Usdc Disbarment - Dkt 13 - Motion For Reconsideration Re Recusal - 09-mc-00129
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RICHARD I. FINE c/o Men’s Central Jail Prisoner ID # 1824367 c/o Men’s Central Jail 441 Bauchet Street Los Angeles, CA 90012
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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT CENTRAL DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA, WESTERN DIVISION
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In the Disciplinary Matter of RICHARD ISAAC FINE
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California State Bar No.: 55259
Case No. MC-09-00129 ABC MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF THE DENIAL OF THE RECUSAL OF JUDGE OTIS WRIGHT
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REASONS FOR MOTION
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The reasons for the Motion are that Judge Snyder omitted to address the crucial facts that the Federal civil rights cases which formed the bases for Counts 15-22 of the State Bar’s Notice of Disciplinary Charges and conviction
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of “moral turpitude” on Counts 16, 18, 20 and 21-22 (considered together). Count 17 had been dismissed by the Hearing Department and reinstated by the
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Review Department sua sponte without notice or hearing (a Constitutional violation of due process) in violation of State Bar Rule of Procedure 305.
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Further, the State Bar did not appeal the dismissal. Count 15 was dismissed by the Hearing Department and not appealed, as was Count 19.
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Counts 15-17 related to the case of Los Angeles County Ass’n. of Environmental Health Inspectors v. Los Angeles County and Lewin, et al, 215 F.Supp.2nd 1071 (CDCal. 2002). The complaint alleged that the LA County payments to Los Angeles County (hereinafter “LA County”) Superior Court
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Judge Kurt Lewin violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution and the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
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The case of Sturgeon v. County of Los Angeles, 167 Cal.App.4th 630 (2008), filed in April 2006, two months after the State Bar filed its Notice of Disciplinary Charges, held that the LA County payments to LA County Superior Court judges violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution.
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U.S. Supreme Court cases showed the payments to be a denial of due
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process. These were the holdings of Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U.S. 510 (1927) – denial of due process for mayor/judge to sit as judge and be paid from fines he assesses in addition to salary when fines go into town treasury; Ward v. Monroeville, 109 U.S. 57 (1972) – denial of due process for mayor/judge to sit as judge without salary as judge and assess fines when fines go into town
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“Fisc.”; and Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Lavoie, 475 U.S. 813 (1986) – denial of due
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process for an Alabama Supreme Court justice to vote to uphold a punitive damages award against an insurance company for bad-faith refusal to pay a claim when he was the lead plaintiff in a nearly-identical lawsuit pending in Alabama’s lower courts. The U.S. Supreme Court stated in Lavoi, at page 825, that the proper constitutional inquiry is “whether sitting on the case then before
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the Supreme Court of Alabama ‘“would offer a possible temptation to the average … judge to … lead him not to hold the balance nice, clear and true.”’”
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(quoting Monroeville, supra, at 60, in turn quoting Tumey, supra, at 532.) Judge Matz of the District Court did not address these issues in Lewin, supra. He wrongly held under the Rooker-Feldman Doctrine that cases cannot proceed in both State and Federal courts. He also violated the doctrine that a
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case should not be dismissed without leave to amend unless there is no opportunity to amend. In the Lewin case, the LA County Superior Court was
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named as a party. After the remittitur of the Sturgeon case, the LA County Superior Court intervened as a “necessary party”.
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Fine moved to amend the complaint in the Lewin case. Such motion was the basis for Count 16’s conviction for “moral turpitude”.
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Counts 18-19 involve the case of Silva v. County of Los Angeles,
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Chalfant, Mitchell, Doi Todd, Boren and Nott, 215 F.Supp.2d 1079 (CDCal.
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1 2 3 4 5 6
2002). The complaint alleged that the LA County payments to judicial officers in LA County violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution and the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, sought approval of a defendant’s class of the judicial officers who received such payments, and injunctive relief to stop such payments to all judicial officers before whom LA
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County may appear as a party.
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As with the Lewin case, the theory of the case was well founded. Judge Matz made the gratuitous statement, without basis, that the suit was brought to “retaliate against judges”.
Given the holdings in Sturgeon, supra, and the
Supreme Court cases of Tumey, Monroeville, Lavoie and the recent case of Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co., Inc., 566 U.S. ___ (2009) decided June 8,
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2009 – due process violated by a $3-million contribution to the campaign committee of a candidate for the Supreme Court of West Virginia by the
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executive of a company who may have a case before such court, such comment was both incorrect and libelous. Such comment was carried through to the State Bar disbarment proceedings and became the basis to find Fine guilty of “moral turpitude” under Counts 18-19 for filing a frivolous lawsuit, i.e., the Silva case.
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As shown above, the Silva case was meritorious under Sturgeon, supra, Tumey, Monroeville, Lavoie and Caperton. The LA County payments to the LA
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County Superior Court judges and court commissioners who regularly sat as “temporary judges” were 27% of their state salary paid to them by LA County in addition to their state salary and state compensation. For example, in the year 2007, according to the Sturgeon case, a LA County Superior Court judge had a state salary of $178,800 plus benefits, and received an additional $46,300 from
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LA County.
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Counts 20-22 related to the case of Fine v. Mitchell, et al, seeking injunctive relief against judges who had taken payments from LA County; LA County Superior Court Commissioner Bruce E. Mitchell, who was a defendant in the Silva suit (who had taken payments from LA County while he presided as a “temporary judge” in the “eminent domain” and “class action” departments of
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the LA County Superior Court; and others. The State Bar linked this suit to the Lewin and Silva suits and held it to be frivolous as it sought the same result and
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found Fine guilty of “moral turpitude”. The Federal Court had made the error of dismissing the case under the Rooker-Feldman Doctrine and denied a motion to amend the complaint after it had dismissed another cases entitled Fine v. Czuleger on the ground that it should have been brought as part of Fine v. Mitchell. The judge in both cases was Judge Taylor, who retired thereafter.
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Recusal Is Mandatory
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As shown by the test set forth in Lavoie, supra, Judge Wright cannot “hold the balance nice, clear and true.” He has received payments from LA County. Under Senate Bill SBX2-11, the payments have now been acknowledged to be criminal and he has been given retroactive immunity from criminal prosecution,
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civil liability and disciplinary action (the latter if he were still sitting as a LA County Superior Court judge).
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Knowing these facts, Judge Wright should have recused himself. Other Central District judges in similar positions did exactly that. Judge Dale Fisher, in the case of Fine v. State Bar of California, et al, USDC Case No. CV-082906, which sought to have the California moral turpitude and involuntary
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enrollment statutes declared unconstitutional, recused herself the day after Fine made a motion for her recusal. She is a former LA County Superior Court judge
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who received LA County payments.
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Judge George Wu recused himself in Fine v. Sheriff of Los Angeles County, USDC Case No. CV-09-1914. He did so immediately upon its being assigned to him. Judge Wu is a former LA County Superior Court judge who
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received LA County payments. The case concerns a Writ of Habeas Corpus petition.
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Magistrate Judge Carla Woehrle and Judge Walter denied the writ and Judge Walter denied the Request for Certificate of Appealability. The Ninth Circuit granted the Certificate on the issue of whether the judge (LA County Superior Court Judge David P. Yaffe [who received payments from LA County while making orders in favor of LA County, then sat in judgment of his own
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orders]) should have recused himself.
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The case is presently before the Ninth Circuit (where Fine awaits the ruling on his unopposed Emergency Motion to Immediately Grant Writ of Habeas Corpus Based Upon Opening Brief), Case No. 09-56073. The actions of the District Court are questionable in that Respondent Sheriff did not file an answer. The LA County Superior Court filed a “limited” response stating Fine
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was incarcerated solely to “coerce” him to answer questions. They did not file an answer and did not seek to intervene.
Respondent Sheriff’s Motion to
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Dismiss or in the Alternative Direct Real Parties in Interest to Respond to the Petition was denied as moot by Judge Walter.
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Here, Judge Wright is being asked to decide if Judge Collins should recuse herself from the disbarment proceeding. The disbarment proceeding
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involves LA County payments to LA Superior Court judges. These payments have been held to be unconstitutional under Article VI, Section 19, of the
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California Constitution under Sturgeon, supra.
These payments have been
acknowledged to be criminal under Senate Bill SBX2-11.
Judge Wright
received these payments and received the retroactive immunity under SBX2-11, which he still has.
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Although his “official act” will be to decide whether Judge Collins, whose husband is the Dental Director of LA County’s Department of Human Relations
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or Resources and thereby derives part of her family income from LA County, should decide the disbarment involving LA County, the real issue is whether he can decide a case where LA County is the “Real Party In Interest”. LA County is paying Judge Collins’ family. LA County has paid Judge Wright. LA County has made the criminal payments which Fine challenged in the Federal civil rights suits which caused his disbarment. As a matter of note,
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the “complaining witness” in the disbarment case was LA County Superior Court Commissioner Bruce E. Mitchell, a defendant in the Silva case, who
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received the LA County payments. He was assigned to the LA County Superior Court “eminent domain” and “class action” departments where he sat as a “judge pro tem”. He also initiated and held Fine in contempt in 2001. Such judgment
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was voided and annulled in 2002 after the U.S. District Court issued an Order to Show Cause re an issuance of a writ of habeas corpus without further hearing.
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In 2003, he initiated another contempt proceeding.
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Such proceeding
became void when the Judge (Czuleger), in 2006, did not respond to a disqualification alleging fraudulent actions between Mitchell and him from 2003 through 2006, including but not limited to Mitchell fraudulently claiming to be a “temporary judge” in the case of DeFlores, et al, v. EHR, et al, after the
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judgment and voiding and annulling the September 24, 2001, contempt order on August 21, 2002, and Mitchell approving the taking of $80,000 out of the
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DeFlores class settlement fund to purchase all of the claims that Fine had against Mitchell and “all other judicial officers” in violation of the Final Judgment in the case.
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Under the holdings of Tumey, Monroeville, Lavoie and Caperton, Judge
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Wright must be recused.
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The actions of Judges Collins, Wright, Matz, Walter and Magistrate Judge Woehrle show an entrenched defense of aberrant judicial conduct at the expense
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of constitutional due process. Fine presently has an unopposed Petition for Writ of Certiorari before the U.S. Supreme Court (Case No. 08-1573) seeking to have the Court take the case relating to his disbarment. The Ninth Circuit, in Case No. 09-80130, recently
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stayed disciplinary proceedings based upon the California disbarment on the
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grounds that the issues in the disbarment and the habeas corpus appeal, Case No. 09-56073, overlap. A Motion to Set Aside the District Court disbarment and follow the Ninth Circuit is pending in the District Court. It is respectfully submitted that a judge who did not have a financial interest with LA County, in contrast to Judge Collins, would have stayed the District Court disbarment proceeding in the first instance.
It is further
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respectfully submitted that a judge who did not have a financial interest with LA County, in contrast to Judge Wright, would have recused Judge Collins.
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Judge Matz, from the outset, ignored the claim that the LA County payments violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution, ignored the violations of the California Code of Judicial Ethics set forth in the Lewin and Silva complaints, and basically rejected the due process violations with minimal
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comment.
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His abusive language about “retaliating against judges”, which itself is a non-sequitur, demonstrated an attitude that the unconstitutional and known-tobe-criminal conduct of the judges shall be protected at all costs, even if it means the deprivation of the right to due process for their “victims” appearing in their courts.
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This theme was carried further by Magistrate Judge Woehrle and Judge Walter, who exercised it in situations where opposition did not exist. In Fine v. State Bar of California, et al, Magistrate Judge Woehrle held the Motion to Dismiss for almost ten months, until after the State Bar case was over. She then dismissed the case on abstention grounds. Judge Walter approved. A Motion to
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Set Aside the Judgment was filed. The Motion was not opposed. The Motion was denied. The issue in the dismissal was whether the California Supreme
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Court justices were biased. Four of the six California Supreme Court justices who denied Fine’s Petition for Review in the disbarment case had received payments from counties while they were Superior Court judges. These were
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Chin, Corrigan, Kennard and Moreno. Two of the justices were on the Judicial Council of California that wrote Senate Bill SBX2-11. These were Chief Justice
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George and Justice Baxter.
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Not only were these justices biased, but they would be judging their own actions and interests. It is well established that “no man can be a judge in his own case” and “no man is permitted to try cases where he has an interest in the outcome.” In Re Murchison, 349 U.S. 133, 136 (1955).
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The same situation occurred in Fine v. Sheriff of Los Angeles County, supra. No answers to the Petition were filed. Judge Yaffe admitted at trial,
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where he was both judge and a witness, that he received payments from LA County, that he did not report the payments on his Form 700 Statement of Financial Interests, that he did not use the money in his political campaigns, that he did not have a written employment agreement arrangement with LA County, and that he could not remember any case that he decided against LA County in
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the last five years other than a decision regarding “dirt” in the underlying case of the contempt proceeding. (See Case No. CV 09-1914 JFW(CW), Dkt. # 1,
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Reporter’s Transcript December 22, 2008.) The failure to answer and the Supreme Court holdings did not deter Magistrate Judge Woehrle and Judge Walter from denying the Writ.
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Conclusion
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The omitted facts mandate reconsideration and recusal. The history of the District Court shows that the judges have denied due process on a consistent
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basis when faced with LA County payments to LA County Superior Court judges.
The reasons are either the District Court judges were financially
involved with LA County such as Judges Collins and Wright, or they were
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determined to protect the LA County judges even if it meant trampling the due
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process clause and the rights of others, such as Judges Matz and Walter and Magistrate Judge Woehrle.
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Now is the time to stop the trampling of due process; recuse Judge
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Wright; recuse Judge Collins; and follow the precedent of the Ninth Circuit, as the District Court is bound to do, and stay the disbarment.
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Finally, the Court is respectfully reminded that, although the Court
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disclosed that Fine appeared before the Court, the Court did not disclose that the
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Court was quoted giving favorable comments about Judge Collins in the same Los Angeles Times article that disclosed that Judge Collins’ husband, Tim Collins, worked for LA County.
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This familiarity may have influenced the Court’s objectivity in this matter
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as demonstrated by the irrelevant remarks that Fine was not a lawyer in the Sturgeon case. The extension of that argument is that a precedent only matters if
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“you” were the “lawyer” who fought the case. The absurdity of this argument is self-evident, and clearly beneath the extreme intellectual capacity of the Court. /// /// ///
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///
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1
Dated this _____ day of September, 2009
Respectfully submitted,
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BY: ____________________________ RICHARD I. FINE, In Pro Per
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PROOF OF SERVICE
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STATE OF CALIFORNIA,
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COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES
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I am Fred Sottile. My address is 2691 E. Victoria Street, # 108, Rancho Dominguez, CA 90220. On September ____, 2009, I served the foregoing document described as “MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF THE DENIAL OF THE RECUSAL OF JUDGE OTIS WRIGHT” on interested parties in this action by depositing a true copy thereof, which was enclosed in a sealed envelope, with postage fully prepaid, in the United States Mail, addressed as follows:
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None: No Proof of Service on Order to Show Cause. No other parties identified within Order to Show Cause. No other parties identified in court docket on PACER.
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I certify and declare, under penalty of perjury under the laws of the United States of America and the State of California, that the foregoing is true and correct.
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Executed on this ______ day of September, 2009, at Rancho Dominguez, California.
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____________________________________ FRED SOTTILE
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RICHARD I. FINE c/o Men’s Central Jail Prisoner ID # 1824367 c/o Men’s Central Jail 441 Bauchet Street Los Angeles, CA 90012
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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT CENTRAL DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA, WESTERN DIVISION
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In the Disciplinary Matter of RICHARD ISAAC FINE
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California State Bar No.: 55259
Case No. MC-09-00129 ABC MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF THE DENIAL OF THE RECUSAL OF JUDGE OTIS WRIGHT
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REASONS FOR MOTION
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The reasons for the Motion are that Judge Snyder omitted to address the crucial facts that the Federal civil rights cases which formed the bases for Counts 15-22 of the State Bar’s Notice of Disciplinary Charges and conviction
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of “moral turpitude” on Counts 16, 18, 20 and 21-22 (considered together). Count 17 had been dismissed by the Hearing Department and reinstated by the
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Review Department sua sponte without notice or hearing (a Constitutional violation of due process) in violation of State Bar Rule of Procedure 305.
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Further, the State Bar did not appeal the dismissal. Count 15 was dismissed by the Hearing Department and not appealed, as was Count 19.
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Counts 15-17 related to the case of Los Angeles County Ass’n. of Environmental Health Inspectors v. Los Angeles County and Lewin, et al, 215 F.Supp.2nd 1071 (CDCal. 2002). The complaint alleged that the LA County payments to Los Angeles County (hereinafter “LA County”) Superior Court
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Judge Kurt Lewin violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution and the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
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The case of Sturgeon v. County of Los Angeles, 167 Cal.App.4th 630 (2008), filed in April 2006, two months after the State Bar filed its Notice of Disciplinary Charges, held that the LA County payments to LA County Superior Court judges violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution.
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U.S. Supreme Court cases showed the payments to be a denial of due
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process. These were the holdings of Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U.S. 510 (1927) – denial of due process for mayor/judge to sit as judge and be paid from fines he assesses in addition to salary when fines go into town treasury; Ward v. Monroeville, 109 U.S. 57 (1972) – denial of due process for mayor/judge to sit as judge without salary as judge and assess fines when fines go into town
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“Fisc.”; and Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Lavoie, 475 U.S. 813 (1986) – denial of due
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1 2 3 4 5 6
process for an Alabama Supreme Court justice to vote to uphold a punitive damages award against an insurance company for bad-faith refusal to pay a claim when he was the lead plaintiff in a nearly-identical lawsuit pending in Alabama’s lower courts. The U.S. Supreme Court stated in Lavoi, at page 825, that the proper constitutional inquiry is “whether sitting on the case then before
7 8 9
the Supreme Court of Alabama ‘“would offer a possible temptation to the average … judge to … lead him not to hold the balance nice, clear and true.”’”
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(quoting Monroeville, supra, at 60, in turn quoting Tumey, supra, at 532.) Judge Matz of the District Court did not address these issues in Lewin, supra. He wrongly held under the Rooker-Feldman Doctrine that cases cannot proceed in both State and Federal courts. He also violated the doctrine that a
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case should not be dismissed without leave to amend unless there is no opportunity to amend. In the Lewin case, the LA County Superior Court was
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named as a party. After the remittitur of the Sturgeon case, the LA County Superior Court intervened as a “necessary party”.
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Fine moved to amend the complaint in the Lewin case. Such motion was the basis for Count 16’s conviction for “moral turpitude”.
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Counts 18-19 involve the case of Silva v. County of Los Angeles,
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Chalfant, Mitchell, Doi Todd, Boren and Nott, 215 F.Supp.2d 1079 (CDCal.
-3-
1 2 3 4 5 6
2002). The complaint alleged that the LA County payments to judicial officers in LA County violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution and the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, sought approval of a defendant’s class of the judicial officers who received such payments, and injunctive relief to stop such payments to all judicial officers before whom LA
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County may appear as a party.
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As with the Lewin case, the theory of the case was well founded. Judge Matz made the gratuitous statement, without basis, that the suit was brought to “retaliate against judges”.
Given the holdings in Sturgeon, supra, and the
Supreme Court cases of Tumey, Monroeville, Lavoie and the recent case of Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co., Inc., 566 U.S. ___ (2009) decided June 8,
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2009 – due process violated by a $3-million contribution to the campaign committee of a candidate for the Supreme Court of West Virginia by the
19 20 21 22 23 24
executive of a company who may have a case before such court, such comment was both incorrect and libelous. Such comment was carried through to the State Bar disbarment proceedings and became the basis to find Fine guilty of “moral turpitude” under Counts 18-19 for filing a frivolous lawsuit, i.e., the Silva case.
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As shown above, the Silva case was meritorious under Sturgeon, supra, Tumey, Monroeville, Lavoie and Caperton. The LA County payments to the LA
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1 2 3 4 5 6
County Superior Court judges and court commissioners who regularly sat as “temporary judges” were 27% of their state salary paid to them by LA County in addition to their state salary and state compensation. For example, in the year 2007, according to the Sturgeon case, a LA County Superior Court judge had a state salary of $178,800 plus benefits, and received an additional $46,300 from
7 8
LA County.
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Counts 20-22 related to the case of Fine v. Mitchell, et al, seeking injunctive relief against judges who had taken payments from LA County; LA County Superior Court Commissioner Bruce E. Mitchell, who was a defendant in the Silva suit (who had taken payments from LA County while he presided as a “temporary judge” in the “eminent domain” and “class action” departments of
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the LA County Superior Court; and others. The State Bar linked this suit to the Lewin and Silva suits and held it to be frivolous as it sought the same result and
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found Fine guilty of “moral turpitude”. The Federal Court had made the error of dismissing the case under the Rooker-Feldman Doctrine and denied a motion to amend the complaint after it had dismissed another cases entitled Fine v. Czuleger on the ground that it should have been brought as part of Fine v. Mitchell. The judge in both cases was Judge Taylor, who retired thereafter.
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Recusal Is Mandatory
1 2 3 4 5 6
As shown by the test set forth in Lavoie, supra, Judge Wright cannot “hold the balance nice, clear and true.” He has received payments from LA County. Under Senate Bill SBX2-11, the payments have now been acknowledged to be criminal and he has been given retroactive immunity from criminal prosecution,
7 8 9
civil liability and disciplinary action (the latter if he were still sitting as a LA County Superior Court judge).
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Knowing these facts, Judge Wright should have recused himself. Other Central District judges in similar positions did exactly that. Judge Dale Fisher, in the case of Fine v. State Bar of California, et al, USDC Case No. CV-082906, which sought to have the California moral turpitude and involuntary
16 17 18
enrollment statutes declared unconstitutional, recused herself the day after Fine made a motion for her recusal. She is a former LA County Superior Court judge
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who received LA County payments.
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Judge George Wu recused himself in Fine v. Sheriff of Los Angeles County, USDC Case No. CV-09-1914. He did so immediately upon its being assigned to him. Judge Wu is a former LA County Superior Court judge who
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received LA County payments. The case concerns a Writ of Habeas Corpus petition.
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-6-
1 2 3 4 5 6
Magistrate Judge Carla Woehrle and Judge Walter denied the writ and Judge Walter denied the Request for Certificate of Appealability. The Ninth Circuit granted the Certificate on the issue of whether the judge (LA County Superior Court Judge David P. Yaffe [who received payments from LA County while making orders in favor of LA County, then sat in judgment of his own
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orders]) should have recused himself.
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The case is presently before the Ninth Circuit (where Fine awaits the ruling on his unopposed Emergency Motion to Immediately Grant Writ of Habeas Corpus Based Upon Opening Brief), Case No. 09-56073. The actions of the District Court are questionable in that Respondent Sheriff did not file an answer. The LA County Superior Court filed a “limited” response stating Fine
16 17 18
was incarcerated solely to “coerce” him to answer questions. They did not file an answer and did not seek to intervene.
Respondent Sheriff’s Motion to
19 20 21
Dismiss or in the Alternative Direct Real Parties in Interest to Respond to the Petition was denied as moot by Judge Walter.
22 23 24
Here, Judge Wright is being asked to decide if Judge Collins should recuse herself from the disbarment proceeding. The disbarment proceeding
25 26 27
involves LA County payments to LA Superior Court judges. These payments have been held to be unconstitutional under Article VI, Section 19, of the
28
-7-
1 2 3 4 5
California Constitution under Sturgeon, supra.
These payments have been
acknowledged to be criminal under Senate Bill SBX2-11.
Judge Wright
received these payments and received the retroactive immunity under SBX2-11, which he still has.
6 7 8
Although his “official act” will be to decide whether Judge Collins, whose husband is the Dental Director of LA County’s Department of Human Relations
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
or Resources and thereby derives part of her family income from LA County, should decide the disbarment involving LA County, the real issue is whether he can decide a case where LA County is the “Real Party In Interest”. LA County is paying Judge Collins’ family. LA County has paid Judge Wright. LA County has made the criminal payments which Fine challenged in the Federal civil rights suits which caused his disbarment. As a matter of note,
18 19 20
the “complaining witness” in the disbarment case was LA County Superior Court Commissioner Bruce E. Mitchell, a defendant in the Silva case, who
21 22 23 24
received the LA County payments. He was assigned to the LA County Superior Court “eminent domain” and “class action” departments where he sat as a “judge pro tem”. He also initiated and held Fine in contempt in 2001. Such judgment
25 26 27
was voided and annulled in 2002 after the U.S. District Court issued an Order to Show Cause re an issuance of a writ of habeas corpus without further hearing.
28
-8-
In 2003, he initiated another contempt proceeding.
1 2 3 4 5 6
Such proceeding
became void when the Judge (Czuleger), in 2006, did not respond to a disqualification alleging fraudulent actions between Mitchell and him from 2003 through 2006, including but not limited to Mitchell fraudulently claiming to be a “temporary judge” in the case of DeFlores, et al, v. EHR, et al, after the
7 8 9
judgment and voiding and annulling the September 24, 2001, contempt order on August 21, 2002, and Mitchell approving the taking of $80,000 out of the
10 11 12 13
DeFlores class settlement fund to purchase all of the claims that Fine had against Mitchell and “all other judicial officers” in violation of the Final Judgment in the case.
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Under the holdings of Tumey, Monroeville, Lavoie and Caperton, Judge
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Wright must be recused.
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The actions of Judges Collins, Wright, Matz, Walter and Magistrate Judge Woehrle show an entrenched defense of aberrant judicial conduct at the expense
21 22 23 24 25 26
of constitutional due process. Fine presently has an unopposed Petition for Writ of Certiorari before the U.S. Supreme Court (Case No. 08-1573) seeking to have the Court take the case relating to his disbarment. The Ninth Circuit, in Case No. 09-80130, recently
27 28
stayed disciplinary proceedings based upon the California disbarment on the
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grounds that the issues in the disbarment and the habeas corpus appeal, Case No. 09-56073, overlap. A Motion to Set Aside the District Court disbarment and follow the Ninth Circuit is pending in the District Court. It is respectfully submitted that a judge who did not have a financial interest with LA County, in contrast to Judge Collins, would have stayed the District Court disbarment proceeding in the first instance.
It is further
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respectfully submitted that a judge who did not have a financial interest with LA County, in contrast to Judge Wright, would have recused Judge Collins.
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Judge Matz, from the outset, ignored the claim that the LA County payments violated Article VI, Section 19, of the California Constitution, ignored the violations of the California Code of Judicial Ethics set forth in the Lewin and Silva complaints, and basically rejected the due process violations with minimal
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comment.
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His abusive language about “retaliating against judges”, which itself is a non-sequitur, demonstrated an attitude that the unconstitutional and known-tobe-criminal conduct of the judges shall be protected at all costs, even if it means the deprivation of the right to due process for their “victims” appearing in their courts.
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This theme was carried further by Magistrate Judge Woehrle and Judge Walter, who exercised it in situations where opposition did not exist. In Fine v. State Bar of California, et al, Magistrate Judge Woehrle held the Motion to Dismiss for almost ten months, until after the State Bar case was over. She then dismissed the case on abstention grounds. Judge Walter approved. A Motion to
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Set Aside the Judgment was filed. The Motion was not opposed. The Motion was denied. The issue in the dismissal was whether the California Supreme
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Court justices were biased. Four of the six California Supreme Court justices who denied Fine’s Petition for Review in the disbarment case had received payments from counties while they were Superior Court judges. These were
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Chin, Corrigan, Kennard and Moreno. Two of the justices were on the Judicial Council of California that wrote Senate Bill SBX2-11. These were Chief Justice
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George and Justice Baxter.
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Not only were these justices biased, but they would be judging their own actions and interests. It is well established that “no man can be a judge in his own case” and “no man is permitted to try cases where he has an interest in the outcome.” In Re Murchison, 349 U.S. 133, 136 (1955).
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The same situation occurred in Fine v. Sheriff of Los Angeles County, supra. No answers to the Petition were filed. Judge Yaffe admitted at trial,
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where he was both judge and a witness, that he received payments from LA County, that he did not report the payments on his Form 700 Statement of Financial Interests, that he did not use the money in his political campaigns, that he did not have a written employment agreement arrangement with LA County, and that he could not remember any case that he decided against LA County in
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the last five years other than a decision regarding “dirt” in the underlying case of the contempt proceeding. (See Case No. CV 09-1914 JFW(CW), Dkt. # 1,
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Reporter’s Transcript December 22, 2008.) The failure to answer and the Supreme Court holdings did not deter Magistrate Judge Woehrle and Judge Walter from denying the Writ.
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Conclusion
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The omitted facts mandate reconsideration and recusal. The history of the District Court shows that the judges have denied due process on a consistent
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basis when faced with LA County payments to LA County Superior Court judges.
The reasons are either the District Court judges were financially
involved with LA County such as Judges Collins and Wright, or they were
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determined to protect the LA County judges even if it meant trampling the due
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process clause and the rights of others, such as Judges Matz and Walter and Magistrate Judge Woehrle.
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Now is the time to stop the trampling of due process; recuse Judge
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Wright; recuse Judge Collins; and follow the precedent of the Ninth Circuit, as the District Court is bound to do, and stay the disbarment.
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Finally, the Court is respectfully reminded that, although the Court
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disclosed that Fine appeared before the Court, the Court did not disclose that the
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Court was quoted giving favorable comments about Judge Collins in the same Los Angeles Times article that disclosed that Judge Collins’ husband, Tim Collins, worked for LA County.
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This familiarity may have influenced the Court’s objectivity in this matter
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as demonstrated by the irrelevant remarks that Fine was not a lawyer in the Sturgeon case. The extension of that argument is that a precedent only matters if
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“you” were the “lawyer” who fought the case. The absurdity of this argument is self-evident, and clearly beneath the extreme intellectual capacity of the Court. /// /// ///
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///
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1
Dated this _____ day of September, 2009
Respectfully submitted,
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BY: ____________________________ RICHARD I. FINE, In Pro Per
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PROOF OF SERVICE
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STATE OF CALIFORNIA,
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COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES
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I am Fred Sottile. My address is 2691 E. Victoria Street, # 108, Rancho Dominguez, CA 90220. On September ____, 2009, I served the foregoing document described as “MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION OF THE DENIAL OF THE RECUSAL OF JUDGE OTIS WRIGHT” on interested parties in this action by depositing a true copy thereof, which was enclosed in a sealed envelope, with postage fully prepaid, in the United States Mail, addressed as follows:
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None: No Proof of Service on Order to Show Cause. No other parties identified within Order to Show Cause. No other parties identified in court docket on PACER.
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I certify and declare, under penalty of perjury under the laws of the United States of America and the State of California, that the foregoing is true and correct.
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Executed on this ______ day of September, 2009, at Rancho Dominguez, California.
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____________________________________ FRED SOTTILE
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