer, are, on average, not really strong in math.

Yet, when a bunch of market participants get together, invite a couple of entrenched decoys to serve as a distraction for the public while consumers are otherwise excluded, and try to decide how to save their high fees and their monopoly to serve the consumer base that predominantly cannot afford their services and is hurting because of it - please, don't call it service to the public!

In the Greene Village Court, Chenango County, criminal defendants do not have a right to remain silent, on the opposite, they "need" to talk to the prosecutor before every appearance, at the direction of the court

Here is a document I recently received in one of the criminal cases I handle from the Greene Village Court, Chenango County, New York (the presiding "acting" judge is Judge Alta R. Martin).

Those of you who have experience with the New York local justice court will immediately see several problems.

First, in all justice courts clerks use standard software to generate scheduling orders of the court.

That technology, obviously, somehow did not reach the Greene Village Court, so I wonder whether the court keeps records of proceedings properly.

Usually, pro se parties or counsel do not receive "Next Appearance Date" sheets of paper bearing no identifying information to the case.

Instead, what they receive is scheduling ORDERS which must bear the following specific information:

1. Name of the case.
2. Assigned number of the case.
3. That it is a scheduling order.
4. The scheduling order must be signed or name of the judge who issued the order shown.
5. The order must state what the appearance is for - scheduling conference, hearing etc.
6. The order must be addressed, by name and address, to the pro se party and the prosecutor, or to the defense attorney and the prosecutor.
7. The order must list charges for which the defendant must appear.

None of what HAS to be in such a scheduling notice/order IS in the Greene Village Court "Next Appearance Date" paper.

Yet, what absolutely CANNOT be there, is included.

At the very first appearance in the criminal case, the criminal court MUST advise the criminal defendant of his or her right to remain silent throughout the criminal proceedings.

This right is guaranteed by the New York State Constitution and by the U.S. Constitution.

Instead of advising the criminal defendant that he has a right to remain silent, the Greene Village Court advises the criminal defendant, whether represented or unrepresented, that the defendant "need[s] to contact the ADA before [his/her] next appearance", meaning that the court EXPECTS and practically DIRECTS the criminal defendant to waive his or her right to remain silent and talk to the ADA before every appearance in the case.

I have never in my entire career as a criminal defense attorney and my prior career as a paralegal for a criminal defense trial lawyer seen anything like that.

Once again, by law criminal defendants DO NOT "need" to talk to the prosecutor before any appearances unless they decide to waive their right to remain silent on advice of counsel or on their own accord.

By law, criminal courts MAY NOT direct criminal defendants to talk to the ADA, because, first, it is giving criminal defendants (represented and unrepresented) legal advice, which the court is not allowed to do, and, second, such an advice is directly contrary to criminal defendants' constitutional right to remain silent and to the court's duty to advise criminal defendants' of such a right and to see that that right is observed in that court.

And that brings me to the next issue - are criminal defendants in justice courts provided, as a point of due process and equal protection of laws guaranteed by the State and Federal Constitution, with competent judges?

Read my next blog about it.

When the prosecutor is asserting the best interests of his employee's relative in a criminal case, what kind of justice can people expect?

I reported on this blog back in September 2014 of the vehicular assault by a police officer Derek Bowie upon Barbara O'Sullivan of Delhi.

Since then, Barbara O'Sullivan was charged with a crime upon the statement of Derek Bowie, Derek Bowie was sued by Barbara O'Sullivan for assault and battery, but the Delaware County DA did not charge Derek Bowie with assault, battery and attempted murder of Barbara O'Sullivan, and I wondered why.

I recently got an answer to my question, why that happened.

It came to my attention that the DA failed to disclose that the alleged victim of Barbara O'Sullivan Delaware County deputy sheriff Derek Bowie (who is, according to Barbara O'Sullivan a perpetrator of a vehicular assault on her and battery, for which he is sued in the Supreme Court, and the county defends him at the taxpayer expense instead of indicting him for assault, battery and attempted murder) is, as far as I understand, a nephew of the District Attorney's employee Jeff Bowie.

Now this relationship raises very bad implications for the DA.

  Can it be that Richard Northrup, who worked with Jeff Bowie for an eternity, did not know about his close blood relationship to Derek Bowie?  It is completely unbelievable.

So why did Richard Northrup then proceed with the charges against Barbara O'Sullivan, Derek Bowie's victim and not against Derek Bowie?

Why was Richard Northrup present in the grand jury and directed the grand jury against Barbara O'Sullivan in violation of Criminal Procedure Law 190.25 despite knowing that he is disqualified to be there and contaminated the indictment by his presence?

He tried to make sure that the charges against Barbara O'Sullivan would stick - to suit his employee?

Why is Richard Northrup using/abusing his power, at taxpayers' expense no less, pretending that he protects People of the State of New York and in this county while he is doing the bidding and acts in the interests of his own employee?

When you take the blood relationship into consideration, the case starts smacking very much of corruption and gross prosecutorial misconduct.

Apparently, when the DA would not prosecute an attempted murder committed by a nephew of his own employee, but instead prosecutes the victim of that nephew, something stinks, and badly.

And that brings me to the problem of nepotism in Delaware County.

There is a saying in Delaware County, imparted to me by its long-time residents - that Delaware County is "a land of kissing cousins".  Pure white kissing cousins at that, too.

And that appears to be true - and interferes with fairness in criminal and civil litigation.

Back in 2009 I filed a Freedom of Information Request with the Delaware County, asking Mr. Moon, the then Commissioner of Social Services to provide me records of any anti-nepotism policies that the county might have.

There were no such policies to provide in 2009.

I bet, there are no such policies now either, and, as far as I know, not just single pairs of relatives, but clusters and clans of relatives are employed by Delaware County - and that is a big problem because it generates multiple conflicts of interest, most often undisclosed, often not even discernible because of different last names of the parties.

I first bumped into this problem in litigation when I had a child neglect case where I found out through discovery that multiple members of the Delaware County DSS participating in the proceedings, as well as multiple other high-standing employees of Delaware County.

The names are:

Meghan Barnes - DSS social worker
LaVonne Shields - Sheriff's Deputy/DSS investigator, Ms. Barnes' mother-in-law
Beverly Shields, the Delaware County Treasurer - Ms. Lavonne Shields' sister-in-law

That struck me weird and inappropriate, even though later I've learnt that this is only the tip of the iceberg of the Barnes clan in Delaware County employment.

Apparently, that is not the only clan in employment of Delaware County (I found more names, which are not pertinent to what I am going to tell you next, and I am sure, an untold amount of names will go unnoticed because people are related without marriage ties and with different last names).

The Bowie clan is, apparently, another powerful clan in employment of Delaware County, so powerful that when a member of the clan was involved in a vehicular assault, battery and attempted murder, the county helped him orchestrate charges against his victim and escape uncharged and, as far as I know, undisciplined in any other way and on the loose with a pistol and a taser, exposing other potential victims to future harm - think the recent North Charleston events with tasering and shooting by a police officer of an unarmed man, think the recent Albany events when an unarmed man was tasered by the police and died.

Dangerous weapons such as pistols, tasers - and police cars - may not be entrusted to people with a violent past.

Crimes committed by police officers must be investigated and prosecuted, and when the officer's relatives stand in the way of such investigations and prosecutions, there is a problem to public safety of all, not just Barbara O'Sullivan.

So why is Richard Northrup, instead of protecting the public from a potential dangerous predator, Derek Bowie, is protecting Derek Bowie from his victim and is pursuing his victim with a criminal charge?

The answer may be simple - Derek Bowie is a member of another powerful clan, the Bowie clan.

Jeffrey Bowie, likely Derek Bowie's father or uncle, was a DSS investigator, employed by the county since 1986.

After a scandal connected with his employment as a DSS investigator and deputy sheriff without proper records and without taking a civil service exam, Mr. Northrup employed him to rescue him.

Earlier, Jeff Bowie was involved in yet another scandal, where a Sheriff's deputy, Ken Eck, was dismissed from his job for allegedly conducting unlawful surveillance of Jeff Bowie allegedly having an affair with Ken Eck's wife, which did not preclude Jeff Bowie from doing disciplinary investigations of Ken Eck, according to the appellate court decision that I've read in that case some time ago. 

By the way, Ken Eck was dismissed, among other things, for conducting surveillance of Jeff Bowie despite an obvious conflict of interest.

Nobody dismissed Jeff Bowie for engaging in an affair on the job, with a wife of a fellow officcer no less, while investigating that same fellow officer in disciplinary matters, despite an obvious conflict of interest:

"Petitioner conceded that it was a conflict of interest for him to investigate Eck, with whom he was involved in litigation, and Bowie, who had previously investigated petitioner on another disciplinary matter."

Beautiful - an investigator investigating a police officer on a disciplinary matter gets (allegedly, but there were witnesses testifying about it in Ken Eck's hearing, so it could be true) into a romantic relationship with the officer's wife, and it is not a conflict of interest, and the investigated officer is dismissed when he starts to investigate the investigator back.

Not only Jeffrey Bowie stayed on in his employment in Delaware County, he thrived, despite no record of having ever passed a civil service exam, and so he was never even supposed to be an investigator, and had thus no authority to ever investigate Officer Eck.

Yet, it is Officer Eck who was dismissed, and it is Jeffrey Bowie who stayed and reportedly earned $77,420 in 2014 and has worked as a Delaware County employee since April 14, 1986.

Jeff Bowie's salary reportedly (see the same link as above) is "2.1 times greater than the average of all Delaware employees ($36,891) and $30,101 greater than the average of all New York employees ($47,599)", same source as the above link.

After Jeff Bowie became the focus of  media scrutiny for being improperly listed as an employee of the District Attorney's office and for never taking a civil service exam while working in a position requiring such an exam, Richard Northrup still employed Jeff Bowie.

So, Jeff Bowie has pull enough in the county for Richard Northrup taking the heat for improperly employing him previously for years, and still accepted him for employment after the scandal became public.

And now, Richard Northrup charged Jeff Bowie's blood relatives' victim instead of that blood relative.

Doesn't seem like a coincidence to me.

Clearly, this person who works as a Delaware County employee for nearly 30 years and earns 2.1 times the average salary of Delaware County employees, has a pull in the county.  

Is his pull enough to whitewash his son or nephew Derek Bowie of using the police vehicle to engage in assault, battery and attempted murder on a woman?  That same Derek Bowie who threatened the use of Taser against an unarmed middle-aged woman for no other reason?  The same Derek Bowie who was rewarded for his misconduct by being promoted after that to a TASER INSTRUCTOR in Delaware County - now await something really bad to happen!

I think, the investigation against Derek Bowie and the investigation of corruption in Delaware County, as to how its Sheriff's Department and its District Attorney's office prosecuted the victim instead of the well-connected perpetrator, should be referred to special prosecutors and special investigators outside of this county.

It simply stinks and it is clear that in this county the only thing that can happen is that Barbara O'Sullivan will be railroaded by the very people who hurt her and escaped without punishment due to their positions of power in the county.

Richard Northrup is apparently undeterred by the fact that Jeff Bowie his employee, employee of the office prosecuting Derek Bowie's victim Barbara O'Sullivan on what is likely a charge orchestrated in retaliation for her recording of Derek Bowie's misconduct, as well as her stance against judicial misconduct in this county.

Nothing like a tangle of conflicts of interest.

It is interesting to mention that during investigation and hearings pertaining to dismissal of Ken Eck involving Jeff Bowie, some illustrative statements were made by witnesses about alleged ticket-fixing for government officials in Delaware County, Nazi-like salutes by former Sheriff Thomas Mills, attempts to change accident reports, fear of county employees to testify at the hearings because they were afraid to lose their jobs...

Since Delaware County employment appears to be up for grabs for clans of people who arrange for favors for each other and for their relatives, I do not believe Delaware County is a good venue to try any cases where members of such clans are complainants, alleged victims or are testifying.

Nor, in the cases of O'Sullivan v Bowie and People v. O'Sullivan (see the link showing how Barbara O'Sullivan was jailed by Derek Bowie's colleagues and discriminated while in jail, she is out now, no thanks to the courts, prosecutor or Sheriff's department) should relatives of the prosecutor or relatives of the alleged "victim" Derek Bowie be involved in prosecuting the criminal case, as it happens when Derek Bowie is, upon information and belief, the nephew of Richard Northrup's employee Jeff Bowie.

What a mess.

An update - it was confirmed that a court observer was deliberately misdirected that the Mokay trial is not going to happen while it proceeded

I wrote on this blog that a court observer who wanted to observe the Mokay trial was informed by a court officer that the jury is dismissed and the attorneys went home, thus misrepresenting to the court observer that the trial was not ongoing.

There is an update - the would-be court observer confronted the court officer about the misrepresentation and the court officer reluctantly admitted to her that the officer knew the trial was ongoing when the representation was made to the court observer implying that there is no trial.

I am sure the officer will be intimidated by his administration not to make any sworn statements about that, for fear of losing employment.

Yet, if the trial was all legitimate, why should the court instruct the court employees to make false statements to members of the public who wanted to observe the trial?