J.A.I.L. News Journal
______________________________________________________
Los Angeles, California
December 22, 2022
______________________________________________________
The Inherent
Right of ALL People to Alter or Reform Abusive
Government
The Right
Upon Which All Other Rights
Depend
The
Torchbearer for J.A.I.L. Nationally - Support
Them!
P.O. Box
412, Tea, S.D. 57064 - (605)
231-1418
J.A.I.L.'s Effect
On
Judicial
Immunity
By Barbie, ACIC, National J.A.I.L.
Administration
[email protected]
The distraction
potential is nothing short of chaotic. Consider, for
example, there are two million people in America's prisons right now.
How many of them think they got a fair shake from the
judge? How about all the people that lose in civil
lawsuits every day? .... The bottom line is, do we want our
judges deciding cases in the courtroom or being distracted
by all the time they have to spend as defendants? There's
probably enough litigation in this country already. We'll see what the
people of South Dakota have to say about it. --Kendall Coffey, Fmr.
U.S. Attorney [emphasis
added]
Such an amendment would
dangerously undermine the independence of the
judiciary, and could lead to the harassment of judges,
according to Tom Barnett, Secretary-Treasurer of the State Bar of South
Dakota. Hopefully, the good citizens of
South Dakota will realize a truly independent judiciary is
essential to a fair civil and criminal justice system
and vote down the proposal. --ADR
Institute (arbitrator training) [emphasis
added]
Does the above
sound familiar? Those portions are taken from two internet articles
regarding the South Dakota J.A.I.L. Amendment, included below. In my
report in JNJ 12/13/05 titled "An Open Letter to News
Reporters"
1. That
J.A.I.L. will interfere with the independence of the judiciary.
(It will actually enforce judicial independence by making
judges accountable under
law).
2. That J.A.I.L.
will allow judges to be sued by litigants who "didn't like" the
decision and felt they "didn't get a fair shake."
(J.A.I.L. enforces law only, not decisions or the feelings
of litigants).
3. That J.A.I.L.
isn't needed in a state with little or no judicial corruption.
(The amount of corruption is not relevant-- J.A.I.L. is
needed as a guard to assure the protection of the People's rights by
the judiciary).
4. That
imprisoned inmates will be allowed to serve on the Special Grand Jury.
(Imprisonment is listed as an exception to qualification of
jurors).
Those lies will
continue to be reported by newspapers, on television interviews such as
the one below, and by internet articles such as the ADR article below.
One thing to always note when reading the J.A.I.L.-bashing articles, is
who is making the false claims. It will almost always be a member of the
legal fraternity, such as the former U.S. Attorney, and the editor of the
legal arbitration institute, in the below articles. However, some members
of the legal fraternity realize what a hoax it is. See "A 50-Year
Career Lawyer Speaks Out" http://www.jail4judges.org/JNJ_Library/2005/2005-11-29A.html
where former judge
John F. Molloy says: When a lawyer puts
on a robe and takes the bench, he
or she is called a judge. But in reality, when judges look down from the bench they are
lawyers looking upon fellow members
of their fraternity. In any other
area of the free-enterprise
system,
this would be
seen as a conflict of interest. By the time I ended my 50-year career as
a trial attorney, judge
and president of southern Arizona's largest law firm,
I no longer had confidence in the legal
fraternity
I had
participated in and, yes, profited from. --John F.
Molloy
So, Mr. Coffey, and
the editor of ADR, --take a bow. The ADR even cites one of
the brethren, Thomas Barnett of the South Dakota State Bar, to continue
to spread his lies as well.
J.A.I.L.
On Judicial Immunity
Although I didn't
cover the judicial immunity issue among the four in my JNJ of 12/13/05
(cited above), I did discuss it extensively in "The Target For J.A.I.L. Is The Abuse
of Judicial Immunity For
Whomever It Is Applied" (JNJ
12/7/05)
http://www.jail4judges.org/JNJ_Library/2005/2005-12-07A.html.
I respectfully request Mr. Kendall Coffey and his interviewer Fredricka
Whitfield, as well as the editor of the ADR item, to read that
article. As it states, J.A.I.L. is involved only with the
abuse of judicial immunity as stated in the
Preamble. Read it, Mr. Coffey, et al., as well as the entire
amendment.
And
that abuse covers only the violations listed in the amendment,
i.e.,
--any deliberate
violation of law;
--fraud or
conspiracy;
--intentional
violation of due process of law;
--deliberate
disregard of material facts;
--judicial acts
without jurisdiction;
--blocking of a
lawful conclusion of a case;
--any deliberate
violation of the Constitutions of South Dakota or the United
States.
So, Mr. Coffey, et
al.,
-
Are judges to be
immune from responsibility for committing those
acts?
-
Are judges and
related officials above the
law?
-
Are only judges
entitled to protection from liability for violations of law,
or
-
Are the People
entitled to protection from miscreant
judges?
It would have been
nice if Ms. Whitfield asked you those
questions. What would your answers be, Mr. Coffey?? I know the
Legal Fraternity thinks it is above the
law. But I'm sure the South Dakota voters think
otherwise!
-Barbie-
Two pieces of propaganda
follow:
Aired November 17,
2005
FREDRICKA
WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR:
Kendall Coffey, I want to bring you into
this equation. Maybe you can help answer the question of why even have
judicial immunity?
KENDALL COFFEY, FMR. U.S. ATTORNEY: Well, this goes all the way back to
merry old England, Fredricka. It's one of the most basic things in the
system. In this country, it was established right after the Civil War in
connection with the trial of one of the alleged accomplices in the
assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
Why have it? Because we've got to have judges focus on their work in a
courtroom as judges, not being hauled into a courtroom as defendants, not
being threatened by the possibility of a lawsuit.
The distraction potential is nothing short of chaotic. Consider, for
example, there are two million people in America's prisons right now. How
many of them think they got a fair shake from the judge? How about all
the people that lose in civil lawsuits every day?
So if there's anything that would increase moral litigation, subject us
to avalanches and flood tides beyond imagination, it's opening the door
to suing judges whenever we disagree with what they do.
WHITFIELD: Is not the appellate court system in place in which to try to
challenge, perhaps, a judgment coming from a case you're involved in?
COFFEY: Absolutely. And in fact, everyone has an absolute right to go to
the appeals court, different judges who had nothing to do with the trial
court process, to get a fair shake if there had been significant
mistakes. One of the realities is people in this country do not have a
good feeling or understanding of what happens in the appeals process.
There aren't reality or daytime TV shows that talk about appellate
courts. And I think if there was a better understanding of the vital role
of appellate courts, there might be a recognition that we don't really
need to solve any frustrations with the legal system by declaring open
season on our judges.
WHITFIELD: So being able to sue a judge might obviate the need altogether
to even have an appellate courts?
COFFEY: Well, originally, before you had appellate courts, going back
centuries, that's when they allowed people to sue judges. Once you have
appellate judges, very responsible, different, independent from the trial
court situation, you've got a real safeguard. And, of course, in many
cases you go beyond the intermediate appellate court and you can go all
the way to a state or a federal supreme court.
The bottom line is, do we want our judges deciding cases in the courtroom
or being distracted by all the time they have to spend as defendants?
There's probably enough litigation in this country already. We'll see
what the people of South Dakota have to say about it.
WHITFIELD: Where do you see this potential going potentially in South
Dakota?
COFFEY: Well, if they've got enough signatures, it could get on the
ballot. Now, it's a pretty convoluted proposal. And I can see all kinds
of legal challenges to the technical sufficiency of the proposal itself,
which, of course, would be decided by judges.
WHITFIELD: All right. Kendall Coffey, thank you so
much.
ADR = Appropriate Dispute
Resolution
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A petition with over 46,000 signatures of South Dakotans
seeks to put a proposed constitutional amendment on the
November 2006 ballot in South Dakota. The proposed amendment
would allow lawsuits against judges - and possibly arbitrators
- for alleged abuse of authority. Bill Stegmeier, a South Dakota businessman, drafted the
proposal which contains 13,000 more signatures than necessary
to place the measure on the ballot.
If approved, this amendment would change the well settled law
that a judge enjoys absolute civil immunity from suit so long
as the contested action was judicial in nature and was not
taken in the complete absence of jurisdiction. See Stump v. Sparkman, 435 U.S. 349,
356-57 (1978)(Westlaw
registration required); Bradley v. Fisher, 80 U.S. 335, 347
(1872)(Westlaw
registration required) (stating that "[a] judge shall be
free to act upon his own convictions without apprehension of
personal consequence to himself"). The amendment would
eliminate immunity in cases involving deliberate violations of
the law, deliberate violations of constitutional rights, or
deliberate disregard of the facts.
The
proposed amendment would apply only to state judges in South
Dakota; it would not apply to federal judges. It is possible
the law could directly affect arbitrators, however.
Judicial immunity has been extended
to arbitrators based on the idea that an arbitrator's role is
"functionally equivalent" to the role of a judge, with a
corresponding need to protect the process from reprisals by
dissatisfied parties. See Galuska v. N.Y. Stock Exch., 2000 WL
347851 (7th Cir. Apr. 3, 2000)(Westlaw
registration required); New England Cleaning Servs. v. Am. Arbitration
Ass'n, 199 F.3d 542, 545 (1st Cir. 1999)(Westlaw
registration required); Olson v. Nat'l Ass'n of Sec. Dealers,
85 F.3d 381, 382 (8th Cir. 1996)(Westlaw
registration required).
While he
has never personally had a bad experience in court, Stegmeier
said the amendment could help curb abuses he has heard about
across the country. According to Stegmeier, the current system
does not provide an "adequate way to hold a given judge
accountable for improper behavior or to prevent them from
judicial misconduct." Promoters of the amendment were
especially motivated by the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision
allowing homes to be seized for private development. See
Kelo v. City of New London,
Conn.,
125 S. Ct. 2655 (2005)(Westlaw
registration required).
Such an
amendment would dangerously undermine the independence of the
judiciary, and could lead to the harassment of judges,
according to Tom Barnett, Secretary-Treasurer of the State Bar
of South Dakota.
Hopefully,
the good citizens of South Dakota will realize a truly
independent judiciary is essential to a fair civil and criminal
justice system and vote down the proposal.
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Arbitrators do act in a judicial capacity and
would be subject to J.A.I.L. if they claim to be covered by judicial
immunity.
The arbitrator acts as a
private judge in a closed and private court. Arbitrated disputes result
in a binding decision based on the evidence and testimony of all
parties provided at a hearing convened by the arbitrator.
They admit this in the
above text: Judicial immunity has been extended to arbitrators based on the
idea that an arbitrator's role is "functionally equivalent" to the role
of a judge, with a corresponding need to protect the process from
reprisals by dissatisfied parties. However, J.A.I.L. has nothing to do with
"reprisals by dissatisfied parties."
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