California #JudgeEdmundWClarke admonished for mistreating prospective jurors in a murder trial - Part I, juror 7122

California judicial disciplinary authorities just imposed discipline - admonishment only - upon Judge Edmund W Clarke, for mistreating prospective jurors in a murder trial.

Here is the description of Judge Clarke's misconduct in the disciplinary decision.

The judge first excused juror 7122 on the basis of severe anxiety - and then ordered her to stay behind in the hall and wait for him to discuss things with her (against her will) after she added, in a public proceeding, that the judge's clerk was disrespectful with her.

Surprise!  Court personnel disrespectful with lay people with no power?  Does not ever happen.  Right?

And, when it does happen, and the victim of that disrespectful conduct has the courage of challenging that disrespectful conduct openly in front of a judge - the judge lashes out.  Against the victim, of course.

The judge made FORMER juror candidate 7122 to wait in the hallway for an hour, until the end of the session.  The woman obeyed, crying.

Here is the exchange between the judge and the woman after she was already excused - but still ordered to wait for the judge's tongue-lashing.  For an hour.

At the very proceeding the woman felt so intimidated by the ordered detention in the hallway for an hour that she started to communicate with the judge with an apology - which was the effect the judge, apparently, sought.

Since the woman was deposed at the end of the session, most likely, the public was excused at the time of the tongue-lashing.

So, public criticism of misconduct of a public official is now "going after her like that".  And, the judge is very obviously bullying the women, is putting her on the defensive.  For criticism of a public employee, the judge's long-time clerk (of 7 years, as the judge disclosed later on).

"Attacked her in open court in front of a judge with your criticism" - that is the gravest of offenses for the judge, apparently.  And, since the judge was merely "admonished", and remains on the bench, the people of the State of California can expect more of the same from this judge, as well as from other judges.

Now, this is beyond mean.

Criticism of a public official, open criticism, was and is the prospective juror's right as a citizen.  The judge had absolutely no right to go into the person's employment background and not-so-thinly threaten her to complain to her employer, in retaliation for the woman's complain about rude behavior of the judge's clerk.

Let's note that the judge engaged in tongue-lashing of a critic of his clerk's RUDE behavior without any investigation of that behavior.  So, for the judge, the mere facts that:

1) the clerk worked for the judge for 7 years, and that
2) this was the first complaint about her behavior in 7 years - means that the complaint is untruthful.

The judge, without an investigation, on record, in open court, accuses a woman who has an anxiety problem and who was already a victim of his clerk's rude behavior, of a lie.

 Let's count.

The judge

1) accused the woman of "going after" the judge's clerk;
2) accused her of lying - without an investigation, and based on his own unsworn character testimony on behalf of his clerk;
3) accused the woman of "no longer [able to see] that other people are struggling and doing their best";
4) accused the woman of "looking immature and selfish and not contributing to the society that we're supposed to support".

And, the judge let the woman go with a final branding her that her "accomplishment" is to be the only one out of thousands of prospective jurors to ever complain against the judge's clerk. 

Let's remember that at all times after the judge excused prospective juror 7122 he no longer had the power to detain her, and detaining her, forcing her to come in front of him in open court and abusing her verbally was all illegal conduct and conduct without authority.

Let's remember that the judge already excused the prospective juror 7122 because of a severe anxiety problem, which would bind the judge to treat that woman as a person with disability suffering from a severe anxiety, not trying to aggravate that problem, as he did.

But, the clerk was, in fact rude:

Yet, for the judge what actually occurred did not matter.  He steamrolled through a woman with anxiety and accused her of wrongful criticism of his clerk without verifying whether the clerk was actually rude with the woman or not.  For the judge, his personnel is simply above reproach - and above the law.

And, as it often happens when judges are themselves challenged with disciplinary proceedings, Judge Edmund Clarke lied to the disciplinary panel.

First, Judge Clark lied that he did not see anxiety in juror 7122 - even though he excused her on that basis.

Second, Judge Clarke lied that he did not excuse the juror 7122 when he sent her to the hallway - because otherwise he would have to have known his conduct was illegal, so he tried to backtrack.

Third, Judge Clark lied that he detained juror 7122 because he had an "ethical obligation" to investigate her complaint - while Judge Clark did nothing to actually investigate, and instead assumed juror 7122 is lying, ordered her to sit and wait (for an hour) for being called back into the courtroom, and when she was called, used that time not to investigated, but to bully her for criticizing his clerk.

There was a squabble between the special master, the examiner and the disciplinary panel in the disciplinary proceeding where the  special master and the disciplinary panel tried hard, in different ways, to save Judge Clarke's sorry ass:

Now, if judge Clarke did excuse juror 7122, he should have known that his conduct in ordering her to wait, then calling her back into the courtroom for a tongue-lashing was outside of the judge's authority - and the woman did believe that she was called back in not to be heard, but to be chided for criticism of the judge's clerk:

And, of course, if Judge Clarke lied to the commission that he did not excuse the juror when he did, that would be a severely aggravating circumstance for the outcome of his case - which means, the issue whether the juror was or was not excused, was of utmost importance and required a factual finding by the disciplinary panel.

Here is what happened.



The special master found - against the record - that Judge Clarke first excused juror 7122, and then reversed the excuse after she criticized the clerk.

The significance of this finding is to protect judge Clarke giving at least a semblance of legitimacy to his order to the juror 7122 to sit in the hallway, keep her there for an hour and then order her back into the courtroom for a tongue-lashing.

The honest examiner disagreed with the special master's finding as not supported in the record.  In other words, the examiner pointed out that the special master lied.

What disciplinary panel, instead of resolving the conflict of findings between the special master and the examiner, on the MOST important issue involved - whether the judge acted illegally, and whether he lied to the commission about it - chose to claim this:

So, the disciplinary panel, consisting of "market players" (attorneys and judges) preferred to protect Judge Clarke's ass and make no findings on the most significant issue, whether judge Clarke knowingly acted illegally, and whether he lied to the disciplinary panel about it.  Moreover, the disciplinary panel claimed that the issue in question is not necessary in their determination of misconduct.

I just bet that if the disciplinary panel consisted of LAY CITIZENS, judge Clarke would have been taken off the bench - for mistreating that one juror and for lying to the disciplinary panel about it.

Nevertheless, as to juror 7122, the disciplinary panel concluded this:

But, juror 7122 was not the only one bullied by Judge Clarke in jury selection for that case.

Judge Clarke was disciplined - by admonishment only - for misconduct regarding 4 prospective jurors, and I will continue to analyze the disciplinary decision, juror by juror.

Stay tuned.

In Alabama, Texas and New York, sexual misconduct of judges is not deemed a basis for attorney discipline

While the Alabama Chief Judge Roy Moore was suspended for disobeying the same-sex marriage precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court (while other judges happily throughout the country continue to disobey a variety of U.S. Supreme Court precedents concerning civil rights litigation), one thing that Judge Roy Moore's attorney pointed out is really spectacular:  from the point of view of discipline, it is a worse offense for a judge to disobey the precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court than to sext with a litigant appearing before a judge.

What was meant is just 6-month suspension for sexting with a litigant for judge Leon Archer of Alabama.

The same is happening in New York, both in terms of attorney discipline and judicial discipline.

I recently wrote that, in New York, an attorney, Barry Dolgoff, who admitted in court to committing what qualifies as a felony by stealing from his clients' trust fund (reportedly, $149,000), received a lighter discipline than the attorney whose only "fault" was criticism of a judge in motions to recuse on behalf of her clients, one of them pro bono.

As to sex crimes, in New York, judge Bryan Hedges was relatively recently taken off the bench for sexual child abuse, sexual molestation of a deaf-mute 5-year old niece, see determination of the New York Commission for Judicial Conduct here, but remains a licensed attorney with "no record of public discipline".

So, Alabama, same as in New York, embraces criminals, including sexual predators, as licensed attorneys and judges - and sends to the public an unmistakable message that all assurances the attorney licensing exists to protect the public is a sham.

The sexting judge in Alabama is not the only sexting judge exposed recently.

In Texas, Judge Joel Baker recently resigned during a sexting investigation.

A criminal complaint was filed against judge Baker back in 2011, for stalking a woman - but Judge Baker remained on the bench, and the investigation was swept under the rug.

Despite criminal complaints for stalking, resigning during sexting investigation and criminal indictments for violation of open meetings law, former judge Joel Baker remains, as of today, a licensed attorney in the State of Texas:

Well, before it was only civil rights attorneys who were kicked by the system for doing their jobs the way they understand it.

Now joining the crowd of attorneys punished for their correct legal opinions is Chief Judge for the State of Alabama, suspended for stating the obvious - that precedents of the U.S. Supreme Court are not the Law of the Land, not being part of the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, and thus not mandatory for enforcement in the State of Alabama.

Let's see what the U.S. Supreme Court says to that - if Judge Moore's case goes that far.

As a summary of the sorry cases of Judges Leon Archer in Alabama, Judge Bryan Hedges in New York and Judge Joel Baker in Texas, I bet that the American public should feel extremely protected through attorney licensing when sexual predators are allowed to remain licensed attorneys with "no record of public discipline".

New York reacts to a criminal defendant's request for a non-attorney counsel of his choice - with a psychiatric evaluation and lockup

I wrote on this blog about what I thought to be the first known case of a consumer of legal services to file a motion requesting the court to allow him to be represented in court by an individual of his choice who is not a licensed attorney.

I was wrong stating that the motion filed in early 2016 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York was the first case where a consumer of legal services would ask the court to allow him representation in court by an individual of his choice, whether a licensed attorney or not. 

There was another, earlier, case in 2014, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, by an indigent pro se civil rights plaintiff Cory Townsend, I am publishing the entire complaint of Cory Townsend here, which I obtained from Pacer.gov.

Cory Townsend raised, among other issues, that he was improperly denied representation by "counsel" of his choice, who was a non-attorney.

The 6th Amendment provides for a right to "counsel" in criminal proceedings. 

Nowhere does the 6th Amendment say that the "counsel" must be a government-approved (licensed) attorney, and courts have no authority to narrow constitutional rights through interpretation, that is usurpation of authority of the People to make amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

So, the plain language of the 6th Amendment requires the court to accept the defendant's choice of court representative.

Recently, in an article addressing the "justice gap" and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonya Sotomayor's statement that she would endorse mandatory pro bono work by attorneys to bridge that gap (you can read here about the results of mandatory assignments to criminal cases of attorneys not specializing in criminal defense in Louisiana), law professor Ilya Somin suggested to give vouchers for assignment of public defenders to criminal defendants - so that they could choose their attorneys themselves.

That is not a revolutionary concept, because relationship with a court representative is a fiduciary relationship, a relationship of trust which cannot be ordered by a third party, or by the government, as it happens nowadays through court-appointed counsel in criminal cases.

After all, if "monied" litigants can hire private counsel of their own choice, indigent litigants should have their choice of counsel, too, even though the state pays for it.

Yet, courts are "unprepared" to give choice of a court representative to poor litigants, even when monies for legal representation and non-legal services auxiliary to such representation (experts and investigators) for the indigent are provided for by law.


In my husband's motion filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York in early 2016, the court ducked the motion by refusing to address it at all and claiming that my husband is under an anti-filing injunction for new actions, even though the motion was filed in an old action, with a motion to vacate.

In Cory Townsend's case, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York dismissed his claim that his constitutional rights were violated when he was not allowed representation by a non-attorney of his choice without an explanation, reasoning or even without litigation - before the complaint was even served, so the court was acting as an advocate for the defendants.

Cory Townsend repeatedly objected to state-court-appointed attorneys and insisted on a non-attorney representing him, he was sent to an involuntary in-patient (locked up) psychiatric evaluation for his request, in the best traditions of Soviet punitive psychiatry against dissidents raising issues or expressing views as to government misconduct that the government considers inconvenient or dangerous.

Licensed attorneys are neither better educated, nor do they necessarily pass the bar testing their knowledge of the law of the state where they are practicing, based on reciprocity agreements between states on attorney admission.

And, statewide, not area-of-law-wide law licenses permit licensed attorneys to practice in the area of law of which they have absolutely no concept.

And, while justice gap in New York ever widens, New York itself invents ways of having the poor represented by unlicensed and uneducated individuals, while squeezing out qualified attorneys working for the poor, as explained in my pending petition to the U.S. Supreme Court - with a detailed explanation of mechanisms of how it is done.

But, when New York is squeezing out qualified counsel for the poor, including criminal defense attorneys, and invents "stop-gap solutions" where the poor are offered inadequate substitutes of qualified counsel of their choice, New York insists on one thing - that whenever the poor are, in fact, given counsel where counsel is constitutionally required (by Gideon v Wainright), the choice of counsel must be the presiding judge's and not the poor criminal defendant's.

Well, one criminal defendant in New York, Cory Townsend, did not want to accept the choice of his counsel, a relationship of trust, from the presiding court - and filed a federal complaint about it in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of New York, in 2014.

He was given a "poor person status" - but only to dismiss his case before it was served upon the parties, on various theories

His claim that he was entitled to representation by "counsel" under the 6th Amendment by any individual of his choice, whether licensed or unlicensed, went unaddressed.

The dismissal was affirmed on appeal.

I will have to split analysis of Cory Townsend's complaint into several blogs, as it raises a number of important constitutional issues that would be better to analyze separately.

Here, I will address that Cory Townsend objected to appointment of a public defender:

1. On September 27, 2012 Judge Curtis Farber appointed public defender Iliana Santiago over objection of criminal defendant;
2. On October 1, 2012 Judge Farber had a proceeding where the defendant was not present, with Cory Mescon as his public defender - while he objected to a public defender;
3. On November 26, 2012, defendant was brought into court before Judge Alexander Jeong, represented by public defender Cory Mescon who Cory Townsend claimed did not represent Cory Townsend properly;
4. On February 19, 2013, defendant was brought to court before judge Danny Chun, and objected against representation by public defender Mijin Chung Kang; his objections were ignored, but Cory Townsend claims he was not properly represented by attorney Kang;
5. On April 17, 2013, Cory Townsend was brought before the court again, and attorney Kang against whose appointment Cory Townsend objected, was there representing him, against his wishes, again;
6. On May 21, 2013, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Kang again;
7. On June 26, 2013, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Kang again;
8. On September 25, 2013, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Kang again;
9. On October 21, 2013, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of public defender Christiana Giardino;
10. On December 3, 2013, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Giardino again;
11. On January 16, 2014,  at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Kang again;
12. On February 6, 2014, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Reginald W. Haley III;
13. On March 20, 2014, at another court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation of attorney Craig Lee Newman;
14. On May 1, 2014, at a court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to "recusal" of attorney Craig Lee Newman as his representation - I am following the complaint;
15. On May 2, 2014, at a court appearance, Cory Townsend objected again to "recusal" of attorney Craig Lee Newman as his representation;
16. On May 20, 2014, at a court appearance, Cory Townsend objected to representation by appointed attorney David Michael Walensky;  despite Cory Townsend's objection to representation by David Michael Walensky, he claims he was coerced into agreeing to a psychological evaluation with Walensky as his counsel;

On June 10, 2014 the court ordered an in-patient competency evaluation and had Cory Townsend detained in a psychiatric facility.  No court representative of Cory Townsend's choice was present at the hearing.

At that hearing, Cory Townsend wanted to be represented by a non-attorney, as stated in the court order of federal court dismissing his complaint.

On June 18, 2014, a petition for habeas corpus was filed on Cory Townsend's behalf.

On July 2, 2014, at a court appearance, a trial was scheduled for September 10, 2014 - meaning that competence of Cory Townsend should not have been in question, otherwise he could not be tried.

All that Cory Townsend wanted is the appointment of a non-attorney Lidya Radin to represent him in court at a hearing which eventually sent him to an in-patient competency evaluation, and that was denied to him.

Federal court, while acknowledging that Cory Townsend raised the issue that he wanted a non-attorney represent him at the involuntary competency hearing, said nothing further of that issue, did not analyze it and dismissed that claim without an explanation, analysis or statement of legal grounds.

Based on the fact that a trial was scheduled after the order for a competency evaluation, Cory Townsend was deemed competent.

So, what occurred is that:

1. a person who was presumed to be competent was brought as criminal defendant before a criminal court;
2. the criminal defendant objected to appointment of public defenders at least 16 times in court;
3. defendant's objections were ignored and public defenders not of his choice, against whose representation he vigorously objected, continued to represent him, represented him in a manner that he objected to, including in his absence;
4. defendant's request for a non-attorney to represent him at the competency hearing was ignored by the court, and the court ordered his competency in-patient (locked up) evaluation in a psychiatric hospital while he was represented by an attorney who was forced upon him by the court and against whose representation he vigorously objected;
5. then, he was deemed competent, and was convicted.

We come back to the same issues:

1. does a competent consumer of legal services have a choice of his own fiduciary agent, a court representative, whether the representative of the consumer's choice is licensed (approved by the government to "help" him with his choice) or not?
2. is it constitutional - to force a consumer of legal services, and especially one sued by the government, to accept a government-approved, government-appointed court represented as his only alternative to pro se representation?

I will continue to analyze Cory Townsend's civil rights lawsuit, and decisions (trial and appellate-level) dismissing it.

Stay tuned.

The pretense show of being tough on prosecutorial misconduct begins across the country - and ends in Arizona by letting a prosecutor keep profits from his misconduct

California has made introduced new legislation to hold prosecutors criminally accountable - for a felony, a disbarring offense - if they withhold information from the defense, which they USUALLY do.

Of course, the teeth of any law is in its enforcement, and, where the law concerns criminal liability of prosecutors, I believe that the public and not other prosecutors, must be given the right to turn cases over to the grand juries - which California did not do.

So, theoretically, there is some progress made.

Practically - there is an appearance that the public is being appeased, but the law will change nothing, since prosecutors who habitually withhold Brady material will not charge their brothers and sisters for doing the same.

At the same time, in Arizona, a prosecutor who committed misconduct in several cases, over several years - and misconduct included even writing a book about a criminal case he prosecuted before the case was appealed (talking about personal interest of a prosecutor in the outcome of litigation), the prosecutor received a whopping discipline of an "admonition", and "probation".

The prosecutor announced in November of 2015 that he is "set to release" the book about the case where he prosecuted a person for murder, in 2016, before the appeal ran through, thus disqualifying himself from opposing the appeal since he acquired a pronounced financial interest in the outcome of litigation - and attorneys are prohibited by rules of professional conduct from acquiring a cause in their client's case, so what prosecutor Martinez was doing was attorney misconduct even had he not been a criminal prosecutor.

Moreover, a criminal prosecutor represents the People in a criminal case, and there may not be any "untold stories" sold by prosecutors to the public - because such information is either privileged under attorney-client privilege, or improperly withheld from the defense, and a criminal prosecutor in either event may not be allowed to profit from his own wrongdoing.

The book was, indeed, published on Amazon.com in February of 2016, and was on a pre-order before that:

It takes time to put together such a book.

The fact that it was so quickly published after the conviction indicates that prosecutor Martinez prosecuted the case not so much to do his job "so crimes are prosecuted vigorously, and so that justice be done", but in order to gather material to publish this book, and enrich himself.

The disciplinary proceedings, resulting in admonishment and probation, did not actually require prosecutor Martinez to stop selling the book, as he had no right to sell that story.

Martinez continues to sell the book as of today:

Here is how prosecutor Martinez describes himself and the book in order to drum up sales despite the fact that he had no right to sell the story, and selling the story was attorney misconduct and public fraud:

For his misconduct, Martinez was not disbarred, was not even suspended - while misconduct listed in the 27-page complaint was committed in 11 murder cases.

Martinez was not ordered to forfeit his ill-gained proceeds from the book either.

And, Martinez is no novice as a prosecutor - he advertises himself on Amazon as being a prosecutor for 27 years, so he knows full well he should not be doing what he is doing, but - easy money for a sensational book was too hard to pass by:

Moreover, as of today, the Amazon.com page of Juan Martinez's book also features an interview with Martinez - which makes no mention that he was admonished for publishing the book in the first place.

With a slap on the wrist, the happily smiling Mr. Martinez continues to sell the evidence of his misconduct, gaining glowing customer reviews and profiting by his misconduct.

Amazingly, a seasoned - retired - attorney with 37 years of experience, filed one of the glowing reviews, in full knowledge that publishing such a book was prosecutorial misconduct:

So, the Arizona bar, essentially, said - go ahead, Mr. Martinez, do more of the same - and maybe, it will be addressed with another admonition in some more years.

The question is - did Martinez share the proceeds from the book with the disciplinary prosecutors and judges to keep his loot?

The disciplinary decision in Arizona does not even cite the prosecutor's specific misconduct, so that it would be clear for the public whether the discipline was too light.

So, that is another curtsy to appease the public into believing that discipline of prosecutors is more than what it actually is, a closed-door rigging game.

At the very same time, in New York, prosecutors continue to be the Sky Dwellers who may never be touched by attorney discipline and can engage in any kind of misconduct they want.

Even though New York Senator DeFrancisco (himself an attorney) introduced a bill for creation of a separate Commission on Prosecutorial Misconduct which was heralded when it was introduced, in 2014, as "the first in the nation" - New York State Association of District Attorneys have so far lobbied the bill into non-existence, and the regular attorney disciplinary board continue to enforce their unspoken policy of not prosecuting prosecutors.

Here is how the lobbying by the Association of the District Attorneys against the bill was described in the testimony by Mr. Bastuk, a victim of prosecutorial misconduct who testified in front of New York Commission on Attorney Discipline in Buffalo in 2015:

But, as I said in my previous blog, the wheels of justice may be turning slowly, but they are, in fact, turning.

So, we see at least some changes in how prosecutorial misconduct is addressed, no doubt, brought about by public pressure and outrage.

And, public pressure and outrage should continue if we want any real progress be made against prosecutorial misconduct.

And - the public, the Arizona taxpayers should press the Arizona disciplinary authorities to revisit Martinez's disciplinary case and make him forfeit all profits from his ill-gained book and put the profits into the state budget.


Update as of October 4, 2016:  Martinez is appealing his discipline.

The bench is no longer a shelter for attorney misconduct - in Ohio and in North Carolina. In New York, the black robe protects attorneys from charges of misconduct

I recently wrote about a case in North Carolina where a judge was prosecuted for misconduct both as a judge and as an attorney.

The judge claimed that he could not be prosecuted as an attorney, because he was already prosecuted as a judge.  Yet, since maintaining a law license in good standing is a pre-requisite for a judge, and a judge adds rules of judicial conduct to rules of professional conduct of attorney when taking the bench, there is no law prohibiting to prosecute misconduct of judges both through judicial disciplinary authorities and through attorney disciplinary authorities.

A similar case is happening now in Ohio, where the Ohio disciplinary counsel is targeting with investigation a former judge for the judge's conduct on the bench.

Yet, in the blessed state of New York, attorney disciplinary committees usually refuse to prosecute judges as attorneys, claiming that they cannot prosecute a sitting judge, thus making the bench a sort of refuge for attorney misconduct of its occupants.

For example, I wrote on this blog about a complaint I filed in January of 2016 with the New York Commission for Judicial Discipline against judges that was nearly instantly dismissed without an investigation.  The complaint was against attorneys-turned-judges:

1) Christina Ryba, and
2) Richard Northrup

I complained about their actions before they came to the bench, actions of them as attorneys.

New York does not have a statute of limitations for attorney misconduct.

Christina Ryba engaged in misconduct so bad that he was fired from her position as counsel for the Chief Judge of the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division 3rd Department for her unethical behavior and illegal and fraudulent use of the court system to rig her own judicial election.

Yet, the announcement of her being fired was not made in such a time to allow the rigging be known to the voters, and Christina Ryba was elected and took the bench, while her rigged election was paraded as "historic".

No attorney discipline followed against her, and the New York State Judicial Discipline Commission refused to prosecute her, even though she was fired for ethical violations - possibly, because a high-ranking judge known for his own misconduct, as well as for his preference for pretty-face female "special counsel", took her under his wing.

So, no criminal charges, no judicial disciplinary charges and no attorney disciplinary charges followed.

The same applied to judge Richard Northrup who rigged all criminal convictions in Delaware County from January of 2002 to July 31 of 2015 by failing to disclose that the Chief Assistant District Attorney he hired was the presiding judge's (Carl F. Becker's) law partner in private practice John Hubbard.

Now John Hubbard appears in front of Richard Northrup as an Acting District Attorney in front of a judge, even though these two have been now known of rigging cases for 13 years in the District Attorney's office.

Richard Northrup is also the one who refused to investigate attempted murder of a judicial critic Barbara O'Sullivan because the perpetrator was the nephew of Richard Northrup's long-time employee, and who instead filed rigged charges against the victim.

The New York State Commission for Judicial Conduct dismissed my complaint about both judges, without investigation, in April of 2016, within three months of filing at the end of January, 2016.

Yet, apparently, public pressure upon attorney disciplinary counsel and public outrage about rampant judicial corruption in the country has already resulted in changes in Ohio and North Carolina where attorney disciplinary authorities now dropped their unspoken and unwritten policy of not prosecuting judges for attorney misconduct and are doing it.

Not yet in New York, the stronghold of corruption, but - the wheels of justice are turning slow, but they are turning. 

We can all here the screeching sound.  It will happen.

The serious business of filming the police - the case of John Walker, Omavi Kushukuru, Maurice "Mo" Crawley, Adam Rupeka and Barbara O'Sullivan

I wrote on this blog about efforts of governments across this country undertake to block, intimidate or punish people who seek access to public records that may expose the government, see also here - where a black woman live-broadcasted her own murder by the police.  Of course, Facebook obliged the police request of blocking her live broadcast after a while.

But, videotaping and livestreaming police misconduct has proven useful in yet another case since then that I reported on.

The new bogus theory of the government for arresting a person for filming the police - in New York, that is - is that the person, Maurice "Mo" Crawley, was "stalking" the police officer, creating "a reasonable fear of injury" - by videotaping, apparently.

And, in Oklahoma, Missouri, a female white cop who killed an unarmed black man and was charged with manslaughter (not murder) despite a video of her execution-style killing, is raising yet another bogus theory - of "auditory exclusion", a theory that would have been laughed out of court for anybody but a defendant who is a police officer.  Of course, she should not have been allowed to be out on the streets with a gun if she had such "exclusions", but anyway, whatever saves her ass.

By the way, Apple has patented software to remotely disable video recorders on their phones back in 2012, and the timing is quite suspicious, since that was just the very beginning of the movement to film the police and expose police misconduct through citizen videos created by smart phones. 

The interesting part is that Apple does not disclose whether such video-stopping software is already embedded into iPhones. 

And, the even more interesting part is why Apple, a business, would patent such a thing.  Usually, businesses do not patent anything that is not promising profit.  And, if such software promised a profit to Apple, then who is paying?  And how much?  Did Apple receive government money to develop, patent and embed such software into its phones to prevent embarrassment of police and resulting unrests when people publish their videos from smartphones on the Internet?

Courts - while resisting public efforts to make court proceedings subject to public videotaping - have gone to extraordinary lengths to prevent introduction of videotapes of police misconduct in court.

For example, in 2011, in Texas, an appellate court has ruled that a motorist who was stopped by the police had no right of access to the potentially exculpatory police-created dash-cam video, which is required for disclosure under federal constitutional "Brady" rule.  By the way, the arresting officer made his own determination that the video "does not have any evidentiary value", did not put the existence of the video into his report, and the video was destroyed - which did not bother the court one bit.

Yet, when the police, on the one hand, has a self-activating dash-cam video recording equipment on patrol cars, but when destruction of such dash-cam video is ruled insignificant by courts, such a ruling is nothing other than encouragement to other police officers to do just the same.

Moreover, in order to prevent police embarrassment, state legislatures undertook steps to actually block public access to police-created (if they are created) dash-cam videos.

In July of 2016 such a legislation was passed in North Carolina.

After the legislation was passed, the police immediately took advantage of it by shooting what appeared to be an unarmed black man in Charlotte, NC, in September of 2016, and, following the new legislation, refused to release the police footage of the shooting.  Only the wife of the man shot by the police recorded the incident on her own cell phone and posted it.

Massive protests erupted in Charlotte, NC.

As a response to those violence protests, no doubt, Missouri authorities charged their white cop for killing an unarmed black man (the killing was at about the same time as the killing in North Carolina) with manslaughter - while releasing her back on the streets despite her being a danger to society.

In North Carolina, because of public pressure, the police footage of the killing, the police footage of killing of Keith Lamont Scott was released to the public in September of 2016 - but, since the blocking legislation goes into effect on October 1, 2016, this release is likely the last one of this kind.

The wonder is why it was released at all, and why the police did not simply wait until October 1, 2016 to deny release - apparently, that was done to appease the public protests.

The footage released by the police in North Carolina, reportedly, does not show whether Keith Scott did or did not have a gun - a very convenient video given the circumstances of protests.  The question is whether the footage was redacted before release.

The question is also whether a gun was planted by the police at the scene - and, obviously, that is also not shown in the videos and pictures released to the public.

And, the police footage released to the public does not show Keith Scott pointing a gun at the police.

It would be good to borrow from practices of other countries where lay witnesses must be present at the investigation of the crime scene and recovery of any material pieces of evidence, to prevent such planting.

What is a tragedy in Missouri and North Carolina, turned into a complete farce in Arkansas where, same as in the New York case I described above, a man was arrested for filming the police.

Only it was not just any man.

It was an Arkansas legislator who actually promoted a bill for filming the police.

And, legislator John Walker was, reportedly, filming the police to prevent them from killing the man they stopped in a traffic stop.

The police was stupid enough to put that statement of John Walker into their report - apparently, as a justification of an arrest.  A person should be arrested in Arkansas, apparently, for videotaping the government in order to make sure the government does not kill a citizen - which is what the government across the country is known of doing.

And, according to the same police report, Rep. John Walker refused to obey an officer's command to come to the officer (which command did not have any legal basis, obviously), and

I wonder what the "antagonistic and provocative manner" was for - was it because John Walker insisted that what he was doing is legal and that officer has no legal right to give him any commands because of it or stop him from videotaping them?

Of course, after a media frenzy, Arkansas authorities claimed that Rep. John Walker, D-Rock,

who was already arrested for filming the police, will not be charged with any crimes.

It could have been just a knee-jerk reaction - a black man is filming the police, let's arrest him.

As to Rep. John Walker, the "incident" was "resolved" (of course, John Walker can sue for the arrest) - because the authorities indicated that no charges will be filed against John Walker, and the local police chief even issued a letter of apology

- which John Walker reportedly rejected, as he had every right to do.

Charges were also dropped against John Walker's employee, 29-year-old attorney Omavi Kushukuru who was on the scene and assisted John Walker when he was filming the police, and when he was opposing unlawful demands of the police.

I must note that no letters of apology were sent to the similarly arrested 29-year-old lawyer Omavi Kushukuru, as was sent to the State legislator John Walker.

So, the only reason for dropping the charges, and an apology, is apparently, John Walker's status as a high-ranking member of the government.

Attorney Omavi Kushukuru, thankfully, escaped charges since it was embarrassing to not drop charges against him when identical charges were dropped against his boss.

But, arresting an attorney for assisting his client, on the scene, and giving him legal advice is even more outrageous than the arrest of John Walker.

And, no apologies were sent in New York to Maurice "Mo" Crawley, who is still being prosecuted for the same bogus charges that were dismissed against John Walker and Omavi Kushukuru in Arkansas - "obstruction of governmental administration".

For filming the police.

After all, recently, another activist in New York who had the audacity of filming the police, Adam Rupeka

• was charged with a sex crime by the same officers who were out to get him for suing them and causing their fellow officer to lose his job for pepper-spraying Rupeka when he "flipped the bird" at the police officer;
• had to flee to another country knowing that his life was in danger;
• was found dead in Mexico, and
• an extensive murder investigation into those who wanted him to come to harm miraculously did not occur.

And, another activist in New York for filming the police, Barbara O'Sullivan, was

• criminally prosecuted for 1.5 years for a felony (charges were dropped), then her dogs were killed under suspicious circumstances, then
• her house was burnt down, with nobody investigating it (the dirty prosecutor John Hubbard has recently, reportedly, confirmed to Barbara that "her is not aware" of an investigation of the house fire) - because one of the prime suspects is a cop, Derek Bowie, a nephew of the investigator Jeff Bowie employed for years by the Delaware County District Attorney's office, then
• her lawsuit against Derek Bowie who attempted to run her over in a patrol vehicle to smash the tablet in her hands with which she was videotaping his misconduct, was dismissed by Judge John F. Lambert for failure to comply with irrelevant discovery demands - the discovery seeking documents  which were irrelevant to Barbara's lawsuit, and which were destroyed by the fire.  By the way, Bowie was served with that lawsuit by the Delaware County Sheriff, his employer, defaulted, and then obtained from Judge Lambert a vacatur of default on a bogus claim that the Delaware County Sheriff (his employer) did not know about the lawsuit - while having served it.  Of course, the Sheriff's Department did not have to know about the lawsuit (even though it did, since it served it) because the Sheriff's Department was not sued, and Bowie was sued for an intentional act not subject to the Notice of Claim requirements.  And, the Sheriff's Department, its attorney Frank Miller and Judge John Lambert knew they were fixing the case by vacating the default on the basis of "lack of notice", because the lack of the Notice of Claim was never raised by Miller on behalf of Bowie, and without that, Miller had no right to even participate in the action because he was an insurance attorney for the Sheriff's Department, and in New York, insurance does not cover intentional misconduct.

I wonder what the Appellate Division will say about this bullshit from Judge Lambert.

But - as you see, filming the cops is becoming dangerous in this country.