Tuesday, February 19, 2008

kanBARoo Court. 30th Installment. The Richard Fine Matter and the Moral Turpitude Travesty

Incompetent administration of law is oppressive in itself, as bureaucratic reflex replaces legal reasoning, but usually the oppression turns corrupt. In my case, the prosecutrix resorted to fraud on the court by pilfering documents submitted for filing. Thus, a second way incompetence breeds oppression occurs because of the inability of the incompetent to defend their acts honestly. A third way is that incompetence limits the reasons for eschewing oppressive or corrupt practices. It matters little whether one acts for good or bad reasons, if the results are wrong in either instance. A fourth way, their sole means to career advancement, the incompetent curry favor.

I started this blog, subtitled "How Legal Incompetence Engenders Oppression," because my case illustrated in pure form the most generic variant of legal oppression, bureaucratic reflex. Because of the case's direction, these Installments have digressed into the second route from incompetence to oppression, the prosecutrix's inability to win cases honestly, and, somewhat the third, in the court's indifference to the prosecutrix's misconduct. I have traveled the fourth, financially self-aggrandizing corruption, only briefly here. While there are pure cases of bureaucratic reflexmine was at its inceptionthere are no pure cases of juridical corruption by currying favor for material reward because such corruption requires generalized incompetence, an environment unable to rebut error.

An all-sided view of incompetence and oppression must take account of scenarios where greed joins ineptitude in the engenderment. The Richard Fine disbarment is such a case. (See http://tinyurl.com/38ek9h) Attorney Richard I. Fine has practiced for some 40 years, gaining a reputation for successfully litigating citizen actions against government entities. His career trajectory eventually led to collision with the judicial system itself when he demanded the disqualification of judges in citizen litigation against the County of Los Angeles, based on the judges’ accepting payment from the County. Fine contends that the gratuitous payment of a $40,000 annual cash benefit by the County violated the California Constitution, which states that judges shall be paid by the State exclusively, and he contends the payments amount to a bribe. Fine repeatedly moved to disqualify judicial officers in actions against the County and eventually sued the judges personally, a procedure permitted for personal wrongdoing. At least one of the judicial officers filed a complaint with the State Bar, and the complaint resulted in the Hearing Department recommending disbarment. Judge Honn's 72-page opinion differs from similar documents in other courts by the absence of respondent Fine's legal and factual contentions. Judge Honn presents the findings in full comprehensiveness, dwelling on the smallest details of what the court claims happened, while he provides scant indication of the issues and none of Fine's contentions. The omissions are giveaway that justice is not being done.

The State Bar Court doesn't ordinarily disbar without a showing of greed or dishonesty. Judge Honn needed allegations of moral turpitude, and such allegations the good judge did propound. Judge Honn accused Fine of making frivolous motions out of corrupt motive, the corrupt motive implying moral turpitude. Even if the court could justify discipline for good-faith motions the court considered frivolous, it remains hard to see what Fine's corrupt motive might be. Allegations of greed — the substance of true moral turpitude — are absent from the charges and Judge Honn's opinion. The moral turpitude may be invisible, but Judge Honn is not one deterred by implausibility. According to Judge Honn's opinion, the corrupt motive served by Fine's allegedly frivolous filings was to coerce the judges, and failing that, to wreak revenge!

Judge Honn does not clarify how he surmised Fine's motives. The State Bar Court recommended Fine's disbarment because he is a "legal bully," obviously the tenor of the offended judges' complaints. Some judges are so accustomed to lawyers cowering in their courtrooms that they might contrast any zeal as bullying, but, as to actual bullying, a barrage of frivolous motions is no way to bully a judge. And where is the revenge, when the judge wins, the petitioner is sanctioned, held in contempt, and serves, as did Fine, three days in jail? Corrupt motive in the Fine case is a senseless conclusion without evidence in the face of a far more plausible explanation of Fine's incessant motions. When the judges showed new biases, Fine had to file motions demanding disqualification or risk
waiving the issue. Fine perceives a mass-conspiratorial fraud on the court, not an everyday legal situation. Whatever the merits of his position, this is not a State Bar matter.

In the next Installment, you can learn how the Fine Hearing Department failed even to establish the alleged facts on which it dwelled and relied.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mr. Fine lied and stole from me, an indigent person who is facing a criminal matter. He is in fact immoral and before you support him further you should look into this.

Anonymous said...

He has been disbarred. And it is about time. The man is a menace.

Anonymous said...

Mr. Fine is just as bad as the judges. He takes money from clients and leaves them in the dust. He's no hero that's for sure.

Laser said...

Given the recent US Supreme Court decision on Massey - should not this suffice as new evidence to warrant an independent judicial review under coram nobis for Richard Fine.
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Keep up the good work - America needs patriots such as this!
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http://www.fulldisclosure.net/

Anonymous said...

Gee, I have a case against my county up here in the Bay Area that has languished in the local Court of Appeal for almost a year and they still won't calendar our oral arguments.

Shouldn't I wonder if the judge's up here are also getting these county bribes? They worked SO WELL in Los Angeles County keeping that county judgment proof, what "responsible" county official wouldn't push the envelope in every county in California if it were a proven success in LA?

Where is the FPPC in all of this, and what are they able to do since it is now declared legal? Shoudn't every citizen of California that has a legitimate suit against his or her county be wondering right now if the judge he is in front of has taken one of these bribes? How can you know whether to challenge a judge for bias under 170.1-170.3 unless they disclose their financial conflict of interest, and we know they don't disclose them on their Form 700? I want to KNOW whether my judge is unbiased or not. Where can someone go to investigate how far this racket has gone by now? Hss it gone only to the Superior Court judges, or does it go to the Court of Appeal judges, too? Did Chief Justice George take a payment from LA County when he was a judge there? Shouldn't a competent investigator be looking at this statewide?

jcolard said...

this case and the states political
houses that voted and approved a bill that was pushed thru the committees should be a signal that this states judicial branch does indeed has before them the biggest case of judicial Crime.One only has to read SBX2-11 to realize that Judges in this State,that sat on the bench in LA county since the late 90 received payments undisclosed could RETROACTIVELY RELEASE ALL PARTIES CONCERNED AND
TURN WHAT WAS A ACT BY JUDGES,THAT
WAS THERE ACCEPTING FUNDS FROM THE COUNTY,KNOWING THAT,FELT THEY ARE ABOVE THE LAW THEY MANDATED TO UPHOLD!ALSO THE DISBARMENT AND THOSE MEMBERS THAT REVIEWED THE COMPLAINT,HAD BEEN CHALLENGED BY THIS BRAVE MAN,SHOULD BE ASKED BY ITS MEMBERSHIP ABOUT THERE CONNECTION WITH ATTORNEY FINES CLIENTS HE REPRESENTED THIS IS GOING TO BACKFIRE ON ALL INVOLVED IF THE FULL STORY- IS EVER TOLD
ALSO AT ISSUE IS THE TAKE OVER BY THE JUDICIAL COUNCIL THRU SBX2-12
THIS BILL GAVE ALL THE CHECKS AND BALANCES OF FUNDING OF STATE PROJECTS OF THE COURTS TO THEM TO DESIGN LOCATE BUILD AWARD CONTRACTS PURCHASE PROPERTIES,EVEN HAD WORDING SUCH AS THE POWERS TO USE FUNDS FOR ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY'S
AND ALSO WORDING THAT WOULD RELEASE FROM RESPONSIBILITY FUTURE LOSES FOR BAD JUDGMENTS MADE!
NEVER HAVE I READ SUCH BOLD ACTIONS,THAT MY LOCAL REP DARREL STIENBERG AUTHORED! HE TOO NEEDS TO ANSWER TO,WHAT WAS THE SOLE RESPONSIBILITY THE HOUSE AND SENATE HAS HELD,NOW GIVEN TO THE COUNCIL!
THE CONSTRUCTION FUND AND 5BILLION DOLLARS OF STATES CREDIT,NOW IS TO BE PAID BACK BY UNWARRANTED COURT ASSESSMENT FEES,ADDED TO ALL CITIZENS THAT APPEAR BEFORE JUDGES
IN CALIF THIS MEANS IF FOUND GUILTY OF ANY INFRACTIONS,LAWS,CIVIL,CRIMINAL OR OTHERWISE,YOU ARE ONE TO PAY TO REBUILD THE JUDICIAL BRANCHES WISH LIST OF NEW COURT HOUSE,PROGRAMS ECT, ECT GO TO THERE WEB SITE TO SEE
THIS MASSIVE LIST THAT EVEN SANTA CLAUS COULD NOT FILL

THIS IS A ISSUE THAT MUST GO BEFORE THE SUPREME COURT! IFNOT?