IF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE HAD THE DOLLAR AMOUNT THE PARASITIC LAWYER CLASS SUCKS OUT OF THIS COUNTRY WE WOULD SEE LAWYERS HANGING FROM THE ROOF TOPS!
THE CALIFORNIA STATE BAR EXISTS TO PROTECT SHITBAG LAWYERS FROM THEIR VICTIMS!
"What this has led to in its “Model” form is a smoke screen to frustrate individuals that have a problem with an attorney, and to keep attorneys out of harm’s way from the general public."
More
Corruption With the State Bar of Arizona, This Time Protecting a Sexual
Predator
There is
an effort underway around the country in many states to
dismantle state bars. Over half of them are mandatory, operating as unions with
a monopoly over the practice of law. This has led to massive corruption.
The left controls the state bars, and uses them to target conservative
attorneys. They also protect their own.
Michelle Flick was the victim of a sexual predator, but
because he worked for the State Bar of Arizona, he was protected. Flick met Hal
Nevitt through a recommendation. She had a friend who worked for an alcoholic
attorney. The friend was very concerned about her boss, who had several DUIs
and was frequently driving drunk during the day while working.
Flick asked around and was told she should contact Nevitt
about it, who was the director of the bar’s Member Assistance Program (MAP).
Nevitt is a licensed clinical social worker and substance abuse counselor. The
MAP program deals with attorneys who have substance abuse or mental problems.
It requires them to undergo mental health treatment in order to keep their
licenses to practice law. Arizona Attorneys Against Corrupt Regulation has reported on the abuses of this program. It
seems like a stretch to get the bar involved with health issues.
Nevitt
previously served time in prison for drug trafficking. While there, he was
given three compassionate leaves from prison. Prosecutors say he must have
known someone to be given all that special treatment.
Nevitt took a liking to Flick, and asked her if she wanted to
work for him on an as-needed basis. Since Flick received government assistance,
he told her he would pay her under the table.
Before she started work, he asked her a bunch of questions
that he said were necessary, such as whether she had ever been sexually abused.
He approached her and tried to kiss her. She was appalled because he’s
married.
At one point, he came over to her house. He took her into her
bedroom. He pulled her hair and made her perform a sex act on him.
Nevitt started stalking her; driving down her street, sending
her emails and calling her (she wouldn’t answer). She notified the Arizona Bar
(AzBBHE) about the sexual assault. John Furlong, the bar’s General
Counsel/Deputy Executive Director at the time, told her the bar doesn’t need
her help and hung up on her.
Flick reported the sexual assault to the police. Nothing
happened. She filed a complaint with the Arizona Board of Behavioral Health
Examiners. They covered for him, saying they wouldn’t do anything since the
police didn’t. She contacted the governor’s office. A staffer for then-Governor
Jan Brewer told her Brewer couldn’t get involved because it would be political
suicide.
Finally, at an AZBBHE meeting, she asked why Nevitt wasn’t
charged with sexual assault. She had recordings of him, so he finally got
busted for a HIPAA violation. But he merely had to take a remedial course and
pay a fine which was deferred.
Another attorney came forward and filed a complaint with AzBBHE against
Nevitt for sexual assault. She was disbarred after that. Coincidence? She
doesn’t think so. Another woman contacted Flick and told her he’d sexually
assaulted her. AZAACPR reports that Nevitt “has been the subject of
repeated agency complaints and other reports to civil and criminal authorities
for sexual misconduct.”
For awhile, the bar’s disciplinary judge, William O’Neil, was
using Nevitt for assistance. He essentially delegated judicial authority to
him. The bar wrote in its monthly
magazine, "The MAP director will have discretion to reduce
Respondent's probation to one year." Another order gave Nevitt the
discretion to require an attorney to wear an ankle bracelet. O’Neil has
his own extensive history of
corruption. AZAACPR has documented much of it.
Then Flick got a request from the big law firm Snell &
Wilmer. The bar hired them to investigate her claims. Finally, the bar fired
Nevitt as MAP director, However, Flick believes they continue to use him as a
contractor. AZAACPR says if you call MAP saying you are an attorney who was
referred there, you will be given the contact information for Nevitt’s private
company.
Flick believes that Nevitt had dirt on so many people such as
O’Neil they had to protect him. For example, Flick was told by a knowledgeable
party that Nevitt knew O’Neil was addicted to pain pills. Many believe that
O’Neil, a Democrat, was put in his position as disciplinary judge since he
would throw the book at conservative attorneys, while protecting favored
friends of the bar — who are almost all Democrats. O’Neil is in part
untouchable since his attorney is Stanley Feldman, a former Arizona Supreme
Court Chief Justice who was very liberal.
Flick
finally filed a lawsuit against Nevitt. He was ordered by the judge to get a
medical examination. He refused to go, probably because Flick could describe
his genitalia. They eventually settled the lawsuit out of court.
Flick worries that Nevitt’s predatory behavior will continue.
He currently works in rehab centers. The kind of women he is treating aren’t
likely to go to the police to report him.
Unfortunately, the Arizona Bar is powerful and attorneys are
terrified to take it on, for fear of losing their bar licenses. One former
member of the bar’s board of governors wrote an article for Forbes documenting some of the
abuses. Within two hours, the bar contacted Forbes and threatened them into
taking it down. That attorney’s bar license is now suspended.
The bar needs to be dismantled and converted into a voluntary
bar. Its disciplinary function should be removed and put under the Arizona
Supreme Court. The bar has demonstrated too many times that it is a good old
boys’ club of progressives, who target conservatives and protect their
own.
Flick testified at the Arizona Legislature in front of an ad
hoc committee that had been set up to analyze dismantling the bar. But
unfortunately, even though legislation has been introduced every year for
several years now, the bar has been able to stop it from going through due to
extensive lobbying. No attorney in the legislature dares vote for it. Until
this important legislation passes, the bar shows no signs of discontinuing its
abuses of power.
The
California State Bar/The Model Problem
https://attorneybusters.com/the-california-state-bar/
(Mother Black Widow & Babies)
The State Bar of California is touted as being the
model and mother for other bars across the country, and there lies the problem
in its “Motherly Model” form.
Once you strip away the
pretentious titles used to describe the various self- elected positions, Office
of Chief Trial Counsel, Board of Governors, etc., it is just a club with forced
membership and dues.
The State of California by law,
requires all attorneys practicing law in the state to be members of the
California State Bar.
The State Bar of California, then in return for
the favor of forced membership and dues, is required to act as the
“administrative arm” of the California Supreme Court.
And what is supposed to be the
chief purpose of administration? To administrate a Self-Disciplinary program of
its member attorneys.
What this has led to in its “Model” form is a smoke screen to
frustrate individuals that have a problem with an attorney, and to keep
attorneys out of harm’s way from the general public.
A general public that has many
valid reasons to be ticked off at them.
The State Bar of California has important
sounding titles for their fellow attorney members that discipline each other.
They call themselves judges (not judges elected by the public),
and governors (not elected by the public), and court committees (not the public
court), and appointees to the court (not the public court, but their own
internal court).
For the purpose of discussion,
lets call the State Bar of California, “The Club”.
“The Club” has proud names for “member only services” that are used to
help discipline themselves, such as, “The Ethics
Hotline”.
On the surface, this sounds fine
and noble, however, once the fog lifts, you realize a more accurate title would
be, “Ethics, I Don’t Think I Have Any, Can You Tell
Me What They Are?” or “Ethics, Not Lately, I Think I’m In Trouble”.
But, the titles would be too long
and they wouldn’t sound as good.
Plus, some of us of lesser
intelligence that need protection from ourselves (according to the attorneys)
might actually catch on to their secret “members only” code names.
Let’s look at the Ethics Hotline. This is a toll free number “FOR ATTORNEYS ONLY” that an attorney
can call to see if either something they did, or plan to do, could get them a
warning letter from “The Club”.
The “Ethics Hotline” is courteous as to provide for
attorneys that do not wish to use their own names, the ability to use
“pseudonyms” (an “alias” for us simple folk). The “Ethics Hotline” will even arrange a call back
appointment (for the attorneys to call back) when they don’t want to leave
their number.
This is not a joke!!
“The Club” is working to provide their members the first level of defense
when they are pursued by a client. “The Club” will tell the attorney what things they can cite to deter “The Club” from “getting” them if they do have
a complaint filed against them.
“The Club” (State Bar if you have forgotten) of course says this is how its
members are better disciplined by knowing what ethics are.
However, Attorney Busters.com believes that
if an attorney hasn’t figured out what ethics are by the time they take their
state bar exam, they simply don’t want to know.
There are several CD’s available
concerning what you should look for in an attorney and what to do if you’ve got
a problem with one.
In order to post a complaint
about a bad experience you or a friend has had with a bar association go to the
Cobweb.
*
Hackers
Expose Attorney Corruption At State Bar
Hackers Expose Attorney Corruption At
State Bar
8/31/2017
State Bar Leader Bites the Dust After Cover- Up
Russia, Clinton Emails, Isis and now California's State Bar.
Hackers may truly be responsible for changing the world and many Silicon Valley
Hackers are now turning to clean up California's Courts.
Confidential State
Bar communications indicate that dating
back to 2014, State Bar employees and
contractors; Braulio Munoz, Gregory Dresser, Sherrie Mc Letchie , Lori
Wallerstein and James Towery, willfully
engaged in misconduct at the State Bar that
compromised the private and confidential
records of private citizens who filed complaints against attorneys,
including the social security numbers and home addresses of individuals who attempted to complaint about
unethical lawyers.
Rindskopf, the Bar's latest leader to flee the rapidly
deteriorating lawyer watchdog agency, is reportedly aware the Bar released the private social security numbers,
home addresses , IRS information, credit card and banking records of private
citizens who sought to address bad attorneys, and that the State Bar never
notified these individuals of the release.
Emails and notes
obtained by members of Silicon Valley's most elite hackers show that Rindskopf
has told those closest to her that she is leaving the State Bar after only two
years, before a hurricane of investigations
results in indictments and criminal
charges for many past and present employees, lawyers and judges.
Some of the records leaked to the press from Anonymous
indicate that the Bar repeatedly covered up attorney misconduct and
ignored clear and convincing evidence that showed
former Chief Trial Counsel James Towery threw Joe Dunn under the bus
when Dunn refused Towery's request to cease investigating lawyers in Santa Clara County, where Towery was
appointed as a judge following his
departure from the Bar.
State Bar Compliant files also show that the state's legal
system has become outright corrupt , as it has allowed large law firms and
individual lawyers off the disclosure hook, while judges award these same
unethical firms and lawyers millions in sanctions and fees awards every year.
The records obtained also show that James Towery failed to
make lawful disclosures himself, while working at the State Bar, and while
acting as a judge in Santa Clara County.
Towery's former law firm , Hoge and Fenton, is
reported to have essentially bought the employment position for their
partner , which in return promised
"protection " for Hoge Fenton lawyers, and lawyers inside the Santa
Clara County prosecutor's office, where Towery's wife was employed. Additionally problematic was the fact
that Towery and his wife, Karen Sinunu
Towery saw to it that millions of State
Bar grants went to fund questionable non profits and programs associated with
Santa Clara County University's law programs.
Bar communications also show that Rindskopf is extremely
worried about Hayward v. Superior court. Rindskopf privately admitted, the Bar
clearly first ignored a complaint against Nancy Perkovich before the Hayward
case was decided, and is now scrambling to discipline Perkovich, who is facing
a civil suit for driving one divorce case to incur over $3,000,000 in fees
where Perkovich did nothing for the millions she charged in attorney fees and
costs.
The Hayward case indicates that orders made by attorneys
acting as private judges could mean the voiding of orders in thousands of
California divorce cases, but also the voiding of the orders that were related
to the formation of Facebook, which
could be problematic for Facebook shareholders all over the world.
The Hayward case could additionally entangle
attorneys who acted as private judges, or minor's counsel, in divorce
and large complex civil litigation matters, where lawyers like; Perkovich, Richmond, Hales, Cox,
Crawford, Nat Hales, , Robert
Blevans, Richard Roggia, Brad Baugh,
Valerie Houghton, Tom Tuttle,
Seastrom and Hammon have been known to be making millions off creating
misery of divorce litigants as these
unscrupulous lawyers have made billions of California divorce, probate and
custody cases.
For employees, shareholders and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg
and Sheryl Sandberg, the issues in Santa Clara County family courts may be far
more important then they once believed.
State Bar memos indicate that Jim Towery pressured employees to bury complaints that would have
shown fraud and outright criminal
conduct that could land , now judge,
James Towery, right in jail based on his involvement in Mark Zuckerberg's lawsuit with the
Winklevosses, that ultimately got Facebook anchored in California.
The use of Facebook in legal matters has become an
increasing matter of public interest. In family courts judges are using
Facebook to hold mothers and fathers in contempt of court after they are
stalked on Facebook by their ex spouse and
on (www.dailybusinessreview.com/id=1202796261138/Judges-Facebook-Friendship-With-Attorney-Doesnt-Require-Recusal-Court-Rules) , August 23, 2017, a Florida's
Supreme Court just ruled that a Judge "friending " a lawyer on
Facebook does not require recusal from cases where that lawyer appears before
her. Many litigants now believe that makes Facebook fair game to stalk judges
and lawyers for information to use against them when filling complaints and
reporting judge crimes.
California's State Bar misusing personal information of
private people who file complaints against unethical lawyers must be addressed
urgently by the state's legislature.
State Bar records, obtained by a core group of elite Hackers in
Silicon Valley, show that judges in Santa Clara, Sacramento and Contra Costa
and Orange Counties regularly refused discipline attorney misconduct over the past
30 years, as Canon 3 of California's Judicial Code of Ethics makes mandatory, and the judicial failures have now
seeped into the state's attorney discipline agencies, in a manner that allows
corruption to flourish in the state's courts.
Members of the Public
who filed complaints against an attorney and provided the Bar with
records, or information, that contained social security numbers, bank account numbers or IRS information, are advised to contact :
caljohnqpublic@gmail.com to see if your personal information is in the records
the Bar has carelessly disseminated to the public when handling complaints about attorney misconduct.
The California
State Bar's dismal history shows why it should be broken up
Assemblyman
Mark Stone (D-Scotts Valley), confronts the defeat May 31 of his bill to reform
the California State Bar, which legislators thought did not go far enough. (AP)
Let's put this
in terms that even an attorney with peerless loophole-seeking skills would
consider straightforward: the California State Bar is a mess.
In recent
years, the organization has been the target of withering state audits
documenting misspent fees by the millions, overpaid executives, and
inept management of its all-important duty of licensing lawyers
and managing professional discipline. Its reputation is at a low ebb among
state legislators, who last month placed on hold the organization's yearly authorization to
collect annual fees because the measure didn't go far enough to achieve reform.
The Bar's
dual role as licenser and ethics enforcer as well as trade
organization pushing policy changes, critics say, leaves it
hopelessly mired in a conflict of interest.
"You
don't delegate regulatory power to a special interest group," says Robert
Fellmeth, executive director of the University of San Diego's Center for Public
Interest Law and a frequent critic of the Bar. "To let them be the
decision-makers is obscene."
The Bar should have only
one purpose—to rid the profession of bad apples.
DENNIS H.
MANGERS, NON-ATTORNEY BOARD MEMBER OF THE CALIFORNIA BAR
These issues seem to crop up every few years, but seldom with as
much urgency as now. That's because a 2015 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court
has put professional licensing bodies on notice that they could be guilty of antitrust violations if a majority
of their members are participants in the business they regulate.
The California State Bar is governed by a 19-member board of
trustees, 13 of whom are lawyers. You do the math.
The Court decision isn't the only driver of potential change.
"People can suffer irreparable harm from attorneys," says Fellmeth, a
lawyer. They can be deprived of their liberty by inadequate representation in
criminal court or immigration cases.
But the Supreme Court ruling sharpens the argument for splitting
the Bar in two — into a trade association with voluntary membership, and a
government body controlled by non-lawyers and responsible for professional
licensing and discipline, much as medical professional standards are overseen
by the Medical Board of California and political advocacy is left to the
independent California Medical Association.
A measure passed by the State Assembly in June 2 would place the "deunification" of the
Bar firmly on the front burner. The bill would create a commission to
reconsider the Bar's governing structure and report back to the legislature by
April. The bill also would restructure the Bar board as a 13-member body
with at least seven non-lawyer members — an effort to comply with the
Supreme Court's 2015 ruling.
Deunification is "the only real solution to the state bar's
chronic dysfunction," says Dennis H. Mangers, a non-attorney Bar
trustee who has submitted just such a proposal to the
legislature. "The Bar should have only one purpose — to rid the
profession of bad apples."
That function often takes a back seat to the policy and social
purposes that make the Bar resemble more a professional club than a regulator,
according to critics. In legislative testimony last April, Fellmeth observed
that the Bar sponsors 30 different programs offering professional services to
its members, often at a group discount, including financial advice, insurance,
consumer products and software. "No other occupational licensing agency
offers any of these goods and services to its licensees," he said.
The Bar tends to hold itself exempt from state rules applied to
other state agencies on grounds that it's an arm of the State Supreme
Court; critics say it still regularly violates the Bagley-Keene Open
Meeting Act, which requires at least 10 days public notice of any meetings
and forbids members to discuss business with each other except in an open
forum, despite a measure passed last year bringing it under Bagley-Keene's
jurisdiction.
Elizabeth Rindskopf Parker, the former dean of McGeorge School of Law who took over as
executive director of the Bar last September, T described
herself as "agnostic" on deunification. The organization hasn't taken
a formal position.
But Parker argues that "as officers of the
court, lawyers have responsibility for the good features of our
rule-of-law system." Their duties include "making sure the legal
system is functioning well" along with "educating and informing the
public and the legislature on technical issues in the law."
Breaking up the Bar, she says, could hamper programs to improve
access to the courts for underprivileged clients, since these are funded from
mandatory fee revenue that might not flow from a voluntary organization with a
smaller membership. Still, she acknowledged that all these functions might be
accomplished via "a different set of structural arrangements"
than the present.
The California State Bar cut its disciplinary backlog in 2011 by
lightening penalties, but the backlog of cases has been creeping back up.
In the mid-1980s, the legislature imposed an enforcement monitor
for the organization. Fellmeth, who served in that role for five years,
found that clients were systematically discouraged from pursuing complaints. For example, the Bar had
established a toll-free hotline, but hadn't listed the number anywhere "a
consumer might logically look to find it."
State Auditor Elaine M. Howle has been turning up the heat. In a
report last year, she ripped into the disciplinary system, especially the Bar's ham-handed management of a
crippling backlog of nearly 5,200 cases in 2010: it reduced the backlog by
two-thirds the following year mostly by settling cases hastily with light
penalties. (Backlogged cases are those in which no action has been taken for
six months or more.)
Some had to be reexamined; of 27 settlements rejected by the State
Supreme Court, the ultimate arbiter of lawyer discipline, 21 had to be
renegotiated with harsher punishments, including five disbarments. About 10% of
the attorneys who were allowed to continue practicing after the settlements
faced new complaints subsequently, and 28 were eventually disbarred.
Howle found that the Bar was squandering resources that
should have been spent on hiring more enforcement staff. In 2012, the
organization spent $76.6 million to buy and refurbish a Los Angeles office
building to supplement its San Francisco headquarters — about twice what
it spent on discipline that year.
Meanwhile, the case backlog was creeping back up — from 1,742 in
2011 to 2,174 in 2014. Bar officials say the backlog was reduced by about 24%
last year, but they warn that further reductions will require as many as 48
more lawyers and investigators, in addition to the 118 employed at the end of
last year.
The Bar's structure as a combined trade association and
enforcement body dates from 1927 and isn't unique. But their day may
be passing, says Ted Schnayer, an expert on Bar governance at the University of
Arizona.
"I want to clear up any perception of a profession being
permitted to regulate itself," says Mangers, a former state legislator who
will be leaving the board this summer. "Most attorneys never have a
blemish, but the bad ones are beyond your imagination."
Keep up to date with Michael Hiltzik. Follow @hiltzikm on Twitter, see his Facebook page, or email michael.hiltzik@latimes.com.
The California State Bar Has No Clue What It’s Doing
California has a plan to help the people who failed the bar exam... and
obviously it makes no sense.
May
24, 2018 a
California just
posted its worst bar exam passage rate in 70 years, and somehow that’s not the
dumbest news we have about them this week. As California continues its
draconian, trade restricting bar grading policy — despite the pleas of academics, common sense, and a
comprehensive scientific study — and pawn
off the blame for its own market manipulation on “students must be getting
dumber” nonsense, it turns out the California Bar is truly the dumbest of them
all.
An essay on Medium,
penned by a graduate who unfortunately failed the February exam,
unleashes a hilarious broadside against
the tinpot bureaucracy behind the exam. To set the scene, those who didn’t pass
the exam were notified on May 18 with the following message of encouragement:
In order to help improve performance on the bar exam, we
recently launched the Productive Mindset Intervention Program. Through this
program and ongoing study, we hope to better understand the downward trend of
bar exam pass rates.
The Productive Mindset Intervention Program will be available to
applicants beginning with the July 2018 Bar Exam. This program is a partnership
with researchers at Stanford University, the University of Southern California,
and Indiana University. The program is designed to improve exam performance
across the board.
But, as the
essayist learned, while this graduate-focused initiative sounds wonderful, it’s
also run by the California State Bar, so….
Well, gee. This program sounds really great! You may be
wondering, as I was, “How do I sign up?” The answer is: You can’t! Haha!
No, seriously. You can no longer sign up for the program that,
according to the Executive Director of the State Bar of California on May 18th,
had just been “recently launched” for the July 2018 exam. I found this out by
calling the Los Angeles Office of Admissions and asking for information on how
to enroll in the program. I was told that the deadline for enrollment was May
14th, 2018. Some might find that an odd date to choose, as it is four days
before the Bar Exam results were released. Meaning that anyone who had failed
the February administration and would be registering for the July exam had
missed the enrollment deadline for a program designed to improve their
performance in July.
Yes, the California
Bar used their failure notifications to pimp a program that they knew none of
those graduates could enroll in. Let that sink in. Because the author of this
essay has let it sink in and remains… perplexed:
Much angrier now, I demanded to have the names of the persons in
charge of running the “Productive Mindset Intervention Program,” and for their
contact information. If you’re reading this and you’re wearing a hat, I would
advise holding onto it before proceeding on and reading the response I
received. The words that stumbled out of the man on the other line’s mouth were
“no one has been appointed for that yet.”
No one. Has been appointed. For that. Yet.
In a sense, this is the perfect metaphor for the California Bar
— there’s literally no one minding the wheel. When the law school deans rolled
into the California Supreme Court with empirical data and asked that body to
exercise a little of its theoretical oversight authority to fix the problem,
the Court rolled over like we should have always expected.
That’s exactly the
sort of service you expect from a test that brings in roughly $12,040,000 every
year in fees! And they’d have even more if they could find a way to charge for
this Productive Mindset Intervention Program… but that would require getting
people enrolled first.
Check out the full essay for a
thorough rundown of everything these people have done to screw over young
lawyers — often along racial and gender lines — for years. And it’ll probably
keep doing this for years to come.
Because no one is
running this show.
California State Bar Accused of Fraud and
Corruption by Former Bar CEO
http://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/california-state-bar-accused-of-fraud-and-corruption-by-former-bar-ceo/
The attorneys in
California are almost all members of the State Bar. The Bar has ethics panels
to see if each attorney is working within the oath they took to become an
attorney. Now we find those running the California State Bar fire
whistleblowers—even those running the organization. We also know that the
statistics kept by the California State Bar are as accurate and honest as a
document from the Obama White House.
“Dunn claims he was targeted
after he discovered that the bar’s chief trial counsel, Jayne Kim, removed 269
backlogged cases from official reports released to the public in order to make
her office appear more productive.
Jay, the newly named defendant, is the former principal attorney to the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court.
“Consistent with her historical pattern of interfering with state bar affairs without any constitutional, statutory, or other authority,” Dunn claims, Jay met with certain members of the bar’s board of trustees to urge Dunn’s termination by spreading “blatantly false information” about him.”
Jay, the newly named defendant, is the former principal attorney to the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court.
“Consistent with her historical pattern of interfering with state bar affairs without any constitutional, statutory, or other authority,” Dunn claims, Jay met with certain members of the bar’s board of trustees to urge Dunn’s termination by spreading “blatantly false information” about him.”
Some of this appears to
be criminal. When will the Attorney General shut down this criminal enterprise?
The people of California deserve better—instead we get the California State
Bar, important people that protect themselves from the law.
Dunn Adds Fuel to Case Against CA State
Bar
By KATHERINE PROCTOR,
Courthouse News, 5/5/15
LOS ANGELES (CN) –
Former state Sen. Joseph Dunn amended his whistleblower lawsuit to name a new
defendant, Beth Jay, in his claim that the State Bar of California fired him as
its executive director for exposing “serious ethical breaches, prosecutorial lapses,
and fiscal improprieties.”
Dunn claims he was targeted after he discovered that the bar’s chief trial counsel, Jayne Kim, removed 269 backlogged cases from official reports released to the public in order to make her office appear more productive.
Jay, the newly named defendant, is the former principal attorney to the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court.
“Consistent with her historical pattern of interfering with state bar affairs without any constitutional, statutory, or other authority,” Dunn claims, Jay met with certain members of the bar’s board of trustees to urge Dunn’s termination by spreading “blatantly false information” about him.
Dunn alleges that Jay met repeatedly with Kim, Craig Holden (the bar’s newly installed president, who is also named as a defendant) and Jim Fox to set into motion plans for Dunn’s termination. The meetings “culminated in Kim filing a frivolous and unsubstantiated grievance against Sen. Dunn,” the amended complaint states.
The former Democratic state senator also claims that Jay was directly involved in and copied on the grievance, which he was never given the opportunity to review or to answer.
“Beth Jay’s involvement played a substantial role in the ultimate decision to terminate Sen. Dunn,” the amended complaint states.
In addition, Dunn accuses Holden of engaging in a “campaign to derail the sale of the state bar’s San Francisco headquarters.”
“Specifically, it has been learned that Holden has a plan to lien the San Francisco property, falsely claiming urgent needs to make property improvement and repairs, that is in effect nothing more than a poison pill plan to scuttle any sale of the property which could have led to the state bar realizing millions of dollars in equity which could be used to defray membership costs and to support its core functions,” Dunn claims.
In November, the State Bar of California issued a statement that called Dunn’s lawsuit “baseless.”
Both sides will be heard on Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court.
In a telephone interview, Holden said that Dunn’s “eleventh-hour” filing of the amended complaint was an effort to derail the hearing.
Dunn is represented by Mark Geragos in Los Angeles.
STATE BAR BURNS
DOCUMENTS TO COVER UP ATTORNEY CORRUPTION AND JUDGE CRIMES
State Bar Cursed - Still Covering Up for James Towery
Ironically, as can be seen in the Bar's own email noted
above , James Towery, former Chief Trial
Counsel of the State Bar was among the victims of the Bar's reckless handling of private and confidential
information. Towery appears to be the only victim who was directly called by
the Bar. Other victims have had their personal information released by the Bar,
as early as 2015, but have never been contacted or informed their private
information had been compromised.
Several victims claim to have experienced fraud and identity
theft ever since providing personal and confidential information to the Bar
when complaining about attorney misconduct.
In addition to compromising private and confidential information of persons and businesses
victimized by bad lawyers. The State Bar
also appears to have released internal emails that show employees of the
Bar attempted to commit fraud on the
State Auditor , Elaine Howle during a 2015 audit.
Since James Towery was Chief Trail Counsel at the Bar from
2010 -2011, policies and procedures appear to have been in place that
allowed lawyers to continue to harm the
public. As far back as 2010 , the Bar
has reportedly hired thugs to stalk,
harass and intimidate people who have filed complaints against California
lawyers
Employees and lawyers at the Bar are additionally aware of millions of dollars bad
lawyers have stolen through trust account abuse, which the Bar never
investigated or prosecuted. Bar staff are also reported to have pressured prosecutors in Santa Clara,
Contra Costa, Napa, Sacramento and Orange County to ignore judge and lawyer
crimes, in return for immunity from investigations of DA offices.
The Bar also appears to have tried to conceal that James
Towery never lawfully reported his financial interests on his form 700. One Bar
employee reports the Bar's top brass told employees not to worry about Towery's
failure to lawfully disclose as he acted in the Bar's most powerful position,
and where he was later appointed to the Santa Clara County bench by Governor
Brown in 2011.
bench by Governor
Brown in 2011.
State Bar disaster continues as California politicians ponder fate
It’s been painfully evident for years, if not
decades, that the State Bar – the quasi-public organization that licenses
lawyers and is supposed regulate their conduct – is an institutional disaster
zone.
Multiple reports by outside auditors about its
managerial shortcomings, regulatory backlogs and financial irregularities, very
public exchanges of charges and countercharges by State Bar officials, and
dueling lawsuits all attest to the mess.
Five
years ago, the Legislature ordered the State Bar to create a “Public Interest
Task Force” to delve into its problems and recommend reforms.
It took four years just for the panel to be
convened – itself a testament to the State Bar’s innate dysfunction. This week,
however, its conclusions emerged, along with a minority
report that says the draft is too weak, ducking the mandate to recommend
“meaningful solutions.”
By its own words, the majority didn’t offer
concrete reforms because it didn’t want to interject itself in an intense,
backroom debate in the Capitol over the State Bar’s fate.
When the State Bar sought its usual bill
authorizing it to charge lawyers “dues” to cover its expenses, the Assembly
rebelled and made dues contingent on a series of reforms – including, oddly
enough, creating another commission to study its operations and recommend
changes.
However, the bill stalled in the Senate
Judiciary Committee, in part because Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye didn’t
like its provisions. The Supreme Court wields the ultimate authority on
disciplining lawyers. And the bill remains in limbo as the Legislature begins
the last month of its biennial session.
Both factions of the task force agree “that
significant changes are needed” to make the State Bar an effective agency.
However, the majority just suggests alternatives
for possible change while the minority focuses on what should be obvious to
anyone: The organization’s dysfunction stems directly from its dual functions
as a regulatory agency charged with protecting the public from incompetent or
venal attorneys and as a trade association that promotes lawyers’ professional
and economic interests.
“We conclude that the only answer to the Bar’s
persistent dysfunction is to de-couple its regulatory and professional
association functions,” the minority says.
The State Bar’s structural and operational
maladies are not only well documented, but continue even as legislators and
others ponder its future.
This week, the Los Angeles Business Journal
reported that the State Bar has selected a new contractor to clean up a
multi-million-dollar, malfunctioning internal computer system after dumping the
original contractor for “seriously flawed” work.
This week, too, the Los Angeles Daily Journal
reported on new suits being filed relating to the messy departure of Joe Dunn,
the state’s former executive director – a continuation of charges and
countercharges of malfeasance and corruption that have rattled the organization
for months.
The time for more study is long past. The time for
action, leading to the de-coupling of the State Bar’s incompatible functions
and other structural reforms, is now.
No comments:
Post a Comment