#FraudsterAttorneyWoodruffCarroll "lacks a filter" - and continues to stalk and harass the clients who fired him with pleas for false affidavits

I wrote the day before yesterday and yesterday (morning) about the criminal efforts of attorney out of Syracuse, New York, #WoodruffCarroll, to have clients who fired him for misconduct to sign fraudulent affidavits against me and a settlement agreement that they do not want - they want to proceed to trial.

Yesterday night I received yet another call from a witness stating to me that Mr. Carroll continues to stalk and harass people who fired him for misconduct, and continues to solicit false affidavits from him - as well as continues to lie to them.

The witness (one of Mr. Carroll's now former clients, though he refuses to withdraw from the case despite having been fired) told me the following:

1) even though the day before yesterday, Mr. Carroll left their residence with the words that he will come back the next day, he was told not to come because he is not welcome, he is fired, they will not be at home and the door will be locked - so the plaintiffs in the Argro v Osborne case (against Chenango County CPS) did not expect him to actually come back, trespass on their property and harass them again;  after all, Mr. Carroll is an attorney with 32 years of experience and must know better than to repeatedly break the law;

2) nevertheless, the door to the residence was locked;

3) nevertheless, yesterday, in the morning and afternoon, there were knocks on their door, which they did not answer;

4) by the evening, the knocks stopped;

5) after waiting for a couple of hours after the last knock, and seeing no cars parked around the house, the besieged plaintiffs opened the door; 

6) as soon as the plaintiffs opened the door, Mr. Carroll materialized and helped himself into their residence despite the plaintiffs' protests;

7) Mr. Carroll came with three "brown envelopes" containing, each, a settlement agreement and a draft of an affidavit against me - both documents that the plaintiffs refused to sign the previous day, even for $100,000 offered by Mr. Carroll in exchange of signing those documents with pleas that otherwise he will lose his law license;

8) Mr. Carroll added to that plea yesterday another plea - that if they do not sign, Mr. Carroll's sick sister will get sicker.  Plaintiffs reportedly firmly told Mr. Carroll that if his sister is sick, signing false affidavits won't make her better.  Of course, an attorney's sister's sickness has nothing to do with the case, nor should the attorney notify his sick sister of what is happening in every litigation he is handling.

9) Also, Mr. Carroll claimed to plaintiffs that if they do not sign what he brought, and if he does not present the signed documents to the court until May 31, 2016, plaintiff's lawsuit against Chenango County CPS litigated since 2012, will be dismissed.

That was a lie.

In fact, the deadline of May 31, 2016 was set by the court for other purposes, of which Mr. Carroll was supposed to tell his clients, but instead decided - as he often does - to lie to them.

Here is why the May 31, 2016 deadline (docket 14) was set by the court:

The order clearly directs Mr. Carroll not to do one thing, that he was requesting (filing a cross-motion) and instead to do two other things:

1) "notify the Court immediately" "if in fact the case is not settled" - that was on May 17, 2016, Mr. Carroll did not notify the court until now, I checked on Pacer;  Mr. Carroll told the plaintiffs that he is holding back notification of the court about the settlement hoping that they will change their minds;

2) file a stipulation of settlement by May 31, 2016 - and if that is not done by that date, "the Court will schedule a trial", not dismiss a case.

Of course, it may be that Mr. Carroll does not know how to try a case - or that the defendants, in whose real employ Mr. Carroll appears to be - pay him handsomely to keep the case from reaching the trial, and are now upset that he screwed up, causing him to camp out 80 miles away from his home and office in Syracuse, NY, on two consecutive days so far.

In fact, Mr. Carroll told the plaintiffs that he will come again today to try to coerce them "to change their minds", and will continue to come every day! until they "change their minds" - until May 31, 2016.

Apparently, Mr. Carroll is not afraid of being arrested for:

1) stalking;
2) trespass - two times now;
3) tampering with a witness;
4) burglary - two counts now (in New York, burglary is "breaking and entering into the residence at night in order to commit a crime within",  Mr. Carroll entered plaintiffs' residence without their consent on two consecutive nights with an obvious intent to commit a crime within of solicitation of perjury, fraud and fraud upon the court).

I got interested as to why Mr. Carroll feel himself to be so immune from prosecution - what kind of connections he has to be so obnoxious and brazen.

Here is what I found.

In 2013 Mr. Carroll ran for office - for a legislative seat in Onondaga County, New York, 17th district.

Mr. Carroll ran on a Republican ticket.  Other two prominent republicans in that area are: (1) the famous in his misconduct Judge James Tormey and (2) Judge Tormey's friend and law school classmate, the local District Attorney William Fitzpatrick who only turned in a judge-pedophile when that particular judge refused to buy William Fitzpatrick off, I wrote about that on my blog.

During his election campaign, local newspapers disclosed some interesting information about Mr. Carroll:

So, Mr. Carroll is from a "local Republican party", and was endorsed to run by the local Republican party - the party where the local District Attorney and the Chief Administrative judge overseeing the entire 5th Judicial District are only members.

It is interesting that Mr. Carroll's incompetence as a civil rights attorney came through information in his election campaign, too.

In his election campaign, his two area of specialty in litigation are announced as:

• products liability, and
• bankruptcy - not civil rights litigation.

In an attorney review on the Internet, Mr. Carroll is also portrayed as an immigration attorney:

On the website of his law firm Carroll & Carroll, P.C. Mr. Carroll is portrayed as a securities attorney.

• securities
• immigration
• products liability
• bankruptcy

Not civil rights litigation.  So, when Mr. Carroll announced to plaintiffs that he had vast experience in civil rights litigation (while at this time he is deathly afraid to proceed to trial and engages in criminal conduct to remain on the case and not to proceed to trial), and when he claimed a $500/hr legal fee as a pre-eminent expert in the field of civil rights litigation, that was obviously, also a lie.

Information disclosed during Mr. Carroll's election campaign also reflects interesting "community experience":

Climbers Access Coalition - Mr. Carroll is a mountain climber, or at least he was a mountain climber in his youth.

His portray on his election campaign Facebook page shows him as quite chubby - I doubt he climbs mountains now.

And here's "Woody"'s family, as described in his election campaign:

Mr. Carroll's listed family members are:

Sister Nancy Carroll Butler, a Baptist Minister who, according to her own disclosure, has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis - it is in her name that Mr. Carroll begged plaintiffs yesterday to sign false affidavits against me, so that he would not lose his law license.

I wonder whether Minister Carroll Butler even knows of her brother's pleas on her behalf, but somehow I highly doubt a minister would approve commission of a crime in her name.

Sister Jennifer Carroll Archie, a securities lawyer at the mammoth law firm Latham Watkins that recently embraced the former Chief Judge of the State of New York Jonathan Lippman.

I wonder whether the fact that the judiciary is bending over backwards for "Woody" Carroll no matter what crimes he commits is because of his prominent sister, a partner of Latham Watkins in Washington, D.C. and allegedly one of the "nation's top data protection attorneys".

Doctor of clinical psychology Susanne Carroll Duffy (not Archie, the "seminars by the sea" website cited in the family information on "Woody" gives his sister's correct last name),

 a clinical psychologist out of Eastport Maine obviously working together with social services to treat traumatized children by playing with them - possibly, that's why CPS was so comfortable giving the job of killing the lawsuit to a brother of a child abuse therapist? 

It is highly unlikely that loving brother "Woody" Carroll would be willing to damage sister's thriving "traumatized child therapy by playing in the sandbox" business 

by going aggressively after CPS in another state and thus jeopardizing lucrative referrals of children to his sister in her home state of Maine.

By the way, THIS was shown at one of the "by the sea" seminars of "Woody"'s psychologist sister as a THERAPY point for children, for the story to be told in a sandbox.

Apparently, not only "Woody" has problems with ... let's say, adequately perceiving reality.

I would not allow my child near this woman - this YouTube video can traumatize rather than help by showing a large bird struggling in the water, and then appearing from the water with a large piece of red-looking piece, it's apparently fish that the eagle is going to kill or feed to his children while still alive.

Children will not be sleeping after this "therapeutic session" and will need Dr Duffy's, or her shrink colleagues', services for life.

Great "play therapy".  One really needs to be a licensed Doctor of Psychology and a certified play therapist ("certified" is a good word though) to invent this crap.

The last family member described in "Woody" Carroll's election campaign is, I understand, 

brother Jonathan Carroll, a "semi-retired businessman" and a "former owner" of Boxer Craft, Inc.

Jon Carroll, as of today, still lists himself on his LinkedIn profile as "founder" of Boxer Craft Inc., a large clothing manufacturer

 - and a  consultant in a global management consulting firm McKinney and Company. 

So - nobody puts Woody in the corner, Woody the brother of:

• a Baptist Minister;
• a Latham Watkins law partner, employing and serving many powerful people of this country (LW is reportedly the "highest grossing law firm in the world");
• a "traumatized children" therapist,  who must necessarily have good connections with CPS for her business to thrive, and of
• a millionaire corporate businessman who can finance election campaigns of many judges and their relatives - or their opponents, if his little brother's little feelings are hurt by those judges or their relatives.

Quite a bouquet of family members to keep judges in check and prevent them from disciplining "Woody" no matter what he does.

Actually, during that election campaign of 2013, it was mentioned in a newspaper - politely - that "Woody" "lacks a filter".

Once again, Carroll, a lawyer, an officer of the court, a "community server" in "rescue missions" and a member of an "international evangelic friendship" religion, a religion that is reportedly preaching that every person is in need of salvation, offered this kind of soothing words of "salvation" in a community where "tensions :

causing people to choose his opponent in elections:

But - "roughing up" the poor "to get 'em motivated" rings a bell.

That's what "Woody" is doing with the indigent plaintiffs - what with his $500/hr rates for doing nothing and for committing fraud and fraud upon the court, what with his harassment, trespassing and continues coercion of plaintiffs, where:

1) all of the three plaintiffs are not wealthy;

2) two of the three plaintiffs are elderly; and

3) one of the three plaintiffs is extremely elderly and disabled.

I guess, "Woody" remembers to mention his disabled sister who would allegedly suffer if plaintiffs do not sign false affidavits against me which are meant to save "Woody" from attorney disciplinary action, criminal prosecution and a lawsuit for fraud and fraud upon the court.

Yet, "Woody" does not seem to care that one of the people he is subjecting to the extreme stress of being made a hostage in her own house is an elderly and disabled individual who he is supposed to help, not hurt.

I will report whether "Woody" will barge again today into the house of his victims who already fired him for misconduct, and on consecutive days.

Stay tuned. 

#FraudsterAttorneyWoodruffCarroll offers a court witness $100,000 for a false affidavit against me to save his law license

I wrote yesterday morning about attorney Woodruff Carroll, of Syracuse, NY who, when caught in lying to the court, tried to coerce his clients to make further false affidavits - and threatened to come to their house, while they told them not to come, to obtain those false affidavits.

Then, he threatened to withdraw from the civil rights case that he was trying to kill, obviously paid by defendants social services.

Just how much he may have been paid by social services, was revealed yesterday night.

According to a witness, Mr. Carroll arrived yesterday to the plaintiffs' residence with two documents - a settlement agreement that they told them ahead of time they did not want to sign and want to proceed to trial, and a long drafted affidavit on their behalf against me.

The drafted affidavit against me, among other things, stated that plaintiffs did not send their retainer agreement with me to Mr. Carroll.

The circumstances of why Mr. Carroll wants that particular issue denied are described in my yesterday's blog, but, briefly, he asked the court to strip me of my fees for 3.5 years of litigation because allegedly I did not have a written retainer agreement, after (according to one of the plaintiffs) asking her to send that same retainer agreement to him, and after she sent that retainer agreement to him.

Lying to the court is a crime.

Lying to federal court is a federal crime.

Mr. Carroll, who is practicing law since 1984, that is, for 32 years so far, certainly knows that.

So, when I filed a motion to vacate the order of the court stripping me, on Mr. Carroll's request, of my legal fees for 3.5 years of litigation, and for sanctions for fraud against Mr. Carroll, Mr. Carroll became desperate.

Since I relied upon the statement to me of one of the plaintiffs in reporting to the court that my retainer agreement was sent to Mr. Carroll, at Mr. Carroll's request, before Mr. Carroll claimed to the court under oath that there is no such retainer agreement, Mr. Carroll had only three options of dealing with it:

1) admit the truth and ask for leniency for his misconduct; or

2) deny misconduct and plead the 5th, or

3) commit a further crime and providing further false statements to the court to save his sorry hide.

According to the statement of a witness, Mr. Carroll chose option # 3.

Mr. Carroll, in front of two witnesses, tried to solicit yesterday night a false affidavit from his client claiming that the retainer agreement was never sent to him, and accusing me of lying.

Mr. Carroll knew that what he was doing was wrong and criminal.

He begged plaintiffs to sign those affidavits "to save his law license" (his words, reportedly), and offered them $100,000 in exchange for signing those false affidavits.

Yes, according to two witnesses to whom I talked personally yesterday, attorney Woodruff Carroll, of Syracuse, NY, offered $100,000 to tamper with a witness in a federal court proceeding.

He did not bring that money with him, mind, he only said that if they sign that affidavit against me - which he knew to be false - he will get them $100,000.

Let's remember that before that time, Mr. Carroll told them that the poor Chenango County and its social workers are dictated by their insurance company that they cannot pay more than $30,000.

Imagine how much Carroll was offered to kill a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the Chenango County Department of Social Services if he was offering $100,000, 3 times more than the recovery offered to plaintiffs to settle the lawsuit.

In view of suddenly increased numbers, and a clear statement that $100,000 will be paid for signing the false affidavit and signing the settlement agreement plaintiffs did not want to sign - and I doubt Carroll was offering that out of his own pocket - a criminal investigation is in order as to whether defendants and their attorney Erin Donnelly, of Levine, Gouldin and Thompson were in collusion with Carroll on that offer to bribe a witness in order to continue to defraud a federal court, avoid attorney discipline and criminal prosecution for prior fraud and prevent the case from going to trial.

Mr. Carroll knew that my former clients were not wealthy.

Mr. Carroll knew that my former clients need money very much.

Mr. Carroll was trying to coerce them to sign the false affidavit by stating that I will otherwise take their home, sue them for millions of dollars and put them to jail.

Thank you, Mr. Carroll, for a good idea - of course, I will be doing all of the above against you and not against my honorable former clients.

They declined to sign the false affidavit, called me and reported the bribe solicitation by Mr. Carroll.

I am honored and humbled with that amount of trust.

When your former clients, even after your suspension, have faith in you not to harm them, rather than in their present attorney - that is something.

The witnesses also told me that Mr. Carroll was so upset and excited he was "ready to be tied".

Mr. Carroll also refused to take the word "fired" at its face value, and insisted that he will not withdraw from the case, even when plaintiffs told him he was fired, and told him they would be better of on their own (without any legal training) than with him.

Well, Mr. Carroll also hardly has any legal training, having been admitted to the bar after a "clerkship", not a law school.

Mr. Carroll also promised plaintiffs that he will return again, today, to have them sign the same papers.

The plaintiffs told him that he is fired, he is not welcome and that they will not be home and the door will be locked.

Mr. Carroll claims he is still coming.

What can I say.

The story gets more and more bizarre.

It is the first time I have an actual confirmation from a witness that somebody offered a witness money - $100,000 in this case - to file a false affidavit against me.

I am sure such rigging was occurring in other setting, for money or other quid-pro-quo, but there witnesses simply did not come forward.

Now I have proof of at least one such case.

I will continue reporting on how this bizarre situation develops.

Apparently, only exposure can help in such cases.

Stay tuned.

Will #attorneyWoodruffCarroll of Syracuse, NY, be charged with criminal trespass tonight? The fraudster attorney is getting desperate

On May 17, 2016 I reported on this blog about efforts of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York to manipulate the docket and not show my motion to vacate stripping me of legal fees for 3.5 years of civil rights litigation, to recuse the court for misconduct and to disqualify and sanction attorneys in the case I was removed from because of my alleged SECRET suspension in federal court, right after I brought the case against Chenango County Social Services (NY) to trial.

Today, I checked the docket once again - the court inserted the motion it did not acknowledge on May 16, 2016 (that the court received, but did not file on May 13, 2016).

Here is how the docket of the case looked on May 16, 2016 for the period between May 6, 2016 and May, 16, 2016 - my motion that the court and parties received on May 13, 2016 (I have confirmation as to the court receiving my motion on May 13, 2016 in the morning, through tracking that I posted here):

Ok, as of the evening of May 16, 2016 the docket shows no motion filed on May 13, 2016.

Here is what the same docket shows today for the period between May 6, 2016 and May 16, 2016:

The motion miraculously appeared, even though my already-filed motion is not discussed during the 5/16/2016 conference, the court and the parties pretended it was not there - until their behavior was exposed in this blog.

But, this is not the end of miraculous events that happened and continue to be happening in this case.

Here is the rest of the docket after the conference of May 16, 2016.

First of all, the docket entry without number as of 5/17/2016 now mentions that a copy of the court scheduling order is now "sent to pro se movant Tatiana Neroni by regular mail".

So, the court does agree that I am a "pro se movant" and that, as such, I cannot be served electronically - which is what the court and the parties have been doing all along since January of 2016, while calling me to conferences, blaming me for not coming (from South Carolina to New York) and stripping me of 3.5 years' worth of legal fees because I did not properly oppose their never-served pleadings and orders.

Second, there is an interesting interaction between the court and the Plaintiffs' new attorney Woodruff Carroll further confirming my claim that Carroll is completely incompetent.

Here is docket 112, the motion scheduling order:

The motion scheduling order set the following deadlines:

No	Description of procedural step in motion practice	Deadline to file
1	Response (opposition) to the motion	May 31, 2016;
2	My reply to response (opposition) to the motion	June 6, 2016
3	The motion hearing (on papers, without oral argument)	June 15, 2016

Note that, while giving opposing attorneys who received my motion on May 13, 2016, 18 days since the day they received the motion, to respond by electronic filing, the court gives me only 6 days to at the same time, receive the opponent's responses by regular mail and deliver the answer by regular mail to the court, from another state.

Where my opponents were supposed to file and serve their responses on me (by regular mail) by May 31, 2016, I will only receive those pleadings (maybe) by the time I already have to file my responses to those pleadings.

This is the type of discrimination against pro se litigants by federal courts what I described in my currently circulating petition that I filed on May 17, 2016 that I encourage my readers to sign.

Under the current rules of service, where 6 days must be added to serve me and 6 days must be added for my delivery of filings by mail to the court, and 3 days would be a reasonable minimum of time given me to prepare a response, all in all 15 days should be added to May 31, 2016, so June 15, 2016 should be not the review date, but my deadline to file the response, and the review date should be extended accordingly.

But even that is not the main point here - I somehow expected this particular court's ongoing discrimination against me as an attorney-turned-pro se litigant (through the court's unlawful secret suspension), and especially because I criticize the court and as against critics of the court (such as people, like me, filing motions to recuse, and especially criticizing the court in blogs).

What is going on is that new attorney for the Plaintiffs Woodruff Carroll obviously cannot read scheduling orders or comprehend them.

When a scheduling order says "response by", the response deadline is also the deadline for cross-motions.

Mr. Carroll obviously does not know that, with all of his $500/hr fees.

Since Mr. Carroll does not know how to read clear and unambiguous scheduling orders, Mr. Carroll asked the court to set a cross-motion deadline for him - the one that was already set,  for May 31, 2016.

Here is Mr. Carroll's letter of May 17, 2016.

In the letter he is complaining that "[n]o date has been fixed for cross-motions in the order".

Well, on that he was wrong - the date of response, May 31, 2016, was a date of cross-motions.

But, as much the court catered for Mr. Carroll because the court found a friendly soul on Mr. Carroll where Mr. Carroll, according to Plaintiff Dara Argro, was trying to inflame the court at a court conference by claiming how bad I am by threatening to sue him for fraud - "the same as she sued this court" - apparently, the court started to realize that Mr. Carroll's involvement, continued fraud and incompetence may ultimately get the court into trouble for handling this case, "handling" me and failing to impose attorney discipline for ongoing fraud in the case, for constantly lying to the court and for allowing an attorney to sell out his indigent clients and coerce them into a settlement they do not want.

So, the court rescinded the implicit deadline for cross-motions, denying Mr. Carroll's letter request to "fix" what was already "fixed":

In the order issued on May 17, 2016, the court appears to be disgruntled with Mr. Carroll's failure to comply with the court order and file a "Stipulation of Dismissal" or a "Status Report" on or before 5/5/2016. 

The court told Mr. Carroll on May 17, 2016, the following:

1. you informed the court (once again) on May 16, 2016 that the case settled;
2. if the case did not settle, notify the court immediately - 3 days later it was not done;
3. if the case did settle, file a stipulation of dismissal by May 31, 2016, or the case will proceed to trial.

Easy, isn't it?

If the case did not settle - notify immediately (on May 17, 2016).

If the case did settle - file proof by May 31, 2016.

Did Mr. Carroll tell his clients, the Plaintiffs, of the court order of May 17, 2016?

Of course not, and that is the next page in the unfolding saga.

Today I received an unexpected call from Plaintiff Dara Argro.

It was not for legal advice.

It was to give me information as to what is happening in the case.

Dara told me that Mr. Carroll insists on coming to their house today (from Syracuse, NY to Oxford, NY), a 3 hour roundtrip for Mr. Carroll:

Before, Mr. Carroll came to the Plaintiffs only once - to have them sign a retainer agreement.

And, before Mr. Carroll did not have time in three days to even notify Plaintiffs that the court cancelled a court appearance, thus causing his indigent clients to make 

Plaintiffs did not invite Mr. Carroll to come to their house today.

In fact, Dara told me that she does not want him to come to her house today - or at any time.

Dara told me that she in fact told Mr. Carroll that he is not welcome and that he should not come.

But, Mr. Carroll told Dara that he will come anyway - so he is insisting on committing a crime of criminal trespass into his clients' home in order to coerce them to sign papers they don't want to sign.

By the way, the lawsuit is about Chenango County DSS also coming uninvited, and without a court order or search warrants, to that same house and barging into the same house, and doing searches in the house, including searches of extremely private belongings and locations, causing physical damage to at least one of the Plaintiffs - which Mr. Carroll considered not enough to proceed to trial.

Apparently, since Mr. Carroll has a belief  that he himself can barge into his clients' home uninvited because he wants it, it is now understandable why he thought the case was not enough to proceed to trial (even when the court scheduled it to proceed to trial).

So, why does Mr. Carroll want so much to come to Dara's house tonight at 6 p.m.?

Mr. Carroll wants all three Plaintiffs to do the following:

1) have the three Plaintiffs sign the settlement agreement of a multi-million dollar lawsuit for $30,000 - which Plaintiffs do not want to do;  remember Mr. Carroll reported to the court several times that the case already settled, and that was a lie, and a motion was filed asking for sanctions against Mr. Carroll because of this lie and many other lies;

2) have the three Plaintiffs sign an affidavit "against you, Mrs. Neroni", as Dara put it, so, I understand, Mr. Carroll is undeterred by the court's prohibition for him to file cross-motions, and still wants to do it - and ask for sanctions against me, because I exposed his raging misconduct in the case.

At the same time as pushing the plaintiffs to sign an affidavit against me, Carroll, according to Dara, was also playing on plaintiffs' friendly feelings towards me and told them that if they do not sign the settlement agreement, I will not be able to get my legal fees.

Right!

That is - after opposing ANY legal fees for me on plaintiffs' behalf, after having me stripped of any legal fees for 3.5 years of litigation while using my work to get his own inflated fees for doing nothing, lying to the court and refusing to do proper work for his clients at $500/hr.

So, while arguing to the court that I should not get any legal fees, settlement or no settlement - on behalf of plaintiffs - Carroll tells the plaintiffs that they "must" sign the settlement agreement they do not want to sign in order to help me get my legal fees.

So, Mr. Carroll is urging plaintiffs to sign the puny settlement agreement in a multi-million dollar lawsuit claiming that that will help me get my legal fees, after asking the court - successfully - to deny me all legal fees, and while asking the same plaintiffs to sign an affidavit "against me".

What a mess this man is.

Of course, there is no "must" in signing any settlement agreements, and Mr. Carroll well knows that.

Of course, Mr. Carroll does not represent my interests and does not want to help me.  It is simply one more episode of fraud in my future lawsuit against him.

Because soliciting an affidavit from a person where the person must say what that person does not feel (and that's exactly what Mr. Carroll is doing when he is trying to get an affidavit "against me" from three plaintiffs in Argro v Osborne) is three counts of soliciting perjury and fraud.

Three more counts.

Dara told me she does not want to sign the agreement, nor does she want to sign any affidavits against me, and neither do other plaintiffs, and that they want to proceed to trial, which Mr. Carroll refuses to do.

Dara then called me again to inform me that Mr. Carroll talked to her on the phone again and told her that if plaintiffs do not sign the settlement agreement AND the affidavit "against me" today - start trembling right now, it's a horrible thing Mr. Carroll threatned - Mr. Carroll will then - TADA!! - withdraw from the case.

And - guess what - Dara is celebrating Mr. Carroll's withdrawal as we speak.

She said she was happy Mr. Carroll was withdrawing, because now she will be able to get a "real" attorney who would "really" represent her and other plaintiffs - as, she said, I was doing.

Since Mr. Carroll is still threatening to come tonight to Dara and other plaintiffs to coerce her to sign these two documents, I will continue to cover this extraordinary story.

The story is about the lengths to which a federal court and attorneys would go to cut off rights of recovery of victims of CPS misconduct, and to what lengths courts will go to retaliate against an attorney who dared to sue social services - when no other attorney would take such a case, out of fear of retaliation.

By the way, I found a report on the Internet that in 2014, two years ago, the then-57 year old Woodruff Carroll reported a crime committed against him by a 17-year-old girl.

Did he lie about that, too?

Legal research by a reader I could not help and why attorneys are afraid to sue Social Services

Yet another reader contacted me who is trying to sue Social Services, but cannot get an attorney (attorneys are deathly afraid to sue Social Services for fear to lose their licenses and livelihoods).

And, of course, I had to say "no" - because of the alleged (secret) suspension in federal court.

Yet, the reader did not stop at my "no" and sent to me the reader's own research on the subject of lawsuits against social services, together with the reader's own story.

I would like to make that research public - showing that (1) lay people can do their own legal research pretty well, and that (2) attorneys are afraid to take a case suing social services even with all this case law on the side of the victims.

Here are the results of my reader's legal research on the issue of whether CPS can be successfully sued for misconduct.

Thank you, my reader, and I will not publicize your name, e-mail address, or story, for obvious reasons.

 *   *   *

CPS workers are not IMMUNE to the Constitution. Below are a few cases that prove this.

Beltran v. Santa Clara County, 514 F.3d 906, (9th Cir. 2008)
Beltrans sued two caseworkers under 42 U.S.C. ' 1983, charging constitutional violations in removing child from their custody and attempting to place him under the supervision of the state by fabricating evidence. Court overruled Doe v. Lebbos, and reversed the district court's ruling that defendants were entitled to absolute immunity.

Brokaw v. Mercer County, 235 F.3d 1000, (7th Cir. 2000)
In 1983, three-year old A.D. Brokaw was removed from her parents' home based on allegations of child neglect. After she turned eighteen, she sued her paternal grandfather, aunt, and uncle, alleging that they conspired to violate her constitutional rights by reporting false claims of child neglect. A.D. also sued the various state actors and agencies involved in removing her from her parents' custody. The district court held that A.D.'s suit was barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine because, in effect, A.D. was challenging the validity of the state removal proceedings. The Eleventh Circuit reversed and remanded.

Calabretta v. Floyd, 189 F.3d 808 (9th Cir. 1999)
"This case involves whether a social worker and a police officer were entitled to qualified immunity, for a coerced entry into a home to investigate suspected child abuse, interrogation of a child, and strip search of a child, conducted without a search warrant and without a special exigency." Can you guess what the answer was? "An unlawful entry or search of a home does not end when the government officials walk across the threshold. It continues as they impose their will on the residents of the home in which they have no right to be."

Chavez v. Board of County Commissioners, 2001-NMCA-065, New Mexico Court of Appeals (2001)
Defendants are deputy sheriffs with the Curry County Sheriff's Department, who were called to assist two social workers from the Children, Youth & Families Department on a "child welfare check" at Plaintiff's home. Plaintiff's son had not been attending elementary school. Thus, one reason for the visit to Plaintiff's home was to investigate suspected truancy or educational neglect. Held: "At the time of entry into Plaintiff's home, it was well-settled that the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibited unreasonable searches and seizures and was intended to protect the sanctity of an individual's home and privacy."

Croft v. Westmoreland County Children and Youth Servs., 103 F.3d 1123 (3d Cir. 1997)
Holding that "a state has no interest in protecting children from their parents unless it has some reasonable and articulable evidence giving rise to a reasonable suspicion that a child has been abused or is in imminent danger of abuse."

Doe v. Gooden, 214 F.3d 952 (8th Cir. 2000)
School district officials can be liable under 1983 if they are deliberately indifferent to acts committed by a teacher that violate a student's constitutional rights.

Franz v. United States, 707 F 2d 582, US Ct App (1983)
"The undesirability of cultural homogenization would lead us to oppose efforts by the state to assume a greater role in children's development, even if we were confident that the state were capable of doing so effectively and intelligently." A brilliant analysis of the fundamental right to be free of unwarranted state interference between the child-parent bond, in this case stemming from the Witness Protection Program.

Good v. Dauphin County Soc. Servs. for Children and Youth, 891 F.2d 1087, (3d Cir. 1989)
"[P]hysical entry into the home is the chief evil against which the ... Fourth Amendment is directed," the Court explained, while adding: "It is a 'basic principle of Fourth Amendment law' that searches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable." No qualified immunity claim to be found here.

Heartland Acad. Cmty. Church v. Waddle, 335 F.3d 684, (8th Cir.2003)
Waddle, as Chief Juvenile Officer for the Second Circuit of Missouri, effected the removal of 115 boarding students from Heartland Christian Academy . Waddle had obtained ex parte probable-cause state-court orders to remove some of the boarding students, there were no orders of any kind to remove many of the students who were taken from the school. This case is noted for its brilliant analysis of Eleventh Amendment sovereign immunity, the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, and immunity as an officer of a juvenile court. The court held that: "any single violation of Heartland's federal constitutional rights in this case would be sufficient to sustain Heartland's claim for injunctive relief under ' 1983."

Jones v. Hunt, 410 F.3d 1221 (10th Cir. 2005)
No qualified immunity in this ' 1983 action for alleged violations of Fourth Amendment rights arising from girl's in-school seizure by a deputy sheriff and s Social Worker Supervisor for the New Mexico Children, Youth, and Families Department ("CYFD"). "We conclude that the Fourth Amendment violation as alleged in this case is both obvious and outrageous."

Kelson v. Springfield, 767 F 2d 651, (9th Cir. 1985)
"Supreme Court and Ninth Circuit precedent establish that a parent has a constitutionally protected liberty interest in the companionship and society of his or her child. The state's interference with that liberty interest without due process of law is remediable under section 1983."

Lopkof v. Slater, 103 F.3d 144 (10th Cir. 1996) (Unpublished)
Defendants do not dispute that the law was clearly established that a warrantless search of a private residence is per se unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment unless one of "a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions" applies. Defendants maintain that because they had "received specific information questioning the safety of children," they acted in an objectively reasonable manner when they entered Lopkoff's private residence. Wrong, and no qualified immunity for these officers.

Loudermilk v. Arpaio, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 76819 (D. Ariz. September 27, 2007)
With respect to Plaintiffs' claim based on violation of the Fourteenth Amendment, parents and children have a constitutional right to live together without governmental interference and will not be separated without due process of law except in emergencies. Motion to dismiss by CPS worker and others who coerced entry into home denied.

Mabe v. San Bernardino, 237 F.3d 1101 (9th Cir. 2001)
Section 1983 creates a cause of action against any person who, acting under color of state law, violates the constitutional rights of another person. Whether reasonable cause to believe exigent circumstances existed in a given situation, "and the related questions, are all questions of fact to be determined by a jury." Hence, no immunity for social worker under 42 U.S.C. 1983.

NEW! Michael v. Gresbach, (7th Cir. 2008)
The court held that: "a reasonable child welfare worker would have known that conducting a search of a child's body under his clothes, on private property, without consent or the presence of any other exception to the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment, is in direct violation of the child's constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches." No qualified immunity for this CPS caseworker! The court also held that the state statute that allowed for "investigations" on private property without a search warrant was itself unconstitutional as applied.

Malik v. Arapahoe County Dept. of Soc. Servs.191 F.3d 1306, (10th Cir. 1999)
"The defense of qualified immunity protects government officials from individual liability under 42 U.S.C. ' 1983 for actions taken while performing discretionary functions, unless their conduct violates "clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Court also held that: "it was clearly established law that, except in extraordinary circumstances, a parent has a liberty interest in familial association and privacy that cannot be violated without adequate pre-deprivation procedures."

Norfleet v. Arkansas Dept. of Human Servs., 989 F.2d 289 (8th Cir. 1993)
Court denies qualified immunity to the Human Services Director and caseworker involved because the state obligation to provide adequate medical care, protection, and supervision with respect to children placed in foster care was well established as of 1991.

Parkhurst v. Trapp, 77 F.3d 707 (3rd Cir. 1996)
The defendants attempt to avoid the imposition of summary judgment by arguing that, even if their conduct violated the Fourth Amendment, qualified immunity should shield them from liability. Qualified immunity is available to state actors in Section 1983 suits if those actors reasonably believed that their conduct was lawful. However, a good faith belief in the legality of conduct is not sufficient. Held: No qualified immunity.

Ram v. Rubin, 118 F.3d 1306 (9th Cir. 1997)
Holding "a parent has a constitutionally protected right to the care and custody of his children and he cannot be summarily deprived of custody without notice and a hearing except when the children are in imminent danger." No qualified immunity for social worker who removed child not in imminent danger.

Rogers v. County of San Joaquin, 487 F.3d 1288 (9th Cir. 2007)
Court held: "the rights of families to be free from governmental interference and arbitrary state action are also important. Thus, we must balance, on the one hand, the need to protect children from abuse and neglect and, on the other, the preservation of the essential privacy and liberty interests that families are guaranteed under both the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments of our Constitution." Section 1983 case reinforces that removal of children from home by caseworker absent either a warrant or exigent circumstances violates those rights, and therefore no qualified immunity applies to caseworker.

Roska v. Peterson, 328 F.3d 1230, (10 Cir. 2003)
Holding no immunity for caseworkers who entered a home lacking either exigency or a warrant, and finding constitutional protection in the right to maintain a family relationship, Court held: "the law is now clearly established that, absent probable cause and a warrant or exigent circumstances, social workers may not enter an individual's home for the purpose of taking a child into protective custody."

Tennenbaum v. Williams, 193 F.3d 581, (2d Cir. 1999)
"We affirm the judgment insofar as it holds that the medical examination violated the Tenenbaums' and Sarah's procedural due-process rights and Sarah's Fourth Amendment rights and awards damages therefor. . . We conclude, however, that there is a triable issue of fact as to whether the defendants' removal of Sarah from school was contrary to the procedural requirements of the Due Process Clause and to Sarah's right to be free from unreasonable seizures under the Fourth Amendment." The Missouri Bar has an informative Courts Bulletin describing the case.

Turner v. Houseman, Docket: 07-6108 (10th Cir. 2008) (Unpublished)
"It was clearly established, at least two years before the events in question, that absent probable cause and a warrant or exigent circumstances, neither police nor social workers may enter a person's home without a valid consent, even for the purpose of taking a child into custody, much less to conduct a search. It was also established that the warrantless seizure and detention of a person without probable cause or exigent circumstances, as alleged in Turner's petition, is unreasonable."

Wallis v. Spencer, 202 F.3d 1126 (9th Cir. 2000)
"In cases of alleged child abuse, governmental failure to abide by constitutional constraints may have deleterious long-term consequences for the child and, indeed, for the entire family. Ill-considered and improper governmental action may create significant injury where no problem of any kind previously existed."

Walsh v. Erie County Dep't of Job & Family Servs., 240 F. Supp. 2d 731, (N.D. Ohio 2003)
"Despite the Defendants' exaggerated view of their powers, the Fourth Amendment applies to them, as it does to all other officers and agents of the state whose requests to enter, however benign or well-intentioned, are met by a closed door. . . Any agency that expects to send its employees routinely into private homes has a fundamental obligation to ensure that those employees understand the constitutional limits on their authority."

Weller v. Dept of Soc. Servs., 901 F.2d 387, (4th Cir. 1990)
"Substantive due process does not categorically bar the government from altering parental custody rights." What I find interesting about this case is that it was brought pro se, and that he sued a lotmore people than I am.

Whisman v. Rinehart, 119 F.3d 1303 (8th Cir. 1997)
Whismans filed this action against juvenile officers and social workers, claiming they violated plaintiffs' constitutional rights of familial association, denying plaintiffs due process of law. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss, contending that plaintiffs' claims were not actionable under 42 U.S.C. ' 1983. Guess again!

Wooley v. City of Baton Rouge, 211 F.3d 913, (5th Cir. 2000)
Holding that a "childs right to family integrity is concomitant to that of a parent. No qualified immunity for police officers who removed young child in this section 1983 action.

 

And, I can add to the above list of cases the case I brought to trial - and was then (allegedly, secretly) suspended on the eve of that trial and stripped of my attorney fees for 3.5 years of litigation.

Argro v Osborne - here is the decision denying summary judgment.

Remember - Argro v Osborne.  The reason why attorneys in NY are afraid to take cases against CPS.  They are afraid they will be suspended, like I was, for suing CPS.