Yet another update on #ThiefJudgeBrendaWeaver - a federal grand jury investigation of the case is under way

I wrote previously in several blog posts, here, here, here, here and here, about the outrageous story coming from the State of Georgia, Fannin County, where a group of judges and prosecutors targeted a publisher, Mark Thomason and his attorney, Russell Stookey, for seeking through public records and through a lawsuit, a verification whether:

1) court transcripts were altered, as compared with audio tapes of a court proceedings, to take out of the transcript mentioning of an "N-word" by the judge, #JudgeRogerBradley - who since resigned; and
2) whether judges in question - the racist judge Roger Bradley and the Chief Circuit Judge Brenda Weaver, who is also the Chairperson of the State Judicial Qualifications Commission - authorized payment of $17,000 out of the taxpayer-funded court operated account to a private law firm representing a private individual seeking to quash the lawsuit that sought access to that audio tape.

I wrote that publisher Mark Thomason and his attorney Russel Stookey were arrested, charged with felonies, and thrown in jail for making a public records request about copies of documents from the court operating accounts showing the illegal checks.

I wrote that the charges against Mark Thomason and attorney Russel Stookey were dropped "at this time", but that the local establishment continues to dig under Mark Thomason and is trying to concoct yet another set of criminal charges for him - all because he "pushed the cart all the way with the N-word", by the claim of the local pro-establishment journalist Brian Pritchard.

It is interesting to mention that the local state prosecutors did not seem to be interested in either Judge Roger Bradley committing grand larceny, a felony, by signing checks for thousands of dollars out of the court operating account to private law firms from the court operating accounts, or in Judge Brenda Weaver openly approving, in writing, such a grand theft.

Apparently, the local state prosecutors were too busy bending over backwards to accommodate Judge Weaver's request to charge Mark Thomason and attorney Stookey with felonies, and to allow Judge Weaver to tamper with witnesses ahead of the official criminal investigation and coach the prosecutor, her own former law clerk and her husband's former employee, as to how to prosecute Mark Thomason and attorney Stookey better.

Well, since the local prosecutors are too busy - and too timid - to do their jobs when judges are committing crimes on their watch, a federal grand jury is reportedly doing their job for them now.

Reportedly, Judge Weaver's puppet, the Appalachin District Attorney Alison Sosebee, was served with a federal grand jury subpoena to turn over her "investigative file" of the whole mess to the grand jury.

It is interesting whether Judge Weaver will be served with a similar subpoena of her own investigation that she reported in her letter to Alison Sosebee where she requested to drop charges against Mark Thomason and Russel Stookey "at this time".

A poetic detail about the whole mess is that Judge Weaver was given a 1st Amendment award in 2014 - of all things.

Here is the happy recipient of the award.

I wonder if the "trophy", the 1st Amendment award, screamed from Judge Weaver's wall when Judge Weaver was ordering her former law clerk to lock up Mark Thomason and attorney Russell Stookey and charge them with felonies for making an access to public records request.

I will continue to cover this story.

Stay tuned.

An update on the "blue-eyed assassin", the Tennessean #JudgeAmandaCampbell - Judge Campbell has been indicted for four felony counts and suspended from the bench

I wrote on this blog in May of 2016 about a Tennessee #JudgeAmandaCampbell, about a story when the judge ordered the Sheriff to elevate criminal charges against a mother from child neglect (for failing to buckle up her children) to aggravated child abuse, and where Judge Campbell initially refused to recuse from the case even when her role as a co-prosecutor of the case became known.

Judge Campbell is a former prosecutor and advertised herself in the election campaign in her Southern state as a "blue-eyed assassin" - not so subtly pointing also to her white skin.

Judge Campbell never notified the defendant of the increased charge.

There is an update to the story about #JudgeAmandaCampbell: she was reportedly indicted on four felony charges and suspended from the bench.

Judge Campbell has been charged with four counts of official misconduct in two separate cases and is accused of lying and misusing her authority.

Judge Campbell also reportedly commenced a sua sponte contempt proceedings against an attorney for not showing up for a hearing in a divorce case while the records show the attorney was not notified of that hearing (the judge's personel's mistake).

Instead of correcting the error and apologizing to the attorney, her name is #KristieAnderson, Judge Campbell instead sought to lie about the attorney's alleged misconduct: that "Anderson was disrespectful, showed disdain for the judge and yelled at court personnel — none of which was alleged in the show cause order nor was Anderson ever accused of such conduct".

Moreover, after attorney Anderson, through her own defense attorney, challenged Judge Sampson, Judge Sampson reportedly  advised attorney Anderson's opposing counsel in the divorce case to file a contempt proceeding against attorney Anderson, which constituted legal advice by the judge in that action and acting as an advocate for the opponent of attorney Anderson's client in the divorce action, not to mention that when a judge advises a part to file a certain motion, that constitutes a clear pre-judgement, as there is no doubt as to how the judge is going to rule on that motion.

The local press, The New Sentinel, reported since last fall "how [JudgeSamspson]

• levied fees against the wrongfully accused for lawyers they did not use,
• ordered children removed from their homes without authority,
• barred people from coming into court and then ordered them arrested for failing to appear, and
• began charging people a fee for drug testing that had not been authorized by any government body as required by law".

It took a year to get Judge Campbell indicted, even though her misconduct was pretty obvious.  Well, at least the indictment happened.

We will now see whether Judge Campbell will be  truly prosecuted and brought to justice, or instead whether she will be let go with an easy plea to something low and insignificant, and whether she will be taken off the bench (as she should) and disbarred (as she should).

Yet, for the present time, I am glad that the tide is turning, and that judges who committed misconduct are held accountable.

Yet, #JudgeAmandaCampbell's case, the criminal indictment is still very rare across the United States, the usual outcome is that judges can do anything in "their" courtrooms under the protection of absolute judicial immunity for MALICIOUS and CORRUPT acts (as Judge Campbell obviously did), hoping that nobody will ever dare to charge them criminally, and if they are not charged criminally, they will never be disciplined and lawsuits against them will be dismissed on immunity grounds, often with sanctions and attorney fees against their victims.

It is obvious that Judge Campbell was charged as a result of outrage in the media and social media.

And, outrage in the media and social media exposing judicial misconduct should continue.  Only this way we can clean up the act of our government, and the most powerful branch of that government, the judiciary.

Without that exposure and pressure, the "honorables" can only do what they already did - give themselves immunity for malicious and corrupt acts and act based on that immunity - maliciously and corruptly.

The American Bar Association's Report on the future of legal services in the U.S. - the "sensitive" core issues are conspicuously and cowardly not addressed

A 116-page report on the "future of provision of legal services" was released by the American Bar Association in August of 2016.

No revolutionary changes were proposed by the ABA.

Do not search the report for words such as

1. judicial misconduct
2. immunity
3. whistleblowers
4. retaliation
5. antitrust

while judicial misconduct, judge-invented "immunities" of government officials as to accountability to constitutional violations, relentless persecution of attorney whistleblowers and antitrust activities of attorney disciplinary committees acting to protect their markets rather than protect the consumers - are at the core of public discontent with the legal profession, the judiciary, and at the core of unavailability of affordable legal services to the majority of the U.S. population.

Instead, the ABA wants to keep regulation in the hands of the judiciary - which is a big problem, creating an ability for the judiciary to hold attorneys in a death grip, and preventing independent representation of clients, and especially in cases involving governmental misconduct and judicial misconduct.

And, of course, the ABA, a non-profit corporation that has foreign funding, wants to control attorney regulation and provision of legal services in the United States, jamming down consumers' throats what consumers do not want - government-imposed expensive attorneys (or incompetent assigned attorneys for the indigent) instead of court representatives of consumers' own choice, as it should be, with or without the government's approval of such a choice through law licensing.

Well, no matter what the length of the ABA report on the "future of provision of legal services", when the core issues making the legal profession and its regulation the main reason why the majority of the U.S. population cannot have true access to impartial courts and cannot have effective remedies at law for violations of their rights are not reflected in that report, the value of that report is zero.

And, of course, the report is a prime example that the ABA knows that the legal profession is in jeopardy and is trying hard to save it - by further rearranging the chairs on the deck of the sinking Titanic.

The Russian Supreme Court has struck as unfair and unlawful a court decision litigated on a whim - just like American courts usually do

I wrote on this blog repeatedly about American courts completely disregarding the rule of law, or the record in front of them, as a pattern or a system of "that's how we do business in our neck of woods, and hell hath no fury like will be unleashed upon you if you cross us".

You can read about the kind of "fury" unleashed upon litigants who have the audacity to insist upon the rule of law and impartial adjudication in the American courts - and listen to the yesterday's interview of attorney and human rights advocate Zena Cranshaw-Logal.

You can also read about adjudication-on-the-whim on this blog, as well as in the social media where people, more and more, come out and publicly expose judicial retaliation and adjudication-on-a-whim.

It is actually habitual for American judges to rule on the judge's whim, often without an explanation of grounds for the decision, on the whim of a judge, telling the litigant - move up (appeal, if you can afford it) or move on.

The legal profession recognizes the fact of adjudication-on-a-whim as habitual part of the American judicial system - by sayings that "a good lawyer knows the law, a great lawyer knows the judge", and by the fact that attorneys pay a LOT of money (as part of their ETHICAL training) to learn about whims of different judges - to consider and rely on such whims in litigating cases in front of such judges (I understand, judges use their taxpayer-backed time and are paid for telling attorneys about their whims upon which their cases are decided).

And, I wrote a lot on this blog about retaliation by the American court against those who actually insist on fair and impartial adjudication of their court cases, following the rule of law.

At the background of a system of adjudication-on-a-whim in American courts, it was a breath of fresh air to read about a decision of - gasp! - the Russian Supreme Court reported today by the Russian legal press portal pravo.ru.

The Russian Supreme Court reversed a lower appellate court's decision (the interlinked article is in Russian, but, I understand, it can be translated through Google), because the lower appellate court, "in violation of Article 67 of the Civil Procedure Code of the Russian Federation

1. did not assess proof in the record as to: 
1. relevance,
2. admissibility,
3. credibility of each separate piece of evidence offered as proof, as well as ,
4. sufficiency and
5. interconnection of the totality of evidence offered as proof, and
2. did not eliminate existing contradictions among the aforementioned evidence in the record, even though the factual evidence in the record is material for the correct adjudication of the dispute"

But - that's exactly what American courts do all along, with no reversals!

After having read countless decisions of American courts that leaves an attorney stunned to the core by their lawlessness, and their arrogance in that lawlessness, where the record is disregarded or contradicted, the applicable law is disregarded or contradicted, or no grounds or explanations are given at all for the decisions that clearly contradict the record and the applicable law - my reaction to the reasons for this reversal by the Russian Supreme Court was - really?  Do courts still do that?  Do courts still reverse their brothers for not following the law and/or the record?

And, please, consider the fact that Russia is, basically, a dictatorship with an abysmal record of human rights violations.

And, please, also consider the fact that, even being a dictatorship with an abysmal record of human rights violations, Russia allows its citizens to sue the Russian government in an international court, the European Court of Human Rights, for violations of human rights, seeking monetary compensation from their governments - the relief blocked in the U.S. by:

1) federal courts dismissing such cases on the pretext of judicially created "abstentions", "immunities", deferences and Rooker-Feldman "the biased state court already decided your case, so what do you want from us" doctrines; and

2) by the refusal of the U.S. legislators to fully ratify the International Convention of Civil and Political Rights and to allow Americans to do what Russians (and citizens or non-citizen individuals wronged by other countries, including some dictatorships, subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights and to the United Nations Human Rights Commission) already have - the right to sue those governments in an international forum for human rights violations.

So, it appears that we are not a dictatorship, after all, here in the United States.

We are much, much worse.

Tonight on Andy Ostrowski's "Justice Served" radio show: Zena D. Crenshaw-Logal, the advocate against torture of advocates against judicial misconduct

Zena D. Crenshaw-Logal

is a passionate national and international advocate against torture by the legal system in the United States.

Yes, torture by the legal system, that follows a pattern described in Mrs. Crenshaw-Logal's articles and on the websites of her organizations - OPT-IN USA and thethirddegree.net.

In 2009, Mrs. Crenshaw-Logal contacted the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights of the United Nations with this letter stating that the U.S. is politically persecuting whistleblowers of judicial misconduct and is denying them effective legal remedies.

In 2015, Mrs. Crenshaw-Logal, a trained civil rights attorney and an experienced advocate for human rights, has filed a class-action complaint against the United States of America in with the United Nations Human Rights Committee claiming that the U.S. is denying its citizens, us average Americans, effective remedies to protect us from retaliation if we raise our voices against misconduct of the government, and especially misconduct within the judicial system.

I encourage my readers to read Mrs. Crenshaw-Logal's complaint to the United Nations.

It not only lists violations of articles of international treaties that the U.S. is part of - and which are part of the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution (even if the Treaties are ratified only with the so-called RUDs, "reservations, understandings and declarations", and without giving Americans a right to sue the U.S. in the United Nations, as other member countries allowed their members to do).

The complaint also cites to interesting precedents, for example, to:

• Morton Nesses v Randall T. Shepard, et al., 68 F.3d 1003 at 1005-1006 (7th Cir., 1995) (providing that a litigant cannot prevail in the legal system he or she contends is corrupt if that contention is true); and
• Ward v Village of Monroeville, 409 U.S. 57 at 61-2 (1972) ("Nor, in any event, may the State's trial court procedure be deemed constitutionally acceptable simply because the State eventually offers a defendant an impartial adjudication. Petitioner is entitled to a neutral and detached judge in the first instance.")

In her complaint to the United Nations Human Rights Committee, attorney Crenshaw-Logal lists the following goals of TTD/The Third Degree (torture of whistleblowers of judicial misconduct), and I quote from attorney Crenshaw-Logal complaint to the UN:

1. "disparage and discredit targets through legal process;
2. intimidate and perhaps terminate witnesses and/or targets;
3. neutralize and eventually preempt the target's acces to courts;
4. impoverish the targets; and, perhaps...
5. incarcerate the targets".

In her complaint to the United Nations, attorney Crenshaw-Logal lists the ways of how those goals are achieved by the judicial system bent on revenge, and I quote from her complaint to the UN:

1. "Procedural irregularities (particularly hearing requests denials, ultimately notice, and/or evidence tampering/destruction);
2. one or more questionable departures from well-established precedent;
3. undisclosed grounds for adverse credibility determinations;
4. personal character disparagement;
5. total or substantial denial of relief through Judicial Activism, i.e., an arguable usurpation of legislative powers;
6. judicial proscriptions that are functional, civil equivalent of ex post facto law; and/or
7. Total or substantial denial of relief pursuant to some form of Judicial Engineering".

In the conclusion of the complaint, attorney Crenshaw-Logal states that the petitioners/complainants "hail from a class of Americans who are not only unsuccessful litigants; we suffer life-altering, unnecessarily devastating U.S. court decisions that essentially punish our championing of public interests (in the course of trying to protect our personal rights) and reward the historically shunned if not outright condemned conduct of our opponents".

I have been documenting just what attorney Crenshaw-Logal described in her complaint to the U.N. over 2.5 years in this blog and through my practice as Family Law, criminal law, defense of foreclosure, defense in consumer debt cases, and in civil rights litigation - that is, until the Third Degree was applied to me and my law license was taken in November of 2015 for making motions to recuse a judge.

So, I was punished - and the judge I sought to recuse, as well as his supporters were rewarded - exactly following the pattern described in attorney Crenshaw-Logal's complaint.

And that is happening not only to me.  That is happening to people who are not attorneys and whose only "fault" is that they want an impartial judge to decide their court cases. 

Such people cannot find attorneys who would make a motion to recuse - because the judiciary holds attorneys, through attorney licensing, in deadly grip and suffocates their independence in advocacy and their ability to provide proper services for their clients and protect their rights in court.

Attorney Crenshaw-Logal is doing an important work for all of us.

She is on Andy Ostrowski's radio show tonight at 6:00 pm discussing her advocacy.

Thank you for your work, attorney Zena Crenshaw-Logal.

An update on #ThiefJudgeBrenda Weaver: the Weaver supporters are skipping church for research to badmouth Mark Thomason, but instead reveal that Mark Thomason and other whistleblowers in Fannin County, Georgia, were and still are targeted for exposing racist and corrupt government officials to the media and the FBI investigations

I wrote on this blog about efforts of the government at various level to block people's access to public records exposing governmental misconduct, and about tools that the government uses to prevent such access - and dissemination - of records about the government:  from blocking access to intimidation, retaliation against whistleblowers, up to the point of a murder.

I also wrote about a specific case in Georgia where a judge arranged with her former law clerk to file felony charges against a lay individual (a publisher) and his attorney for as much as seeking records of a court's operating account to show that a certain judge (or judges) released large amounts of money from that account to private individuals illegally.

After these two individuals, Mark Thomason and his attorney Russel Stookey, were actually charged, arrested, spent a night in jail, were released on bail on humiliating conditions - including random drug tests - and after a national media and social media attention, charges were dropped, "at this time", as the instigator of the charges, Judge Brenda Weaver mentioned in her letter asking her accomplice, prosecutor Sosebee, to withdraw charges because the prosecutor has other things to do.

County attorney Lynn Doss was actually investigated because there was as suspicion - fanned by the pro-Weaver press - that Lynn Doss allegedly talked to the FBI about the court operating accounts.

The pro-Weaver article - published long time after charges against Mark Thomason and Russel Stookey were dropped - raises issues of the conflict of interest of county attorney Lynn Doss, but not the glaring conflict of interest of judge Weaver and district attorney Sosebee.

The pro-Weaver article also published an interesting letter from prosecutor Chase G. Queen, with copies to the Dishonorable DA B. Alison Sosebee, Judge Weaver's accomplice and former employee of Judge Weaver and for Judge Weaver's husband

Chase G. Queen is an assistant district attorney to DA Jeffrey Langley:

Jeffrey Langley is the DA of another district.  His assistant DA Chase G. Queen, in his letter to Sosebee's investigator, first, apologized that he did not get to DA Sosebee earlier - ADA Queen and DA Langley's office were obviously in hiding and waited how the case turns out before responding to Sosebee, and now used a zillion excuses as to why his own office is a mess and why nobody follows any kind of procedure to create records of contacts or messages in his office:

Then, Mr. Chase engaged in some mud-slinging against Mark Thomason:

Then Assistant DA Chase Queen suggests to the already disgraced DA Alison Sosebee to contact ADA Queen at the undisclosed cell phone number (even though official cell phone numbers of prosecutors, where such cell phones are funded by taxpayers, are not private or secret) - for "more details" (more dirt) against Mark Thomason.

That was on July 11, 2016, after the charges against Mark Thomason was dropped.

ADA Queen indicated in his letter that:

and that

What constitutes the "questionable character" and "bad reputation" of Mark Thomason, for which witnesses are to be rounded up urgently and new criminal charges need to be drummed up against Mark Thomson (and that's after Judge Weaver coached witnesses against Mark Thomason ahead of even DA Sosebee's "investigation"), was explained later by the establishment insider-journalist Brian Pritchard.

By the way, the "expert" on Mark Thomason's "bad character" and "questionable reputation", ADA Chase Queen, still has on his LinkedIn profile that he is still a student and an Assistant District Attorney INTERN:

ADA Chase Queen is actually admitted to the State Bar of the State of Georgia - on July 2, 2015,

so at the time he wrote the above referenced letter he practiced law for 1 year only - the establishment chose the last-to-be-hired-first-to-be-fired person to engage in dirty games in a highly politicized case, possibly exposing ADA Chase Queen to federal criminal charges of tampering with witnesses and interfering with an FBI investigation.

But, when you are giving such a formidable task - to badmouth a political whistleblower - to a completely "green" person - embarrassing things may happen.

And the thing that happened with ADA Chase Queen's letter is that prosecutor Chase Queen has injected himself and his office into the whole mess as a character witness on Mark Thomason's reputation and character, thus:

1. practically acknowledging politically motivated surveillance upon Mark Thomason, and
2. completely tainting Jeffrey Langley's DA's office - as well as Alison Sosebee's DA's office who was provided the "details" and help in her own tainted investigation - as neutral investigators and prosecutors against Mark Thomason.

It is apparent that, after the charges were dropped against Mark Thomason, because of public outrage in the media, at the "request" of Judge Weaver, "at this time" - which is a direct threat of renewal of charges - DA Alison Sosebee continued to "work" with the DA of another judicial district digging dirt against Mark Thomason, and, possibly, intimidating witnesses and compromising evidence of the FBI investigation.

Since DA Queens letter contains yet another direct threat against Mark Thomason - that Mark Thomason should have been charged with yet another crime, and that was immediately after criminal charges against Mark Thomason and his attorney Russel Stookey were dropped - yet another criminal prosecution against Mark Thomason may be in the works.

Why?

The pro-Weaver and pro-establishment media person (an elderly white ruddy-face male) Brian Pritchard seen here advertising some merchandize including beer mugs will tell you why, precisely - just rewind the file to about 6:53:

"the witness said that Scott Kiker ... [probate judge - T.N.] Scott Kiker was aware and told him that Mark Thomason brought the FBI to Fannin County.  Remember, Mark Thomason brought Fox5 when the "N-word" started - I wonder who helped that out, ah? Wonder who's pushed this cart ALL the way from the beginning?  I wonder who that person who was pushing this cart from day one, since the "N-word" story started, ok?  Now, why did Mark Thomason call the FBI?  Because he's brought them up here, that's what Scott Kiker says, and they had to sign a paper before they would come up, and Mark wanted representation. It is my understanding from the witness, it is possible that Scott Kiker is Mark's representation with the FBI.  Well, the FBI says that Lynn Doss, the County Attorney, has spoken to the FBI three times.  Three times!  Ha! Wonder if Scott Kiker knew she spoke to the FBI. "

Note that ruddy-faced Brian Pritchard -

whose dog and wife (and, it would be safe to suggest, probably, some bar tenders, too) can testify that he puts over 30 hours of research into every article instead of going to church -

was very upset that the media made so much about:

• those pesky 1st Amendment issues in politicized criminal charges against a publisher and his attorney, and
• the media focusing on the "N-word story" (what of it? right? so, a white judge used an "N-word" in the courtroom in the State of Georgia, where African Americans represent a large portion of the population and where that word smacks back to the "happy" old times of slavery - why "push the cart all the way" about it, why invite the press? it's no big deal - right?).

The ruddy-faced Brian Pritchard blasted the media to do no research before piling accusations against officials involved - as compared to Brian Pritchard who forgoes church to do "hours and hours" of research, which we can verify with his wife, his dog (and his bar tender - that's a lucky guess, judging by his puffed-up ruddy face and advertised bear mugs suggests).

Brian Pritchard did not give names of the allegedly irresponsible media, only claiming "one" especially irresponsible media source, without naming it.

Well, there is a saying in Russian (my native tongue): "what is on a sober's person's mind, is on a drunk's tongue".

Brian Pritchard, the guy who skipped church over research at least did not withhold the truth - that Mark Thomason and other people who participated in the FBI investigations are targeted by the local establishment because of their whistleblowing.

Even though Brian Pritchard withheld the name of the "witness" who allegedly reported that it was Mark Thomason who was the bad person who "pushed the cart all the way" and brought "Fox5" and the FBI into the Fannin County, he claimed that he got the name of that witness from public records.

So, Mark Thomason, a white guy, is blasted by Brian Pritchard, another white guy for being disloyal to the "white brotherhood" - for bringing Fox5 upon a racist white judge - and for bringing the FBI upon another racist white judge and a racist white DA who were trying hard to cover up the cooking of the court records to eliminate the mentioning of the "N-word" by the first racist white judge.

An interesting detail: Brian Pritchard who claimed free access to records right after Mark Thomason and his attorney Russel Stookey were charged with felonies, arrested and thrown into jail for making a public records request, refused to disclose the name of the "witness" who reported that Mark Thomason is the alleged "culprit" "who pushed the cart all the way".

Brian Pritchard invited the public to make their own public records request to learn about the name of that "witness".

Knowing full well that, after charges against Mark Thomason and attorney Russell Stookey, even though the charges were dropped "at this time", the public will be intimidated to file such public records request - for fear of being charged with a felony, arrested and going to jail.

I wonder who Brian Pritchard drinks beer with so that he has free immediate access to public records while other people get arrested and criminally prosecuted for the same requests.

As to the alleged FBI investigation, I hope that it is not meant for show and will result in actual charges against Judge Weaver, prosecutor Sosebee and against their accomplices in this dirty mess - not in total exoneration of the rogue judge, as it happened in the case of Judge Shirley Kornreich in New York, where the judge was not disciplined as an attorney, as a judge, was not taken off the bench and continued in her corrupt ways, now thinking she has the badge of approval from the FBI - and even got her son-in-law employed with the U.S. Attorney's office investiting and prosecuting high-echelon corruption in the New York State government, as an insurance that an FBI investigation will never happen to her any more.

Of course, the FBI recently discredited itself as to investigations of high-echelon governmental misconduct where its director testified before Congress and told the Congress that he made a decision not to seek criminal charges against Hillary Clinton, without even considering to recommend a grand jury investigation - while Hillary Clinton talked to the FBI agent secretly, without a record, and while the FBI director did not even talk to all agents who talked to Hillary Clinton - some kind of a "procedure" smacking more of a desire of the FBI to exonerate Clinton rather than truly investigate her.

That "recommendation" of no charges happening within days of Bill Clinton "accidentally" bumping into the family's former attorney Loretta Lynch, the U.S. Attorney General, "in an airport" (apparently, a closed-off VIP zone) and having small talk (see an article that Loretta Lynch worked for a law firm that represented the Clintons and thus, under the law of partnership, also represented Clintons personally), and after Loretta announcing that she will endorse anything that the FBI will recommend - and the FBI, lo and behold, recommended no charges - has corruption written all over the "investigation".

Of course, no reasonable person would believe that Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch accidentally met at the time of FBI investigation of Hillary Clinton at the height of her election campaign in a closed-off VIP zone of an airport to discuss family and grandchildren - as it was presented to the press, but the fact is that the meeting did thwart an FBI investigation.

If an FBI investigation can be thwarted by status of the investigated person, the only thing that Judge Weaver has to do to thwart the FBI investigation against her is to find a person high enough to push the necessary buttons.

After this, FBI investigations of corruption in the government do not sound extremely encouraging, but we have what we have.

As to Judge Weaver's case, new details recently appeared indicating that:

1) Judge Weaver, the complaining witness and the alleged victim, reportedly coached her former law clerk and the former employee of her husband prosecutor Sosebee as to how to handle criminal investigation and prosecution, whom to investigate and how, which charges to file and how - and that included not only attorney Russel Stookey (for whom a felony conviction could mean also an automatic disbarment, of which both Judge Weaver and prosecutor Sosebee were well aware when bringing the charges), but also the County attorney Lynn Doss who had the audacity of doing her duty and releasing public records sought in a public records request - without consultation with Judge Weaver, where attorney Lynn Doss did not have to consult with Judge Weaver about such release;

2) Judge Weaver reportedly recused from cases where attorney Lynn Doss appeared, but not before advising public officials that Lynn Doss is "against judges" and thus arranging bias against Lynn Doss or cases where she represents the County; but

3) Judge Weaver did not resign so far from her position as a chairperson of the Judicial Qualifications Commission, even when a complaint in front of that same Commission is pending - so the "Commissioners" are put by Judge Weaver into an awkward situation where they have to decide the fate of their own boss.
Instead, the executive director of the Judicial Quaifications Commission, attorney Mark Dehler, the one who likely was supposed to make a disciplinary decision about Weaver, resigned - possibly for fear that if he takes Weaver off the bench, that will be a career suicide move for him.

Unfortunately, Judge Weaver is not even the most corrupt of judges I know about, read about and/or have written about.

The culture of immunity/impunity created in this country for judges, where judges are not held accountable for malicious and corrupt acts on the bench - not through individual lawsuits (absolute immunity), not through disciplinary process, unless there is a significant media attention, and not through criminal process where prosecutors, the usual breeding pool for judges, are reluctant to go against judges, turned the nation's courts into corrupt organizations and judges into mafia Godfathers (and Godmothers, in Judge Weaver's case).

Moreover, the Godfathers/Godmothers' are so sensitive to even a possibility of criticism or exposure that they immediately seek to discredit and destroy attorneys who are simply doing their jobs - here, Russel Stookey who:

1) filed a lawsuit seeking access to an audio tape of court proceedings to compare it with the transcript of the same proceedings;

2) filed a subpoena of bank records seeking to see records of money paid out of taxpayer-funded court operating account to a private law firm representing a private individual who filed a counter-claim in that lawsuit aimed at killing it, and effectively killed the lawsuit;

3) filed an access-to-records request with the County for copies of records in the court operating account, which, as far as I understand the mechanism, is in the custody of the County Treasurer - like it is in New York.

and County attorney #LynnDoss whose only "offense" is that she satisfied the access-to-records request in a neutral manner, without considering the status of individuals whose potential misconduct may be exposed through release of the records, and allegedly "spoke to the FBI - three times", according to the apparent government insider Brian Pritchard.

Yet, when a request for public records is made, the government is not allowed to ask what is the reason to seek those records or how the records are going to be used.  And, there is nothing wrong for a person to speak to the FBI.  In fact, it is a crime not to report a federal felony to the FBI - and grand theft from a court operating bank account is a federal felony, wire fraud.

Judge Weaver complained to a criminal prosecutor, her own and her husband's former employee DA Sosebee, about Lynn Doss, specifically because attorney Lynn Doss did her job and did not act as brown-nosing courtier to Judge Weaver.

Of course, Judge Weaver did not dare to have a County Attorney thrown in jail for satisfying an access-to-records request, as she did with private attorney Stookey, but she did turn the attention of criminal prosecutor and her subordinate judges upon attorney Lynn Doss claiming that Lynn Doss is somehow "against judges" because of release of public records to Mark Thomason and Russel Stookey.

In other words, Judge Weaver clearly used criminal prosecution as a step towards a disciplinary investigation of two attorneys doing their jobs, and ultimately used the system of attorney regulation (which was created, ostensibly, to help consumers of legal services) to intimidate and tamper with witnesses in a criminal proceeding against herself and her potential accomplices.

And, the establishment appears to continue to tamper with the supposed FBI investigation until now.

We'll see whether the FBI will do its job this time or whether it will use a "Hillary Clinton/ Shirley Kornreich" procedure on Brenda Weaver and sweep Judge Weaver's criminal conduct under the rug.

I will continue to cover this story.

Stay tuned.

"Personhood" of corporations after "Citizens United" and pro se representation of corporations in court - if corporations are "persons" enough to have 1st Amendment rights in political campaigns, and to sue as "persons" for civil rights violations against them, why not to represent themselves pro se in court?

The word "corporations" has become something of a misnomer in the United States, especially in the so-called "liberal" circles.

It has become a sign of belonging to a certain "school of thought" to blast "corporations" - all of them - for about anything wrong that may happen in society.

I've encountered that approach by the young intellectuals in the American law school where I went at the same time as my oldest child went to college.  "Corporations" are bad - said the young people with starts in their eyes.  "We should not serve the interests of corporations" was the motto of the day among a large number of my classmates (of course, that changed rapidly once student loans, graduation and the necessity to provide for the family set in).

I see this same approach in, let's say, Bernie Sanders' supporters.

Yet, a corporation is simply a legally available way to protect the assets of individuals doing business - so that the obligations and liabilities incurred by the business do not wipe out the participants' personal assets. 

A "Mom and Pop", or a small family, or a small "group of friends out of a garage" business can still incorporate - simply to protect assets, sometimes very small assets, the only residence or car, for example, that business owners/ entrepreneurs have.

Yet, once a "Mom and Pop" business incorporates, the protection of assets comes at a hefty price of having to hire and pay an attorney to represent the corporation in court, because in both state and federal courts, corporations are not granted personhood in order to represent themselves pro se.

In New York, such prohibition operates through a statute called Judiciary Law Section 495, which states, in part:

"495. Corporations and voluntary associations not to practice law. 1.  No  corporation or voluntary association shall (a) practice or appear as an attorney-at-law for any person in any court in this state or before any judicial body ..."

So, for purposes of self-representation in court, a corporation is not a "person".

Yet, corporations have been given political free speech rights guaranteed by the 1st Amendment as a person for decades:

And, through the case Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, decided in 2010, corporations were given a right of political donations in election campaigns - also as an exercise of their political free speech right, even though corporations are not allowed to vote as persons in those same elections.

I am not aware of any challenges brought in court yet by corporations of the prohibition on pro se representation in court because corporations are, apparently,

• persons enough to SPEND money - pour funds into the coffers of political candidates, and that rule favors, naturally, big businesses and their donations to political campaigns, 
• but are not persons enough to SAVE money where a corporation is a very small business and hiring an attorney to represent such a corporation in court may very simply be such a drain that having to hire an attorney alone may end the business.

It is obvious that the discrepancy created by (1) allowing corporations "personhood" for spending, but not for saving purposes - where spending in the political campaigns is equated with free speech, but saving on an attorney somehow does not infringe access to court guaranteed to any "person" by the same 1st Amendment.

Somehow legislators and judges (all of whom are sworn to protect the U.S. Constitution in its entirety, not by bits and pieces, based on what benefits it provides to them and those close to them) overlooked the fact that when they give a corporation enough "personhood" to exercise free speech in an election campaign, that same "personhood" must be enough for self-representation.

Moreover, corporations are considered "persons" in the United States for purposes of a lawsuit for civil rights violations under 42 U.S.C. 1983, the Civil Rights Act, and are allowed to sue as plaintiffs in civil rights actions.

Yet, corporate plaintiffs are put at a disadvantage in such civil rights actions, because, unlike individual plaintiffs, they are not allowed to sue on their own, pro se - and thus have to hire an attorney. 

Yet, a 1983 civil rights action is an action that may be brought, by a clear statutory language, by "citizens" and "other persons":

If corporations are "persons" enough to sue as civil rights plainiffs for civil rights violations, to have their "speech" protected on 1st Amendment grounds, and exercise their 1st Amendment political free speech rights by donating money to political candidates because they are "persons" enough for those purposes - corporations are certainly "persons" enough for purposes of self-representation.

The only corporations that would even want to represent themselves pro se are small businesses with not many assets.  For large corporations, an expense of legal representation will not put them out of business, as it my happen with small corporations.

Thus, granting rich corporations "personhood" enough to spend money upon political candidates, and giving all corporations standing to sue as "persons" for civil rights violations against them as "persons", but not recognizing them as "persons" for purposes of pro se representation is an equal protection problem.

Since corporations have standing to sue in civil rights actions, they my very well do that - asserting that if they are "persons" enough for one purpose protected by one section of the 1st Amendment (free speech), they are certainly enough of "persons" to represent themselves in court, under the protection of another section of the 1st Amendment, the Petitions Clause.

As the economy becomes tougher and tougher on small businesses, I believe, a legal challenge on this discrepancy by a small incorporated business striving to survive and needing to be able to defend its rights or prosecute violations of its rights in court is only a matter of time.